Hamsin by Margarethe Greenshpon

About the book

When 33-year old, recently divorced Marie Goldstein leaves her Haifa apartment on a hot spring day, her only worries are that the Hamsin wind blowing will ruin her outfit, or that she won't be able to get her 6-year old twins to school in time for her breakfast appointment with her oldest friend Annette; the flawless woman with the perfect looks, life and family.

It is only when she reaches Annette's posh house in the Ramat Eshkol neighborhood and finds two of her small sons playing with something that looks disturbingly like a real gun, that Marie starts to understand that breakfast might not be a prospect. She finds the body of her friend, slumped over her desk in the downstairs study, a short suicide note next to her head. Why would a woman who apparently had it all -- a loving, rich and genuinely nice husband, three cute little boys and a baby girl in the making -- go and kill herself?

It is only during the funeral, when Annette's oldest sister voices the same disbelief and urges her to take a look into the matter, that Marie realizes that not everything had been so perfect in Annette's life.

So instead of concentrating on finding a nice, nerdy boyfriend to prevent her frequent relapses into her philandering and definitely un-nerdy ex-husband's bed -- Marie goes off to find a suitable Private Investigator to help her. When she first meets Doron Rozenthal -- she simply knows that he is the quintessence of a successful P.I, -- intelligent, integer, resourceful and brave. Okay, so he's a sexy hunk -- which doesn't necessarily make him a bad P.I.

Despite his reservations about taking the case and his even bigger reservations to have her trailing after him, they both go chasing possible leads into Annette's death. And sure enough, after a relatively short time Marie starts receiving threatening phone calls and evidence that she and her kids are being stalked. Shipping her children off to their aunt and out of harm's way, she is even more determined to find out what happened to her friend -- only to find herself attacked by a total stranger and fighting for her life. With the cavalry nowhere in sight and only with the help of her weapon of choice -- a marble rolling pin -- she manages to defend herself, sending her attacker flying into the valley below her apartment.

But who was that man? The police don't seem to find a connection between him and Annette or any of the people close to her and decide that he must have acted alone and for unknown reasons. Doron concurs and happily returns the remainder of his retainer -- having decided that Marie simply spells trouble.

So she has no choice but to go after the remaining suspects by herself. And sure enough, by pure luck rather than skill, she finds herself eye-to-eye with her friend's killer and yet again has to think fast to save her own neck.

About the author

Writing has been my one true love from early childhood, the passion for the written word... By now, my nose has grown so long, it touches my computer screen. Truth is -- I always loved to read. And to sing. And dance. And paint. And write. And cook. And garden. And travel. And learn new languages. And have babies (got 5) And animals (got 14) And men (no, not giving any numbers).

One of the aforementioned is my husband of 14 years, who took me from my native Germany to live in the (not so) Holy Land for 12 years, where I worked for an American high-tech company. When it came to a point where I started snoring involuntarily every time I entered my office, I decided that there must be more enjoyable ways to spend one's days. So I quit the job with the company car, the steady income and the stock options and started writing Hamsin -- my first novel -- and had a blast. I could make fun of all the odd quirks in Israeli society and behavior, get romantic with the sexiest guys, get nasty about people I hate -- and call it fiction. Currently I am writing the sequel to Hamsin, which is set in the USA and I am having an equally good time making jokes about American culture and society. And yes, my fellow Germans and their easy-going, fun-loving nature will be next.