This is Kelsey Patterson with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out.
Today, I’m recommending Killers of a Certain Age by Deanna Raybourn, a thriller that is a delightful mashup of Golden Girls meets James Bond.
Billie, Mary Alice, Helen, and Natalie have worked for the Museum, an elite network of assassins, for forty years. Now their talents are considered old-school and no one appreciates what they have to offer in an age that relies more on technology than people skills.
When the foursome is sent on an all-expenses paid cruise to mark their retirement, they are targeted by one of their own. Only the Board, the top-level members of the Museum, can order the termination of field agents, and the women quickly realize they’ve been marked for death.
Now to get out alive they have to turn against their own organization, relying on decades of experience and each other to get the job done, knowing that working together is the secret to their survival. They’re about to teach the Board what it really means to be a woman—and a killer—of a certain age.
I’m a devoted Deanna Raybourn fan after falling in love with her Veronica Speedwell historical mystery series. Like the title character in those, Killers of a Certain Age features smart eccentric women who anchor the story and give it a distinctly feminist bent. With an inventive, unpredictable plot and complex mystery, this story really kept me on my toes, constantly trying to figure out what would happen next. As NYT bestselling author Joshilyn Jackson noted when talking about this book, “Killers of a Certain Age is the 60-something lady assassin book we didn’t know we needed, but, oh, we needed it.”
Killers of a Certain Age is utterly comical, positively violent, and completely endearing, and it makes this yet another winner in my book and a new Deanna Raybourn favorite. Check out Killers of a Certain Age at the Sioux City Public Library.
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