Isobel's Odyssey

Book excerpt: Isobel, a widow of a certain age and long-time resident of a small fishing village on the coast of Maine, decides she requires additional income to support her desire for first-class travel. She answers an ad for a hired mercenary to an ex-Mafia don, first testing her homicidal capabilities at home and later, with her niece Jo in tow, moving on to assignments in Montana to dispatch a Japanese harvester of children’s body parts, in Stockholm to remove a Russian anthrax intermediary, and, in Bermuda to “put paid” to an English high-class pimp. She and Jo, of course, savor the fine accommodations and gastronomic rewards of their efforts, but will they receive their comeuppance? And what of the mysterious gentleman who pops up at each of their assignments?