DECK THE HALLS by Mary Higgins Clark and her daughter, Carol Higgins Clark is their first collaboration where they mix two of their famous detectives.
Alvirah Meehan and Regan Reilly, strong characters in their own series of books, are now thrown together to solve another crime taken place on the streets of New York. This time, the crime is closer, much closer than either woman would like.
Regan’s father has been kidnapped!
Regan Reilly, a Private Investigator, planned on a holiday vacation with her parents. They were to leave her parents New York apartment and fly to Hawaii for a week of sun and fun.
Being an independent young woman, she has found her nitch in the world by thinking for herself and not being intimidated by others in order to get the job done!
Now, she’s looking forward to a pleasant Christmas holiday in Hawaii with her parents.
However, before Regan leaves her California home, she receives a call from her father saying Nora, Regan’s mother and renown author, has tripped and broken her leg. Their Hawaii vacation won’t happen.
Instead of packing for a warm vacation, Regan, repacks her bags to spend a chilly week with her parents in New York.
Meanwhile, Alvirah Meehan spends the day happily decorating her plush Manhattan apartment - quite a contrast to the Queens home she once owned.
At one time, Alvirah was just a simple housewife doing menial jobs to make ends meet. Because money was hard to come by, her favorite past time was probing into the affairs of others. One night changed her life forever. She won the New York State Lottery – a whopping sum of 40 million dollars!
Her new-found wealth didn’t faze Alvirah. On the contrary, she feels it just offers the opportunity to help others more often.
Now, being able to quit her jobs, she can do what she enjoys most, and this to find more people into whose lives she can become involved.
As her memory takes her back to the night she and her husband won the lottery, she sighs thinking how wonderful life is. She also sighs thinking that Christmas is too wonderful for anyone to suffer with a toothache. Because her husband is suffering so badly, she calls and makes an appointment with their dentist for emergency care.
The day is Thursday, December 22nd.
While Alvirah is busying herself with her many memories and decorations, Regan is busy looking for her father, Luke. No one has heard from him in hours. It’s not like him to not attend the funeral of a prominent citizen - especially since Luke is the Funeral Director. His absence doesn’t go unnoticed.
As Regan makes call after call trying to find her father, her mother mentions that he had a dentist’s appointment. Perhaps he’s on his way there. Regan decided to visit the office and check things out.
Meanwhile at the dentist’s office, Alvirah is waiting for husband to recover from the extracted tooth so they can begin their journey home. As she waits, she meets Regan and realizes she’s the daughter of her favorite author. She insists on making herself known.
Alvirah listens as Regan inquires about her father. The dentist hasn’t heard from him either.
Worry sets in as Regan decides to head back to her parents apartment. She figures that if anything happened, that’s where her father would call. Knowing that their apartments aren’t far from each other, Alvirah offers her a ride.
As they reach the front door of the apartment building, Regan rushes out anticipating a call from her father. She doesn’t notice that her cell-phone has slipped from her pocket. Regan rushes toward the tall, heavy doors as her cell-phone rings.
Thinking it might be the call Regan’s been waiting for, Alvirah answers it and hastily asks the caller to hang on while she gets Regan.
As Regan listens to the phone message, she realizes it’s not her father. The call is from the man who kidnapped him (and his driver, Rosita) and is demanding one million dollars in ransom.
The race is on! Nora and Regan must get one million dollars in cash by the next night or they’ll never see Luke and Rosita again. Regan has been warned not to notify the police but Alvirah has a plan. She calls her old friend, Jack Reilly (no relation), a NYC detective and Captain of the Major Case Squad.
Regan and her mother, Nora inform Jack that getting won’t be a problem. They’ll pay whatever ransom is demanded - just as long as they get Luke and Rosita back.
Jack insists on recruiting the help of other local law enforcement personnel - just enough manpower to help but not enough to hinder the ransom drop-off.
It’s all set. Regan is told where to leave the satchel of money, but now a new problem exists.
The kidnapper has an accomplice – a bumbling, unsophisticated young man who talks too much and thinks too little. His clumsiness causes him to lose the initial ransom payment and now the kidnapper must ask for another.
While, neither kidnapper actually anticipated harming Luke and Rosita, their ineptness at crime puts the lives of our victims in jeopardy.
They’ve chained Luke and Rosita inside an old wooden boat that is slowly taking on water - the cold, freezing water from Hudson River!
The few times the kidnappers allowed Luke to briefly speak with Regan, he tried dropping a few clues as to his location. Yet, she couldn’t put them together.
Can Jack, with his experience in solving crime, Regan with her knowledge of investigating procedures and lovable, Alvirah solve this crime and get Luke and Rosita back before the clumsiness of their kidnappers causes their deaths?
Mary Higgins Clark and her daughter, Carol have achieved what other authors only dream about. They have successfully blended with each other in this wonderful combination of sleuths as they entwine their lives to solve the crime.
True, there are few twists and turns in the novel. The ending is predictable but it’s the style of writing that makes this book a great one to read. Mary Higgins Clark knows how to pull her characters together and make them work in a tight setting. She knows how to show their strengths and weaknesses without making them overbearing or hard to understand.
Her talent has rubbed off well on her daughter, Carol. Putting their heads together, they’ve written one book - something you can be sure will be a delightful, worth-reading novel.
Being a fan of Mary Higgins Clark, I looked forward to reading this book since my mom raved so much about it. Clark’s writing makes it easy for you to become involved with each of her characters, especially Alvirah.
Most of us can relate to Alvirah who spends her life working just to get buy but always hopes for the big win.
As we plod along the investigative routes that Alvirah takes in helping to solve crimes, I know I can’t help but wonder:::
If I won the lottery, would I do the same?
While I anticipated the ending, it was not so much how the book ended but how the pieces fell together that kept my interest.
I admit that the kidnappers are identified in the beginning of the story, but ironically, that only adds to this often tongue-in-cheek novel.
I found DECK THE HALLS to be filled with a certain amount of mystery often laced with humor but filled with compassion.
Although the ending is, as I said predictable, the storyline itself is a fast-paced story that doesn’t stop with the end of one chapter.
One chapter leads you right into the next - and the next!
DECK THE HALLS is a book that I would actually enjoy reading a second time.
DECK THE HALLS is a must read for any time of the year.