Overview

Travel agents may be a vanishing breed, but Sidney Marsh, a New York transplant from Mississippi, is holding her ground--at least on land. She is the tour leader on a cruise through Scandinavia to Russia for a group of eccentric senior citizens who call themselves the High Steppers. Sidney expects her days to be filled with long meals, shopping expeditions and visits to museums, churches and fjords. But this cruise is anything but routine. There is a killer on board, targeting the High Steppers and quite possibly herself. After the first suspicious death, the captain and his crew are grimly determined to carry on as usual. Disgusted with their inaction, Sidney decides to take matters into her own hands and launch her own investigation. She enlists the halfhearted help of her friend and business partner, the flamboyant and fun-loving Jay Wilson. Suspects abound. What about those two handsome young men who stay mysteriously aloof? One of them has his eye on Sidney. So does another passenger, far too charming and again too young to fit the High Stepper mold. Then there's Captain Vargos, the arrogant ladies' man whose plans to thwart Sidney's investigation might include seduction. Who is that crew member shadowing Sidney? Is the theater really haunted? Even the High Steppers themselves are not as predictable or harmless as they seem. The closer Sydney gets to the truth, the less she understands. Shore Excursion is the first book in a new mystery series featuring amateur sleuth Sidney Marsh.

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9781603818742

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Reviews

An appealing heroine tangles with murder and romantic interludes gone wrong in a tartly funny take-off on tour travel, with more twists than a conga line. Readers will be enthralled. --Carolyn Hart, author of the Death on Demand series

An appealing heroine tangles with murder and romantic interludes gone wrong in a tartly funny take-off on tour travel, with more twists than a conga line. Readers will be enthralled. --Carolyn Hart, author of the Death on Demand series Anyone who has been on a cruise ship will appreciate the behind-the-scenes look at what goes on in Shore Excursion, murders notwithstanding. Sidney Marsh is an engaging amateur sleuth and the mystery in which she finds herself is creatively devised and vividly drawn. (The international setting helps as does a diverse cast of suspects.) Readers will certainly welcome back Sidney on another tour. -Mysterious Reviews By Regis Schilken, BLOGCRITICS.ORG, Reprinted in the Seattle PI Published 8:40 pm, Friday, February 3, 2012 Beware all mystery writers. Marie Moore has now joined your genre with her well-told tale, Shore Excursion. This cleverly written mystery with its elaborate attention to detail will catch your imagination within a few pages. It might make you a bit leery about taking your next trip on a cruise ship, especially near Scandinavia and Russia. Miss Marsh is an experienced travel agent who has planned to cruise the North Sea with a group of elderly individuals that call themselves the High Steppers. Having finished initial preparations to leave with them from New York, she starts for her apartment on a weary afternoon with a creepy-crawly feeling that someone, possibly a homeless man, is following her. Next, we find her and the High Steppers in London where their bus' luggage compartment is sideswiped and dented by a box truck. All agree that the incident seemed more careless than not, maybe even a deliberate hit. After a short delay to check the integrity of High Steppers' belongings, the elderly group sets sail on the Rapture. This huge vessel carries 2,366 passengers. In the dead of night, Miss Marsh clearly hears the door handle to her cabin creak and turn, not once, but twice. Thankfully, the inside lock was engaged, but Marsh spends most of that night awake. Next morning, a High Stepper is found dead; the sleeves of her new pink robe are tied tightly around her neck. Peculiarly, a creepy Doctor Sledge tells Marsh that she died of strangulation, my dear. Not that she was necessarily murdered (45). This weird comment drives Marsh to investigate the incident the best she can. She begins to questions ship personnel. But the captain forbids her to question anyone. In fact, she must remain silent about the murder because it would ruin the cruise for all passengers. Now, truly befuddled, she trusts no one. Her uncanny feeling of being followed and/or watched obsesses her thoughts. Sitting alone outside by the library, without warning, the door slams shut. She jumps to open the door only to find an empty corridor. A few worried days later, the captain escorts Marsh to the ships freezer compartment. Another High Stepper lay naked . frozen solid, a plastic trash bag knotted around his throat (85). The captain begins to question Marsh. And again, he pressures her to say nothing to panic his passengers because an undercover team will board the ship to investigate. Yet, she receives a dire warning from another woman: There is grave danger here (117). Fear seizes Marsh, not just for herself, but for the High Steppers she organized and brought aboard. The paragraphs above are to give enough exciting information that any lover of mysteries will want to read Shore Excursion. What brutal attacker lurks about this giant vessel to kill two aged High Steppers - what's even more puzzling, why? Is the handsome captain himself involved or is he genuinely worried about Marsh's life? One cannot help but wonder if Miss Marsh's feeling of being followed before she left the U.S. is part of this same mystery - and then there is the mysterious bus incident in London ...

Author Information

Marie Moore is a native Mississippian. She graduated from Ole Miss, married a lawyer in her hometown, taught junior high science, raised a family, and worked for a small weekly newspaper-first as a writer and later as Managing Editor. She wrote hard news, features and a weekly column, and won a couple of MS Press Association awards for her stories. In 1985, Marie left the newspaper to open a retail travel agency, which she managed for the next fifteen years. Her novels are inspired by those experiences. Marie is a member of Sisters in Crime. She and her husband now live in Memphis, TN, and Holly Springs, MS.

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