Mysteries Abound: Following Polly: A From Left to Write Book Club

My friend, Ellen, fancies herself a career in the private investigator business, on occasion. And it might work, because she has a sunhat that is as fabulous as mine. (I just attempted to find a photo of it, but came up blank.) In any case, I always imagine she'll be sitting in a restaurant, menu up almost to her nose, head lowered to obscure her eyes. It would work as well as it did for Alice Teakle in "Following Polly", the most recent From Left to Write book club selection.

In this book, Alice, on a lark, decides to follow a famous person (Polly). And then Polly gets murdered, and Alice is framed for it. So, Alice does what anyone in this situation would fantasize about doing. She slips out of police custody, goes undercover, and hides out in the apartment of the man of her dreams. The story is completely unbelievable, which is what makes it completely fabulous to me. Until recently, I read nonfiction, almost exclusively. But lately? I'm reading for entertainment, and the nuttier it is, the better. And this is nutty. And hilarious. And if Alice can do it, so can Ellen, though hopefully Ellen doesn't get framed for murder.

I would hire Ellen in a minute to tail my kids to school and find out who their friends are when they're old enough that they no longer communicate this information freely. And that day may be coming sooner than I think. Last week, Ed and I had a couple of friends over for dinner. At one point, Helen made some ridiculous request. I denied it. She put her little fist on her hip, pushed her hip toward me while glaring at me and said "fine" in the absolute, most perfect teenager imitation possible. I have no idea where she picked it up, but she seemed mighty impressive doing it.

In any case, just in case Ellen is busy with her own two children when I need her, I've decided to take some time and brush up my own PI skills. For example, a few days ago, I found a pile of little pieces of string, a pair of scissors, and a baggie. The clue that told me who the offender that left this mess had been? The string was pink.

Notice the jar stuffed with confetti made from money? Thank Connor for that. He adores money, and he has a penchant for filling mason jars. I received this confetti when I attended a party at the Fed, and they handed out these little bags of money. Note, if you are ever in this situation. That tiny bag? It holds an ENORMOUS amount of confetti. I've been vacuuming the stuff up for over a year at this point, and we still have quite a lot in the house!

As I was sitting at Denny's having breakfast with Therese and her crew as we dried off from the rain shower that ended our camping trip prematurely, suddenly my orange juice was all over the table. Did the juice just fall by itself? That's what Helen would have you believe. But using my mad skills of deduction, I reasoned that her little paw must have pushed it over, as she told me she was trying to give me my juice.

Of course, I have a long way to go, because when I really needed my PI skills, I was useless. I'll give you this one clue. Connor and Eamon are very fast runners, and together, they can cause two mamas a bit of panic.

I'm going to keep brushing up on my sleuthing skills, so I can continue to figure out these important everyday mysteries.

Elaine

Full disclosure: As a member of the "From Left to Write" book club, I received a free copy of "Following Polly". I have since gifted it to my friend Ellen. I was not obligated to write about this book. I will most definitely be reading anything else Karen Bergreen writes because her writing is funny and provided the perfect break for me.