Kitty Larsen is the world's most unlikely detective. She's on the downside of 65, her figure has shifted from hourglass to pear-shaped, she wears thick false eyelashes and gobs of jewelry, but when her niece begs her to find the homicidal ape that is killing off members of the health club where she works, Kitty leaps (in her case, she hops) into action. In the first of the Sutton Place Mystery series set on Manhattan's ritzy Upper East Side, Kitty poses as tabloid reporter to track the secret lives and loves of the victims. As the killer's trail leads her from a cocktail party-style wake, to a small town in Pennsylvania, to a plastic surgeon's office, to a masquerade ball, Kitty encounters ever-changing motives and suspects. Before the heart-pounding conclusion of the book, a frightening prophecy is fulfilled; a wrong committed half a lifetime ago is corrected and Kitty is shot and nearly drowned.

What they are saying about The Tap Dancing Gorilla

You might not find the idea of a tap dancing gorilla to be sinister until you read Renée Gardner's novel - and you SHOULD read it for the delight of the plot, for the characters, and for the witty writing. … The Tap Dancing Gorilla progresses in lively fashion from murder to detection to climatic mayhem. The book is a fun, engrossing, must-read mystery with a breakthrough (no longer young) protagonist in Kitty Larsen, a woman who has done just about everything in her adventurous life and who is now ready to take on tracking down evil.

Renée Gardner has written an utterly delightful, first-rate mystery. The Tap Dancing Gorilla: A Sutton Place Mystery sparkles with the effervescence of an old fashion whodunit. With dazzling details of Manhattan, humorous banter and a parade of quirky characters, it is a thoroughly enjoyable read.

The Tap Dancing Gorilla is a delicious mix of fear and fun, chills and chuckles, with sprinkles of fascinating Manhattan lore tossed in. I loved it!