"Styx & Stone"

"Styx & Stone" is an Ellie Stone mystery - the first in a series written by James W. Ziskin - and is set in the year 1960.

Ellie Stone works for a newspaper - the New Holland Republic - where she ended up after her mother's death and her estrangement from her father.  When she receives a call to tell her that her father is in the hospital, she returns to New York City to stay at his apartment until he is well enough to come home.

However, when she arrives in New York, she learns (courtesy of Sergeant McKeever) that her father was the victim of an apparent burglary in his apartment and being bludgeoned over the head has him in the hospital in a coma.  On the same night her father was attacked another professor in the department where he worked was found dead in his apartment -- an apparent accident.

When Ellie questions Sergeant McKeever and some of the evidence that has been uncovered, she begins working on her own and with the Sergeant because she suspects murder and attempted murder is what they are really looking at.  In the meantime, a second attempt is made on her father's life in the hospital and convinces the Sergeant that she might have a point.

Some of the professorial and linguistic references were above my head at times but I enjoyed the way Ellie unraveled the mystery and helped the Sergeant solve the crimes.  I look forward to reading the second book in this series.  pazt