The Moonlight was my territory, and it wasn’t cursed just because I’d met a boy here and done something stupid. On the underside of the table I’d drawn crayon portraits of Ms. Won dozens of games of Clue and Mystery Mansion with my mom and Aunt Mona. Read Harriet the Spy and every Nancy Drew mystery. This booth, with its tufted red leatherette seats? It was my booth. I’d spent most of my childhood living in a tiny two-bedroom apartment directly above it. And so what if he was? This was my home away from home. Just to be sure, I scanned the diner one more time, from the rain-speckled glass door to the PIE OF THE DAY chalkboard sign near the register, where the owner had carefully written: ANNE OF GREEN GRAPES, featuring Yakima Valley chardonnay grapes and blueberries.įor the better part of May, I’d avoided coming to the diner, walking past the windows with my hood up, fearing he’d be here, and if we ever occupied the same space again it would rip open a hole in the universe and create the Most Awkward Moment in Modern History, and the diner-my haven in the city-would be tainted forever and ever.īut he wasn’t here, and just because he worked somewhere nearby didn’t mean he was a loyal patron of the Moonlight Diner. Sherlock Holmes, A Scandal in Bohemia (1891) 1 To uncover the writer’s puzzling identity, Birdie must come out of her shell…discovering that the most confounding mystery of all may be her growing feelings for the elusive riddle that is Daniel.

Daniel also shares her appetite for intrigue, and he’s stumbled upon a real-life mystery: a famous reclusive writer-never before seen in public-might be secretly meeting someone at the hotel. The hotel’s charismatic young van driver shares the same nocturnal shift and patronizes the waterfront Moonlight Diner where Birdie waits for the early morning ferry after work. In her new job, Birdie hopes to blossom from introverted dreamer to brave pioneer, and gregarious Daniel Aoki volunteers to be her guide. But her solitary world expands when she takes a job the summer before college, working the graveyard shift at a historic Seattle hotel. Raised in isolation and homeschooled by strict grandparents, she’s cultivated a whimsical fantasy life in which she plays the heroic detective and every stranger is a suspect. Mystery-book aficionado Birdie Lindberg has an overactive imagination. “An atmospheric, multilayered, sex-positive romance.” - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)Īfter an awkward first encounter, Birdie and Daniel are forced to work together in a Seattle hotel where a famous author leads a mysterious and secluded life in this romantic contemporary novel from the author of Alex, Approximately.

Serious moonlight jenn bennett