Heiress Trini Malone, who is the niece of a friend of Quinn's, has fallen into the hands of a cult, the Children of Golgotha. Quinn and his friend know that the cult's leader is no holy man, but a con-man and former convict. But that's not what is worrying them.

A few cult members have died suddenly – what makes the deaths suspicious is that the victims were all members of wealthy families and all had named the cult as sole heir in their wills. Quinn and his friend fear that Trini, about to come into her fortune, will be the next victim. They want Maggie to find Trini with a view to rescuing her. Complicating this "simple" assignment is Trini's history: she's been rescued from the cult once before and returned to its clutches as soon as she could. There is a very good chance she will resist any further attempts to save her.

Maggie, ever intrepid, enlists the aid of a few friends, and gets close to the cult in the only way that makes sense: she sets herself up as a naive and gullible heiress and allows the cult to take her in. Once a part of it, she tries to make contact with Trini without herself being discovered as an imposter.

Will Maggie's true identity be discovered by the cult? Can she save Trini?

What is really going on with the Children of Golgotha?

I neither liked nor disliked reading Murder on the Barbary Coast. Since I never believed Maggie was in danger nor doubted that Trini would come to a proper end, there was little or no tension in the storytelling for me. It was rather liking watching a movie in which you have no doubt whatsoever that the hero will overcome every obstacle put in his way – you keep watching to find out what the next obstacle will be. Nor was I particularly curious about the truth behind the Children of Golgotha – most of what is going on is made clear in the course of the story. The lack of tension was disappointing; what kept me reading was the lively writing style and a bit of mild curiosity about what was going to happen next.

What didn't keep me reading was the mystery. The puzzle of Murder on the Barbary Coast is not very puzzling; the story is busy, not complex. That is the primary reason I cannot recommend this book as a mystery novel. Still, it has a Perils of Pauline quality, full of near misses and breathless escapes, that some readers might enjoy. I might have enjoyed it more, if I hadn't felt as if everything came far too easily to everyone involved.

--Katy Cooper