When teacher Mike Peterson is found dead with a large amount of cocaine in his system, the school district administration agrees with the coroner that it was a tragic and foolish accident. The administration’s top priority is to make sure the community knows that Mike’s drug use was an isolated incident. But two of Mike’s fellow teachers and close friends, Jennie and Maggie, can’t believe Mike would use drugs and can’t let the matter drop so easily. They recruit two of their friends, a social worker and another teacher, to try to clear Mike’s name.

The four women dive head first into unraveling the mystery of Mike’s death. Does it have anything to do with a prank memo Maggie sent out to rile school administrators? How much did they really know about Mike? Who is Mike’s mysterious wife? And why is the teachers’ union president so concerned with the friends’ investigation?

In another book, these might all be compelling questions. However, because of serious flaws in A Memo from Harvey!, the questions are answered clumsily in a plot that is slow to start, lurches around and then finally sprawls into the territory of complete absurdity. Usually, books with weak plots have other redeeming features – strong characters, vivid descriptions or strong writing. Again, Memo strikes out on these counts as well.

The characters are paper-thin and much of the action consists of their long telephone conversations or dinner chats. Descriptions of places and people are provided on a rather sporadic basis. And the writing, unfortunately, is about as strong as herbal tea. To add insult to injury, the book has several copy-editing mistakes in both wording and punctuation that are readily apparent even to a casual reader.

The premise of a fake memo sparking all manner of treachery and intrigue is very appealing. It’s rather unfortunate that A Memo from Harvey! strays from the premise and does not deliver on any of its promise.