Oliver has adopted the bohemian philosophy of life. She resolves that she will never listen to anybody about the way she chooses to live -- writing poetry and taking advantage of the times by smoking, drinking, and having sex with whomever she fancies. Ms. Meyers does an excellent job depicting the roaring twenties, however Oliver is frequently too intoxicated and impulsive to notice her existence lacks growth and development.

During one of Oliver’s usual nights of revelry, she and her current boyfriend, Whit, stumble over the dead body of a woman with her throat cut outside of their favorite speakeasy. Oddly, the unknown victim looks amazingly like Oliver, and when she receives an anonymous gift of shoes identical to the victim’s, she is concerned enough to take action.

Oliver asks Harry, to investigate and he feels that her natural curiosity will be a great help to him in return. While she is away from her home, someone breaks in, uses her typewriter to finish her poem (writing rather badly), and steals her typewriter ribbon. Oliver perceives genuine danger after finding a rag doll (red-haired like herself) with a penknife embedded in its heart.

Oliver begins investigating but continues her impetuous lifestyle of drinking, smoking, and free love, although Harry has warned her to be more careful. When Harry is beaten severely while following Oliver home from a party, he concludes the murderer is one of her friends, and he obtains bodyguards for her from his picturesque friends in the Hudson Dusters gang.

The setting in Free Love is unusual, well researched, and compelling. Few mysteries take place in the twenties, and Greenwich Village is fascinating and gripping. Smoking and drinking gin are so commonplace that they permeate the whole story with their scent and taste. The free-spirited thinking, the plethora of writers, artists, and actors present a youthful, daring, and dangerously adventurous picture of the times.

The murder construct is original and takes some surprising twists. Yet neither Harry’s nor Oliver’s investigative abilities live up to the rank of amateur detective or amateur sleuth. The murderer’s identity is presented clearly long before the end of the book, yet the final confrontation comes as a complete surprise to both of them.

Furthermore, our daring heroine whose philosophy of life is to greet each day as a new and dangerous injection of adventure apparently falls back upon her poetic soul to end the book in a disappointing “state of near collapse, feverish, [and] sick at heart.”

Free Love is a book with a thoroughly original setting, and it takes advantage of a curious period in history. However, I was unable to overlook the weak plot line and found it almost impossible to empathize with Oliver since she is amazingly insensitive to others’ feelings. The book offers some entertainment value, but you might want to wait for the paperback or check it out at the library.

--Monica Pope