Death of an Ex
- Judith D Collins
- Jul 19
- 5 min read
Updated: Jul 21
A Vandy Myrick Mystery #2
By: Delia Pitts
Narrator: Bahni Turpin
Macmillan Audio
ISBN: 9781250904249
Publisher: St. Martin's Press | Minotaur Books
Publication Date: 07/15/2025
Format: Hardcover/Audio
My Rating: 5 Stars (ARC)
Delia Pitts expertly writes about family, race, class, and grief in her mysteries. Vandy Myrick captured readers' and critics' hearts in Trouble in Queenstown. She returns in Death of an Ex, where Vandy tries to piece together what brought her ex-husband's life to an end.
Queenstown, New Jersey, feels big when you need help and tiny when you want privacy. For Vandy Myrick, that’s both a blessing and a curse. Now that Vandy’s back in “Q-Town”, her services as her hometown’s only Black woman private investigator have earned her more celebrity—or notoriety—than she figured.
Keeping busy with work helps Vandy deal with the grief of losing her daughter, stitching the seams, cementing the gaps. The memories will always remain, and they come crashing back to the surface when her ex-husband, Phil Bolden, walks back into her life. Promising everything, returning home, restoring family. Until she answers her door to the news that Phil has been murdered. And Vandy decides Phil is now her client.
It’s hard to separate the Phil that Vandy knew with the one Queenstown did. She sees him—and their daughter—in Phil’s son, who attends a prestigious local high school. She sees the layers of a complicated marriage with his wife. She sees all of Phil’s various roles: parent, husband, businessman, philanthropist. But which role got him killed?
A Vandy Myrick Mysteries
TROUBLE IN QUEENSTOWN #1
DEATH OF AN EX #2
My Review
Delia Pitts is back with her razor-sharp mystery series starring the lively, witty, intelligent, challenging, and sassy PI Vandy Myrick after the introduction of (#1) Trouble in Queenstown (5 stars) with (#2) DEATH OF AN EX.
Vandy is back with another murder mystery, and this time it hits close to home, involving her ex-husband and the father of her deceased daughter.
Exploring grief, class, race, and family within a murder mystery—from small-town suspense, lies, family secrets, and corruption infused with humor and a tenacious, relatable, kick-ass black female PI.
About...
From the last book, set in the fictional town of Queenstown, New Jersey, Vandy Myrick is a former Philadelphia cop who has returned to her hometown to be near her father, Evander, also a retired police officer. He is in a nursing home suffering from advanced Alzheimer's.
Vandy grew up in Q-Town, married and had a daughter, Monica, whom she raised alone after her cheating husband left. Her daughter died of an overdose at a college party, and she has experienced a great deal of loss.
She has opened a detective agency, Evander Myrick, Investigations with the help of her attorney friend located above the pharmacy.
Picking up with this installment, it had been three years since her daughter's death, and now there is the settlement check (blood money) that she will use to make her daughter proud, and she also visits her daughter and her mother (gone for seven years) at the cemetery.
Vandy attends a homecoming gala at the Rome School, an expensive, elite academy ranked among the best private boarding schools.
Before the night ends, she will come face to face with her ex-husband, Philip Bolden, his current wife, his son, plus many more, including a woman who is the treasurer of the Bethel AMC church.
Vandy and Phil get to spend some quality time together when he comes to her for help, and she finds out some things that she did not know about her ex and the involvement with her daughter. They bond and have a nice romantic evening.
However, the next morning, he is murdered. Phil was a cheater, and he was also involved in other questionable activities. His son was not happy with him, nor was his wife, plus more...and now she is involved. He had made enemies. But who would want to murder him?
She must put aside her feelings to try and investigate his murder to bring justice for her daughter's father and the man she fell in love with many years ago, while also trying to help his son.
But the closer she gets to the truth, the more danger she is in.
My thoughts...
I loved TROUBLE IN QUEENSTOWN and was delighted when I found there would be more books in the series.
DEATH OF AN EX is gritty, edgy, twisty, emotional, and heartfelt. I love PI Vandy Myrick's character which is flawed, sarcastic, resilient, fearless, tough, intuitive, smart, and funny and highly relatable.
Twisty and absorbing, this novel delves into the complexities of racial politics, bribery, infidelity, corruption, power, greed, and more, keeping you hooked as you turn the pages to the explosive ending. We also explore grief, family, guilt, and more from a personal emotional perspective written with compassion and sensitivity.
The author cleverly sets up a fascinating new series, and I look forward to the long haul! I cannot wait for the next one in the series and adventures to see what is in store for PI Vandy Myrick next!
Audiobook...
As in the first book in the series, I had the pleasure of reading the e-book and listening to the audiobook, both of which were outstanding! I love Bahni Turpin, the narrator, and she delivered a stellar performance, making the characters come alive-a perfect voice for the novel. I highly recommend the audiobook!
Recs...
DEATH OF AN EX is not just a cozy mystery. PI Vandy Myrick is immersed in a compelling, well-written who-and-why-dunit crime thriller with heart. It is for fans of strong female leads, brilliant cop procedurals, and a blending of family dynamics and humor.
Also for fans of authors Terry McMillan, Aime Austin (Casey Cort & Nicole Long legal crime series), social justice thrillers, Sounds Like a Plan, a new PI series by Pamela Samuels Young, and Dwayne Alexander Smith (a favorite), as well as smart detective mysteries.
Thanks to Minotaur Books and Macmillan Audio for gifted advanced reading and listening copies via NetGalley for my honest thoughts, #MacAudio2025
My Review: Trouble in Queenstown (#1)
@JudithDCollins | #JDCMustReadBooks
My Rating: 5 Stars
Pub Date: July 15, 2025
Praise
“A literary, absorbing whodunit encompassing murder, human compassion, and grief.”
–Library Journal (starred review)
“[Vandy Myrick] is an uncommonly well-shaded mystery heroine. Throw in Pitts’s knack for scene setting and her sharp observations about race and class, and this series seems poised for a long run.”
–Publishers Weekly
"Pitts works so assiduously to knit Vandy’s detective work together with her self-imposed mandate to heal the most vulnerable members of her community that the healing work continues even after Phil’s murderer is identified."
–Kirkus Reviews
“A twisting mystery.”
–Booklist
“Pitts has written a novel rich in the many layers of community while delving deeply into the character of Vandy; the balance between the two is perfect. A great choice for a reading group.”
–First Clue
About the Author
Photo Credit: Steven C. Pitts
DELIA PITTS worked as a journalist before earning a Ph.D. in history from the University of Chicago. After careers as a U.S. diplomat and university administrator, she left academia to begin writing fiction. Delia is the author of the Vandy Myrick mysteries, featuring a Black private investigator in New Jersey. She is also the author of the Ross Agency Mysteries, about a Harlem detective firm, and several short stories. She’s a member of Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, and Crime Writers of Color. Learn more about Delia at www.deliapitts.com
