As "Death Vows" opens, Strachey, a hard-boiled detective in Albany, N.Y., is enlisted to investigate the mysterious Barry Fields, who may or may not be a violent con man and gold digger, preparing to marry an older man named Bill Moore just over the Massachusetts state line in the Berkshires. (If, in fact, those are their real names. Which they're not.) The investigation gets complicated when someone kills Strachey's client, sleazy busybody Jim Sturdivant. (Yes, that's technically his real name, but it hides more than it reveals about his past.)There's only one couple in "Death Vows" ...
