Doppelganger
Laura Resnick
Daw, Jan 2010, $7.99
ISBN: 9780756405953

New York actress Esther Diamond waits for her next gig, but brings in needed cash while resting between roles as a singing waitress at Bella Stella because the patrons when they are not killed are mobsters who everyone knows are the best tippers. As she shares Ben and Jerry with NYPD Irish-Cuban police detective Connor Lopez, the deceased gangsters suddenly return to life.

Connor leads the investigations into the dead firing guns with real ammo. At the same Eastern Standard Time, Esther and her unwise in the way of street magic but a guru with magic-Magic, Max the Magician and his crime fighting companion Nelli the saliva canine queen at her side, also makes inquiries on a slightly different plane than the cops as a gang war from beyond threaten the streets of Manhattan.

The sequel to Disappearing Nightly is an amusing urban fantasy starring a wonderful heroine surrounded by a horde of eccentrics, one straight cop, and one interfering matchmaking mom. The jocular story line is filled with a fast-paced frenzy from the first magical mugging until the last as Esther proves once again to be a reader’s best friend with her misadventures in Manhattan mystical mayhem.

Harriet Klausner