Mama Does Time

By Mama Does Time (Midnight Ink, a division of Llewellyn Books, $13.95 paperback) REVIEWED BY PRUDY TAYLOR BOARD Special to Florida Weekly Fort Lauderdale author Deb Sharp's debut murder mystery series is a delight.

"Mama Does Time" takes place in Himmarshee, Fla. (think a ranching town on the banks of Lake Okeechobee). Her protagonist, Mace Bauer, is a bright, sassy "good ole gal" who works in a wildlife sanctuary. The novel opens when Mama (Rosalee Devereaux) calls Mace from the police station where she's being held for questioning. The problem is that a man's body has been found in the trunk of Mama's convertible after she parked in front of Dairy Queen — Mama had stopped off for a butterscotch dip following bingo.

Mama's girls are stunned that anyone could think Mama capable of murder. She is, after all, a former Sunday school teacher. Granted she's been married four times; that proves she loves men and wouldn't hurt one.

Mace and her sisters, Maddie and Marty, set out to prove mama's innocence. En route to the book's climax, the reader is exposed to a cast of quirky, endearing characters including (but definitely not limited to) Mama's latest boyfriend, Sal Provenza — a New Yorker with a mysterious past and Carlos Martinez, the hunky new homicide detective who's moved up from Miami.

As the investigation moves forward and Martinez explores the background of the corpse, Jimmy Albert, the detective, learns that Albert has some interesting connections. Although he's engaged to Emma Jean — the receptionist at the police station — it turns out he's not as nice as the town thought him to be. And furthermore, there are people in town who have a definite motive for his murder. The detective finally accepts that Mama isn't his murderer and frees her. Both plot and peril progress with a disappearance and a kidnapping and Mace is in jeopardy as she persists in her quest to find the truth.

But Sharp, a Florida cracker and USA Today reporter who quit the reporter's beat to write full time, shares more than true-to-life characters. She also recreates small town, old Florida. Himmarshee is not only home to Dairy Queen, but to the Hair Today — Dyed Tomorrow beauty salon, the Abundant Hope Church with a smarmy evangelical pastor, and juke joints like the Speckled Perch and the Pork Pit.

Sharp's sparkling down-home humor, her understanding of her town and her characters, and her satisfying plot twists make the Mace Bauer series a thoroughly enjoyable read.