Otis disappeared one night and everyone assumes he’s dead, though no corpse has been found.  Ted urges May to go and visit her friends, promising to join her after a day or two.  During the gang’s first dinner at the Estates, they eat overlooking the pool, and Otis floats up to their table.  The group gets very excited.  Now they have a body.  Now all they need to do is catch a killer. 

But wait, several people point out that Otis isn’t Otis and that someone is trying to pull a fast one.  Could it be Otis or Otis’s girlfriend or his scheming wife?  No one is sure, and when the corpse is buried without being identified to May’s friends’ satisfaction, Ted agrees to dig up the corpse to get the fingerprints (the original fingerprints were burned off the autopsy report). 

Things get very silly from here and the climax includes the seniors riding shotgun on motorcycles as they ride to the rescue.  

While the plot has some very good elements and twists and turns, it is so overcome with silliness from May Bell and her gang that the good mystery gets lost.  At first, they are endearing, as they hold up spoons in Denny’s to watch who is behind them while they talk, but the old jokes get old fast and are often not funny.  It is also a bit unbelievable that the gang refuses to go to the police until they have the murder solved.  Normally, amateur detectives interact with the police and the police are aware of them.  It’s also hard to believe that Dr. Ted would first attempt to break into a funeral home and then a casket and when that doesn’t work, digs up a body.  There are some very good, very funny mystery series being written today featuring senior sleuths.  This one, however, is a disappointment.

--Jennifer Monahan Winberry