Judy Drood

Judy Drood ~ "Girl Detective"

The entire town is in shock when Judy's father, lovable old Colonel Drood, a leading member of the community, is arrested for a series of unusually vicious murders. Though the evidence against him is strong, Judy, a student at the local high school, believes he is innocent and sets out to prove it. However, the more her investigations uncover, the more Judy inadvertently proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that her father was actually a fiendish master criminal!
But Judy is blinded by loyalty and does everything she can to prove him innocent, including tampering with evidence and harassing witnesses. Eventually, however, her father is sent to prison for life, leaving Judy somewhat psychologically scarred and jaded, with a cynical distrust of law enforcement and some rather severe anger issues.
While still in high school, Judy becomes obsessed with solving mysteries and uncovering crimes - often where none exist. Her unorthodox (not to mention illegal) methods annoy and antagonize the local police. However, she does manage to solve enough real crimes that the local papers refer to her as the "teen girl detective" - a label Judy despises, but which, unfortunately, sticks, even after she graduates from high school and becomes a student at Lone Mountain College. Judy is a loner who doesn't trust anyone, except perhaps her hapless childhood friend, Kasper Keene, who often finds himself, against his better judgement, assisting Judy on one of her "cases".

(See: MAD NIGHT and THE GRAVE ROBBER'S DAUGHTER. Judy's first appearance was in 1993 in the book BLACK CAT CROSSING, in a story reprinted in MANIAC KILLER STRIKES AGAIN)

Pen & ink w/ watercolor on paper, 9" x 11".
Number 19 in Richard's Skeleton Key series.