Vera Wong's Guide to Snooping (on a Dead Man) (Vera Wong, 2, Band 2) - Softcover

Sutanto, Jesse Q.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0593546253 ISBN 13: 9780593546253

Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group, 2025

Inhaltsangabe

Vera Wong is back and as meddling as ever in this follow-up to the hit Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers.…

A New York Times' Best Mystery Novels of 2025
2026 Edgar's Lilian Jackson Braun Memorial Award Nominee
2026 Audie Award for Best Mystery Finalist

Ever since a man was found dead in Vera's teahouse, life has been good. For Vera that is. She’s surrounded by loved ones, her shop is bustling, and best of all, her son, Tilly, has a girlfriend! All thanks to Vera, because Tilly's girlfriend is none other than Officer Selena Gray. The very same Officer Gray that she had harassed while investigating the teahouse murder. Still, Vera wishes more dead bodies would pop up in her shop, but one mustn't be ungrateful, even if one is slightly...bored.

Then Vera comes across a distressed young woman who is obviously in need of her kindly guidance. The young woman is looking for a missing friend. Fortunately, while cat-sitting at Tilly and Selena's, Vera finds a treasure trove: Selena's briefcase. Inside is a file about the death of an enigmatic influencer—who also happens to be the friend that the young woman was looking for.

Online, Xander had it all: a parade of private jets, fabulous parties with socialites, and a burgeoning career as a social media influencer. The only problem is, after his body is fished out of Mission Bay, the police can't seem to actually identify him. Who is Xander Lin? Nobody knows. Every contact is a dead end. Everybody claims not to know him, not even his parents.

Vera is determined to solve Xander's murder. After all, doing so would surely be a big favor to Selena, and there is nothing she wouldn't do for her future daughter-in-law.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Jesse Q. Sutanto is the award-winning, USA Today bestselling author of the Aunties series, Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers, I’m Not Done with You Yet, and You Will Never Be Me. Her young adult titles include The Obsession and Well, That Was Unexpected, and her children’s fantasy series is Theo Tan and the Fox Spirit. She has a master’s degree from Oxford University and a bachelor’s from the University of California, Berkeley. She currently lives in Jakarta with her husband and two young daughters.

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One

VERA

Vera Wong Zhuzhu should be having the time of her life. She is, in fact, having the most wonderful, lovely, delightful time. Today, like every day, she wakes up at four thirty in the morning and jettisons out of bed like an army general with a new troop of terrified soldiers to scream at. And today, like every day, she puts on her gear, protecting every inch of her skin from the sun, and bustles out of the house to go on her extremely aggressive morning walk. But today, unlike most other days, Vera does not open up her tea shop after her morning routine. No, today is Sunday, Vera's favorite day. After a freezing, character-building shower and a simple breakfast, Vera marches to the kitchen, where she gets to work.

She's planned the menu with the meticulous care of Ralph Fiennes's character from that strange movie The Menu, and she's rather excited to get going, because tonight's meal will include mud-baked chicken. Vera rarely makes this dish because, to be honest, the idea of cooking with mud seems like something a hippie would do, but she is making it tonight because she knows how much it would delight little Emma, and she would do anything for Emma. She lugs the bag of clay she's bought from the garden center for this occasion alone outside of her teahouse and mixes in some water.

"Aiya, why are you making such a mess so early in the morning?" someone calls out in Mandarin. Someone extremely irritating.

Vera scowls before she even turns around. "Mind your business, Winifred," she says.

"What?"

"I said, 'Mind your business, Winifred'!"

"Eh, don't shout so loud so early in the day!" Winifred shouts back. "People are trying to sleep."

Vera sucks in a deep breath and goes back to mixing the clay. Aiya, thanks to Winifred, she's poured in too much water. She grits her teeth and shakes out more clay from the bag.

"Playing with clay, are we?" Winifred says, walking out of her bakery while stretching her arms over her head. "I'm glad you're finding a hobby, Vera. I was starting to get worried about you."

Vera straightens up so fast that her back clicks. "Why would you be worried about me? I have a roaring social life. It is you who people should be worried about."

Winifred raises her eyebrows. "Oh? I have twin grandbabies. I barely have time to run my extremely successful patisserie-"

"Chinese bakery," Vera mutters. The mention of twin grandbabies stings. To make matters worse, against all rules of nature, Winifred's grandkids are actually cute. Considering their genes, Vera thinks sulkily, those two babies should have been born with fangs and a forked tongue, but no, they are so adorable they belong in the pages of parenting magazines. How unfair life can be sometimes.

"My extremely successful French bakery," Winifred continues. "And every day I get to see my little baobei-oh, they love me so much, you know! The other day, little Frieda actually said, 'Ah Ma!'"

"They're two months old, they're hardly going to be saying anything," Vera says flatly. "Maybe you hallucinated it because you're going senile."

Instead of looking scandalized, Winifred merely smirks. "Oh, you know my little grandbabies, they have such good genes. They are geniuses, of course. I expect any day now, they will be invited to join MENSA."

Vera wants so badly to say something snippy about MENSA lowering its standards, but when she thinks of Winifred's chubby little grandkids, all she wants to do is snuggle them and squish their round cheeks and tell them what precious treasures they are. Damn it, if she can't bring herself to be mean about them, she'll lose this round. Oh, who is she kidding? She was always going to lose their sparring matches. Those annoyingly cute little bundles are Winifred's trump cards.

"Well," Vera huffs, "if you'll excuse me, I am very busy cooking a feast for my weekly family dinner." She stirs the bucket of clay mix so aggressively that it squelches, and droplets of sticky clay splat onto Winifred's trousers.

"Aiya!" Winifred cries. "Look what you did! These are pure cotton, you know. My daughter-in-law bought them for me from that fancy organic shop down at Union Square. They cost three hundred dollars."

"For those pajama pants? What is this European nonsense?"

"They are not pajama pants, they are called lounging pants."

"They look like pajama pants to me. In fact, I have a pair just like them from Costco. Are you sure your daughter-in-law didn't get them from Costco?"

Winifred huffs. "My Kelly is a good girl, very filial. She likes to spoil me. I hope that if you ever get a daughter-in-law, she will be half as good as my Kelly."

"When I get a daughter-in-law, you mean," Vera says cunningly.

"Oh?"

"Tonight's dinner is so special," Vera says with a small smile.

Winifred falls for her bait. "And why is that?"

"Because it will be at Tilly's new place. Tilly and Selena's new place."

Winifred's eyebrows rise to her hairline. "Oh? They are moving in together, your Tilly and that police officer?"

"Yes!" When Vera thinks of this fact, she feels a joy so fierce it bubbles up inside and bursts into a huge grin. "And once that happens, you know it won't be any time at all before they get engaged."

"Hmm," Winifred grunts. "Maybe. But you know young people these days, they think nothing of moving in or breaking up. So I wouldn't count your chickens just yet, Vera."

And with that, Winifred saunters back to her accursed bakery, muttering about her expensive pants. Vera hopes they are forever stained. She looks down at the bucket of clay and takes a deep breath. She's being silly, she knows it. There is no need for her to be nervous. Tilly and Selena will settle nicely into their new place, and before she knows it, there will be a proposal, then a wedding, and then . . . twin grandbabies. Nay, triplets! When Vera closes her eyes, she can just see it-Vera sitting on an overstuffed sofa with one arm around Emma and the other arm around three fat babies. She is manifesting like the TikTok told her to. She can practically smell their milky baby smell.

Tonight is going to go perfectly. She can tell, it will be the beginning of an amazing chapter in her life.


Tilly and Selena’s new place is a sweet little duplex in the Mission District, just a short ten-minute drive from Vera’s house. Oliver arrives at two with Julia and Emma in tow to pick Vera up. They come out of the car to help Vera with the ungodly amount of food she’s prepared, even little Emma. She carries a thermos of cold winter melon drink that is nearly as tall as she is and totters down the driveway, and the sight of her makes Vera’s heart ache with affection.

"Vera, don't you think that you've made too much food?" Oliver says, grunting as he heaves a cooler stuffed to the gills with food into the trunk.

Julia elbows him viciously. "No, she didn't." She turns to Vera and says firmly, "No, you didn't, Vera."

"There's enough food here for twenty people," Oliver says.

"And I will happily take any leftovers home," Julia says. "Stop telling her to cook less, Ollie. You know Emma and I basically live off Vera's Sunday leftovers."

Oliver rolls his eyes. "Well, yes, so do I. I'm just saying, you should take it easy, Vera."

"Tch," Vera tuts. "I'll take it easy when you young people learn to take care of yourselves. But you are like children, I have to make sure you get fed." Ever since Vera solved the mystery of Marshall's death last year, she's remained close to the people who'd been involved in the case. Oliver, Marshall's twin brother; Julia, Marshall's ex-wife; and Emma, Marshall's daughter. Now, she steps inside the car and helps strap Emma into her car seat.

"You haven't kissed me yet," Emma says in...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2025
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0593546253
• ISBN 13: 9780593546253
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 337
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: BERKLEY; https://www.penguin.com/?s=BERKLEY; ; Unit 2 Limavady Business Park; Limavady; County Londonderry; BT49 0HR; Vereinigtes Königreich
• Verantwortliche Person: gpsr@libri.de; gpsr@libri.de; ; Friedensallee 273; Hamburg; 22763; Deutschland