An impossible mystery takes a children's book author and his politician wife from Connecticut to Mississippi, where death lurks around every bend of the river. Lyon Wentworth is struggling through a bout of writer's block when a funeral comes to call. The children's book author had no clue his old friend Dalton Turman had died, nor that his last request had been burial at Lyon's house. And yet, here are two men of the cloth dragging a coffin through his front door, rearranging his living room for a wake, and asking Lyon where he wants them to put the snake handler's serpents. Lyon's patience with his old army buddy's wishes is nearly exhausted when the "deceased" leaps out of the coffin and the trick is revealed. Dalton Turman, prankster extraordinaire, is alive and kicking.   Dalton has come north to invite Lyon and his wife, Bea, down to Mississippi for a party on his ultra-luxe new houseboat. But when Dalton and the boat disappear, it falls to Lyon and Bea to locate their far-out friend and bring him back to reality--dead or alive.   Richard Forrest's Lyon and Bea Wentworth Mysteries aren't just thrilling, they're funny, too. In this wild yarn of practical jokers and the people who kill them, the victims will all die laughing.   Death on the Mississippi is the 7th book in the Lyon and Bea Wentworth Mysteries, but you may enjoy reading the series in any order.