Jack Dwyer is an ex-cop turned part-time actor (and, sometimes, part-time security guard in a discount supermarket — but he doesn’t particularly like talking about that) who, since giving up police work, really tries to mind his own business. But when Jane Branigan — his ex-live-in-lover — is found in a state of shock, holding a recently fired gun, he knows that his quiet days are about to become very complicated. Stephen Elliot — Jane’s present lover and one of the hottest young advertising executives in town — is found dead, and all evidence points to Jane. As far as the police are concerned, the case is closed; but not according to Dwyer. Who was Stephen Elliot — and who would have wanted him dead? Dwyer’s investigation takes him deep into the workings of the advertising industry, and into the sometimes luxurious, sometimes seedy, sometimes volatile lives of the people who work there. Could the murderer be Carla Travers — the blowsy, alcoholic media rep whom Elliot publicly humiliated weeks before; or David Baxter — the man who seemingly encouraged his wife’s affair with Elliot; or Bryce Hammond — the ineffectual owner of the Hammond agency — whose company falls into jeopardy with Elliot’s demise; or Phil Davies — the Hammond client who seemed to have a strange attraction toward Elliot’s women? New, Improved Murder is a gritty page-turner of a whodunit, whose solution lies in the secrets of the cutthroat world of advertising. In order to help Jane, Dwyer’s going to have to discover the truth behind the most brilliant — and deadly — hype campaign ever devised