Joan Merrill
Writer, Producer
Joan Merrill
Writer, Producer
Starting in 2010 with "And All That Murder", Joan Merrill has published five novels centered in the world of jazz. Her main character is San Francisco-based PI Casey McKie, a jazz fan whose best friend is club owner and vocalist Dee Jefferson. Casey’s investigations have taken place in San Francisco’s North Beach, a jazz cruise, a jazz festival, New York’s jazz scene, and, in the latest book, a jazz camp.
Casey McKie lives in the small upstairs apartment in a converted home next to the Stockton tunnel in Chinatown. Her landlady is the ever watchful Mrs. Wong who lives in the downstairs apartment where she can keep an eye on the door. A cable car line is one street away and a few blocks in the other direction is North Beach, an area popular for its nightlife. It is home to the Condor, which was the city’s first topless club featuring Carol Doda as well as the historic City Lights Bookstore where the Beat poets hung out. The steep hill street to Coit Tower is in North Beach, and several blocks north is Fisherman's Wharf. To the east is the Embarcadero. If you took into account the several streets to the South where the City Hall and the Opera House sit in all their grandeur, you could accurately say Casey lived in the heart of the city.
Casey looks into the supposed suicide of Dee’s friend, an Oakland jazz club owner. As more jazz people are murdered, she realizes she’s dealing with a serial killer.
“A very good lead character, good supporting characters, good plot line, altogether, a very satisfying first novel”
– Bruce Crowther, jazz reviewer
While on a jazz cruise as Dee’s guest, Casey is asked to locate a missing passenger – the Countess. It turns out she has a number of enemies on board. Did one of them toss her into the Caribbean?
“Jazz lovers will feel … joy as Ms. Merrill craftily deflects suspicion from suspect to suspect before sounding the final chord in this swinging whodunit.”
-- Harvey Siders, Jazz Times
When Dee asks Casey to look into the murder of a young jazz singer whose boyfriend is being targeted for the crime by the police, she agrees. delving deep into North Beach nightlife.
“Writing with flair and imagination, Joan’s pace is crisp, her dialogue snappy and apposite, and her comments on jazz, the music and the people, are insightful.”
– Bruce Crowther, Jazz Journal.
Casey goes to New York to investigate a 50-year-old cold case. Was the drug dose that killed the legendary jazz singer Georgia Valentine self- administered or was someone else involved?
When jazz festival headliner Sid Satin is fatally shot after his set, local police blame Dee. Casey investigates, uncovering a number of Satin’s enemies with a motive for murder.
“I’m a jazz musician and felt that the author did a great job of keeping things ‘real.’”
– Shanna Carlson, jazz singer, pianist
Now on sale: Rebecca Parris, Denise Perrier CD reissues, the Casey McKie jazz mystery series paperbacks, and audiobooks in USB format at The Corner Store.