"Murder Boogies With Elvis" by Anne George, HarperCollins, $23; 243 pages.
Patricia Anne Hollowell is laying tile under her kitchen sink when a cold hand grips her ankle. Murder is about to boogie with Elvis in this latest entry in the Southern Sisters mystery series.
The cold hand is not that of the murderer but instead Patricia Anne's sister, Mary Alice Tate Sullivan Nachman Crane, who has dropped by to announce that she has four tickets to a benefit performance at the Alabama Theater.
For fans of ''cozy'' mysteries, this series of eight books (beginning with ''Murder on a Girls Night Out'') is especially entertaining. ''Cozy'' describes the milieu of the stories in this subgenre of mystery: domestic settings, a minimum of gore and the mystery understandable but not shocking. Think ''Murder, She Wrote.''
A Pulitzer Prize nominee for her poetry, Anne George began her career as a schoolteacher. She wrote her first Southern Sisters mystery in 1996, setting it in her hometown of Birmingham, Ala. Many aspects of this steel-based city, from the topography to the neighborhoods, will seem familiar to Pittsburghers.
Patricia Anne and her husband of 41 years live in a middle-class neighborhood. They have three grown children and an aging dog. The thrice-widowed Mary Alice is more flamboyant, generous with money, advice and derring-do. She has three grown children and an aging cat.
Patricia Anne's sardonic husband owns and operates his own business, a metal fabricating company. He is a perfect foil to his wife's impulsive sister.
The murders in these books occur in plausible situations. In the most recent, a visiting troupe of Elvis impersonators is performing at a fund-raiser to repair the gigantic statue of Vulcan (which overlooks Birmingham), when one topples over dead - into the orchestra pit. Patricia Anne and Mary Alice are, of course, in the audience.
Other mysteries in the series enable the author to describe, for example, the work of genealogical researchers and Florida developers. The reader is both informed and entertained. The mysteries are cleverly plotted, their solutions always plausible.
The surrounding cast of recurring characters is lively and interesting from the vivacious Bonnie Blue Butler, manager of the Big, Bold and Beautiful Shoppe (often patronized by the 6-foot, 250-pound Mary Alice), to the earnest police officer, Bo Mitchell, who drops by Patricia Anne's for microwaved orange rolls fresh from the freezer.
And the details, from the dinners cooked (never gourmet) to television programs watched, are familiar and, yes, cozy.
When Anne George died during heart surgery this spring, her charming cast of characters made its last appearance. Those readers already familiar with the series will enjoy ''Murder Boogies With Elvis.'' Other readers should start at the beginning and savor each book in the series.
Sally Siegel is a Pittsburgh free-lance writer for the Tribune-Review.
