Featuring main characters who are senior citizens definitely makes novels attractive to readers, shall we say, of a certain age. Like me. With Mrs. Plansky, Spencer Quinn has created a main character who is not only a senior citizen (she qualified for Medicare six years ago), but she’s got some of the same aches and pains and elder-problems that we face. However, unlike some other older main characters in recent novels, Loretta Plansky had not been an assassin nor a CIA agent.
Mrs. Plansky and her late husband Norm made their modest fortune (she says she’s merely very comfortable) creating a knife that also toasted bread. She’s now living in Florida, playing tennis, getting used to her new hip, and dealing with her irascible father, who has taken up residence with her after he was kicked out of a residential facility.
In the first novel, “Mrs. Plansky’s Revenge,” we see Loretta’s pluck and determination. We also see her intelligence, as well as her sometimes-failing memory and her soft side. Now she’s back in Florida, and at the start of the novel she’s just won a doubles tournament with her handsome partner, Kev Dinardo. Then, the night of their win, she drives him home because it’s raining and he had ridden his bike to the club. In the driveway of his beautiful home, she sees his large yacht momentarily before she hears the sound of a huge explosion and the yacht is destroyed in a raging fire. Even the rain doesn’t dampen the flames. But Loretta is confused because while Kev says it was hit by lightning, she didn’t see any lightning strike, she just heard the loud boom when things exploded.
The next day, Kev is gone, his house empty. And when her father happens to mention that he connected Kev with her son, Jack, Loretta is concerned that she can’t get hold of Jack. Like Kev, his calls go straight to voicemail. So Loretta, being Loretta, starts to investigate. And she does a darn good job, too.
A little deep diving (literally into the ocean off Kev’s house), a little B & E, a lot of phone calls, and two plane flights are part of Mrs. Plansky’s rogue adventures. One plane flight is definitely more exciting— dare I say more deadly—than the other. Spanish sunken ships, crooks, craft beer, and a monstrous alligator named Fairbanks all inhabit this clever, delightful novel.
Mrs. Plansky never fails to entertain, and her admirable personality, her intrepid nature, and her ability to persevere are inspiring. Spencer Quinn’s narrative, with a narrator who shares Mrs. Plansky’s thoughts and emotions as beautifully as any first person narrative might, will be a tad familiar to those fans of his Chet and Bernie series. We can only hope that Mrs. Plansky’s adventures continue.
This review was first posted on Bookreporter.com.