So, I’ve just recently had several bouts of anxiety that I’m not quite sure how to deal with.  I’m seeking help, b/c it’s annoying to deal with.  I’ve even started having random panic attacks which make every day life hard.  Luckily, they aren’t as severe as others, but still enough to disrupt life.  My anxiety mostly centers around travel, and in August I’m trying to head down to NYC for the Writer’s Digest Conference.  Everything is booked….and I was supposed to go last year….but that darn anxiety got the best of me.  So, here’s hoping that I can get my stuff together for a four day trip out of town.

Which, leads me to the book I want to talk about in this post.

Murder at the Flamingo by Rachel McMillan

Now, you might be saying to yourself….”what is Nicole talking about….this looks like a good old fashioned historical mystery, not some treatise on anxiety.”  And you’d be right.  It is a good old fashioned historical mystery (set in Boston no less!).  BUT it also depicts a character who suffers from anxiety and panic attacks as well.  And it doesn’t define him in the end, and he learns how to cope with the help of a sassy former debutante.

I get ahead of myself though.  Hamish DeLuca was a going to be a lawyer until a panic attack in the courtroom drove him from Toronto to Boston where his cousin was setting up the new Flamingo nightclub.  Regina Van Buren (yes, one of those Van Buren’s), Reggie to her friends, escaped a mundane life of high society in Connecticut to become the secretary for Hamish’s cousin.  She always wanted to be like the self-sufficient women she saw at the pictures, and this is the first step to her new life.  The office is located in the North End, with cannoli’s galore, and shady characters around every turn.

The Flamingo opens to great success, and becomes even more of a destination when a dead body is found in the club.  Hamish and Reggie think it’s murder, while everyone else wants to sweep it under the rug as a tragic accident.  Is it the mob?  Careless accident?  Jealous boyfriend?  Random gentlemen in the club?  The two decide to crack the case and on the way learn some surprising truths about themselves.

I enjoyed this immensely.  It was a great introduction to the characters and the city of Boston.  I can’t wait to follow the trail of the newly minted detectives in further books!