Find You in the Dark by Nathan Ripley

Find You in the Dark by Nathan Ripley - Residing near Seattle Martin “Mart” Reese has just returned from a “dig” in the woods. On the dig he has found human bones. His wife, Ellen, and teenage daughter, 14 year old Kylie, know nothing of his “digs”. As far as his family knew he had just spent a couple of days camping.

It is a tension filled house. Ellen is overprotective of Kylie. Twenty years ago her sister, Tinsley, was taken from a dingy nightclub and murdered but her body has never been found. Ellen and Martin have been married for 18 years. Martin is working hard not to return to the mindset he had at university 20 years ago.

Martin is rich and retired. A tech guy who sold his firm to give himself the time to know his daughter as she grows up.

While Kylie and Ellen discuss family rules Martin looks at photos in his scrapbook, his very personal laptop, from his most recent dig:

I made it through the digging, the carefully arranged dirt, until I finally hit

the first bone: an ulna, the thin forearm bone of a woman in her early

twenties. The next few pictures uncovered the rest of her, showing how

carefully I’d taken the dirt off her yesterday morning.

Is there a shiver working its way up your spine?

I was captured.

Martin has been digging up the bodies of murder victims using information he purchased from a lazy corpulent Seattle detective with a big thirst.

Martin’s passion for “digging” has ebbed and he has decided to make his next “dig” his last. He gets a USB with interviews on it with the suspected killer of Tinsley.

He secretly smiles for he had already made preparations to dig up his sister-in-law’s bones before receiving the USB.

There is an eerie fascination in Martin’s obsession  to find the bones of the murdered. To succeed he needs to delve deep into the minds of serial killers:

A serial killer’s mind isn’t impenetrable, even if those FBI connect-the-dots profiles never seem to nail down the guy’s tics until after he’s caught or killed. That insane foreignness is just a comforting idea the nonmurdering public would like to nurture. A serial killer’s thinking is just this side of ours, in the way that a two-year-old’s logic is alien to a teenager.

The digs are a ritual event with specific rites and Martin talking aloud to himself.

And then Kylie catches him listening to an audio of a psychologist’s interview with Tinsley’s killer.

Martin discusses the life decisions of Tinsley’s killer with Kylie:

“…. Even if he had to kill himself, he could have stopped. But he didn’t,

and that’s what makes him evil. Evil, dead, human garbage.”

What do you do when you cannot discuss your favourite “hobby”? An activity carefully documented and meticulously planned. Even the introverted want more than the enjoyment of the planning and the “digging” and the remembering.

Martin makes mocking robotic calls to the police about uncovering the bodies the police have failed to find. Detective Sandra Whittal is irritated with the calls and the attitude in them. She is inherently suspicious of someone searching out bodies but avoiding credit or publicity. He is dubbed “The Finder”.

And then a newly killed woman is found by Martin in a “dig” with the body he expected to find and it is clear a killer knows, not just of his digging, but the details as well.

Police interest in the “Finder” is intense. Whittal is an intelligent and very determined officer.

Tension builds by the page to the conclusion.

It has been some time since I read a unique mystery. The concept of a “Finder” of serial murder victims is brilliant.  It is an excellent novel not just a very good first book. At the same time the plot chills the reader. Noir is barely black enough to describe Find You in the Dark. Can, should, a reader enjoy the exploration of the minds and manipulations of serial killers and those fascinated by them?

A Gentleman’s Murder by Christopher Huang

A Gentleman’s Murder by Christopher Huang - Eric Peterkin is the sleuth many of us think we could be if opportunity arose. How many crime fiction bloggers have not dreamed of the chance to become sleuths solving puzzling murders? I am one of those bloggers. And should we be transported by time travel back to the Golden Age of crime fiction to take up the investigation even better. Eric lives out such a dream.

It is 1924 and Eric is spending his days reading at his club, the Britannia Club:

Eric had a job evaluating manuscripts for publication, and lately, most seemed

to be about mysterious deaths behind locked doors.

He sits in “his Usual Armchair” next to a fireplace reading with the occasional drink and discussion with fellow club members. He is filling his time with no real purpose to his life.

The Britannia Club “had but one requirement for membership, aside from being a gentleman: experience on the battlefield in the service of the Empire.” Eric had spent a year in the trenches of Flanders.

There has always been a Peterkin as a member of the club.

Yet Eric is as much tolerated as accepted at the Club. He is half Chinese. (His mother was Chinese.) There is a haughty race and class consciousness that looks down upon the “half-caste” Eric. He is “not properly English”. He bears the slights but is an angry young man.

Through all the English classes there is prejudice against the Chinese. The “yellow peril” is feared. They are a favoured villain in crime fiction of the era.

When the newest member, Albert Benson, is murdered at the club and there is doubt the police will aggressively seek out the killer Eric is ready to take up the investigation.

Aiding Eric is Avery Ferrett who spends his days at the Arabica coffee house occupied with horoscopes and tarot cards.

Eric is precisely logical. While Avery is his friend and assistant, a form of Watson, Eric has no belief in the stars or cards.

The investigation, as common with many post-WW I mysteries, involves events from the war. Eric’s investigation takes him to a vast country home, Sotheby Manor, which was a wartime hospital. (Think of Downton Abbey). All the pivotal members of the Club had connections with Sotheby. Adding to the intrigue a young Chinese woman, Emily Ang, who was working at the hospital disappeared during the summer of 1918.

Ang’s disappearance gained but a flicker of newspaper coverage. Many would equally like public attention to the Benson murder to slip away as quickly and quietly. Eric’s strong sense of duty will not abide a coverup. Despite the disdain and threats he endures.

With the murder having taken place in a locked vault Eric starts with determining how access was obtained. He is thorough and careful.

It is striking how Eric, when physically threatened, can almost instantly revert to a soldier fighting for his life. Eric had thought the War had had little effect upon him. Gradually he realizes his psyche was damaged by the year he spent at the front.

Eric says:

“We’ve all been through hell. And it’s turned some of us into monsters.”

I wish Eric had described and used some of the methods of investigation from the crime fiction he had been reading during his days at the Club. Eric draws upon no fictional sleuths of that era..

I wish Avery had been more developed as a character. He aids Eric but is not a true assistant. Most of the time Eric acts on his own. One of the strengths of the Sherlock Holmes series is the active participation of Dr. Watson.

I cannot recall reading about the status of English / Chinese and Chinese people in England during and after WW I. If anything Canada treated its Chinese residents of that era worse than England. There was discriminatory legislation and Chinese Canadians were not granted the vote until 1947.

A Gentleman’s Murder is a promising start to Huang’s crime fiction career.

Give Out Creek by J.G. Toews

Give Out Creek by J.G. Toews - Stella Mosconi with husband Joe and sons, Matt (9) and Nicky (7), has moved from Vancouver back to her hometown of Nelson, British Columbia. They live in a nice cabin on Kootenay Lake and she bicycles into town each day for her work as a journalist with the Nelson Times.

Stella has had a lifelong fear of water. Swimming lessons were restricted to a pool. Now living on a lake she is trying to work through her fear. Solo canoeing does not go well and leaves her shaken.

On the way to work she sees an empty rowboat upon the lake. Stella is deeply upset a short time later when, on her way to interview the police, she sees her friend, Lillian Fenniwick, dead in the boat. She instinctively wants to rearrange Lillian’s dress which has twisted above her knees.

Lillian was a retired lawyer. At 64 she had severe macular degeneration which left her barely able to read. She had just enough sight to be able to row. The previous night she asserted her independence to her housekeeper, Nina Huber, by insisting she would row over to the home of her friend, Vanessa Levitt.

Stella’s former high school classmate, Ben McKearn, now a sergeant in the Nelson Police Department leads the investigation. Each remembers the other from 20 years earlier and teenage dreams.

Stella, Lillian and Vanessa were members of a monthly book club. Retired life coach turned financial adviser, Henry Sutton, was the sole male member of the club.

The book club also becomes a very modest investment club with members investing $20 to $100 with Sutton. They are intent on “socially responsible investing”. However, some members privately invest much more.

Among her friends no one suspects Lillian was murdered.

And then a needle is found in the water near Lillian’s cabin and the pathologist performing the autopsy re-examines the body and finds an injection mark and everything changes.

Creating suspicion are an unknown aspect of the relationship between Lillian and Nina and the provisions of Lillian’s will.

There is little marital bliss for several of the ladies of the club.

Nina was a challenging character for me. Drab in appearance and a pessimist there is not a bit of spark to her. I appreciate she provides a contrast to the bright and lovely ladies of the club but I found it hard to be engaged by Nina.

Stella is a good woman with a strong sense of duty. Coupled with an equally strong curiosity she is driven to find out what happened.

The development of relationships between the characters came later than I would have liked and I would have appreciated more.

The issue of who benefits from the valuable home and property left by the widowed Lillian was only explored late in the book. I do not want to provide a spoiler nor be too technical as a lawyer but the scenario set out was not plausible to me.

The pace dragged for awhile but picked up well in the final third of the book. Toews is good at plotting.

Give Out Creek is a nice mystery.

In Extremis by V.V. Drummond Finished

In Extremis by V.V. Drummond - In my last post I started a review of In Extremis. This post contains the remainder of the review. Here is a link to the first post - In Extremis Started.

Among the judge’s documents is a box titled Mandamus. Morgan tells the judge’s widow it relates to a legal charity - a clear legal fiction to any lawyer. The group’s letterhead depicts the classic Justitia (Lady of Justice) but without a blindfold and bears the phrase Mihi Vindictam (Vengeance is Mine).

Mandamus is one of the prerogative writs of English law that were used in Canadian law when I was a young lawyer. An application for mandamus is for an order to command government or an agency of government to carry out the provisions of a law not being enforced.

The surviving members of Mandamus subsequently meet to discuss their actions and the future of the group:

“We, more than others, are aware that horrible crimes and devious

criminals are going unpunished because of flaws in a system we have

devoted our lives to maintaining. To the extent we have been able to, we

have stepped forward to try to arrest that trend. We have, to paraphrase

Dumas, asked the God of vengeance to yield us His place to punish the

wicked.”

…..

“In doing right, are we morally justified in doing wrong? And lastly, are

we doing enough, or are we trying to do too much?”

I have never encountered fictional vigilante lawyers. They made me very uncomfortable.

The book has two stories uneasily connected. There is the detailed steamy erotic story of an older woman and younger man exploring a relationship. At the same time there are the actions of the vigilante lawyers.

There is a common theme of betrayal. Her adultery breaks the oaths of her marriage vows. The vigilante actions of the lawyers breach the rules of conduct for lawyers. I did not find the respective plots worked well together. It would have been better had there been two books.

The vigilante lawyers are more troubling to me than other vigilantes because of their positions within the justice system. Still the concept of vengeful lawyers is a clever plot line that could have made a distinctive and memorable book. As set out above it does not fit with the story of the lusty lovers. Yet In Extremis is a challenging book for it is not simplistic sexploitation.

As the end of the book approaches the police are introduced. It is late in the plot. Their involvement early on would have been intriguing.

The sophisticated vigilante plot line descends to predictability at the end of the book. So much more was possible on this plot line. At the same time in the other plot line there is a genuine surprise at the end with regard to the affair.

Is there a subgenre of erotic suspense? In Extremis is hardly romantic suspense. On which plot line lay the emphasis of the book I note the publisher of In Extremis is eXtasy Books Inc.

In Extremis by V.V. Drummond Begun

In Extremis by V.V. Drummond - Jason Oosterhuis, self-described wife beater, has just arrived in Toronto after being released from prison for good behaviour having served 39 months of a 6 year sentence. While contemplating the women he might terrorize now that he is free a hired killer shoots him in the shower.

Sharyn Barrington, recently turned 42, is drawing away from the Catholic faith. She is questioning the Church as the means to salvation. Her husband, Carl, a lawyer and accountant, a staunch conservative Catholic, is upset. Their marriage is struggling. The relationship has not been aided by her recent opening of a lingerie shop called Booty’s.

Her provocative older sister, Jenna, is having an affair. Sharyn thinks of adultery as a sin. Jenna is unconcerned. There is no discussion of the commitment to faithfulness in the vows of marriage.

Sharon, deeply unhappy, has drifted into drinking daily screwdrivers referring to them as V and Oh! What started as the occasional screwdriver now includes taking a thermos full of screwdrivers to the store on week days and drinking at home through the weekends.

Sharyn reflects on the morality of having an affair with a teenage friend of her son. Her focus is upon her consequences. Desire triumphs and, as inevitable, Sharyn has pangs of conscience over the affair.

Morgan “Morg” M. Cathcart, QC, LLB and widowed a few years mourns Mr. Justice Samuel Keane Leishman’s death. The retired judge at 83 collapsed at Mass. He converted late in life from Judaism to Catholicism.

There is a deft observation on why a man, born and raised a Jew and with two Jewish marriages, converted to Catholicism:

…. He’d said there was less moral relativism in Catholicism than Judaism. “ I like lots of shalts and shalt nots.” Sam had no patience with shades of gray.

The seal of the confessional is considered by the judge’s troubled pastor:

Would he serve God best by being a loyal priest and maintaining the seal of the confessional? Or would the secret he took to his grave - unspecified crimes, some of them perhaps horrible - condone mortal sin and violate his sense of doing good for the greatest number? And what was God’s position on these questions? To serve a greater good, could He condone someone being a bad priest?

The priest’s turmoil over what the judge has told him felt out of place for every man who becomes a Catholic priest has had ample time to consider the issue in the seminary and, if unable to accept the seal is absolute, not to become a priest.

Morgan is a bitter and vengeful man over a teenager escaping responsibility for killing his wife in a hit and run. He sees no irony between his anger over defence lawyers zealously representing criminal defendants and his satisfaction with his own legal work. Morgan, a tax lawyer, seeks to use every legal argument and strategy to minimize the taxes of his clients.

The old judge had been known for his stern punishments of the convicted. Morgan is ready to carry on Sam’s legacy.

(My next post will contain the rest of my review.)

Cobra Clutch by A .J. Devlin

Cobra Clutch by A .J. Devlin- “Hammerhead” Jed is enjoying a banana milkshake (a milkshake is the favoured drink in his family) at the DQ with aging professional wrestler, Johnny Mamba. Jed is a bouncer and former pro wrestler. Mamba, the victim of a reptile-napping. is calling on a favour owed. His pet python, Ginger, has been stolen from his locker and a $10,000 ransom demanded.

Mamba is a hard man but everyone loves someone (something) and he will pay anything for Ginger’s safe return. It was touching, not a joke, that a snake could be so important in his life.

Jed had justly earned his nickname in the wrestling world by breaking a 2” x 4” board over his head after winning a match.

Aiding Jed is his cousin, Declan St. James, only a few years removed from Ireland. He is famous in downtown Vancouver for his ability to pour the perfect Guinness (including a shamrock in the foam) and picking fights when he has had too many Guinness.

Jed’s father, Frank Ounstead, a massive retired police detective owns the Emerald Shillelagh Pub and operates a private investigation firm.

Mamba is wrestling with the XCCW (X-Treme Canadian Championship Wrestling). While impressively titled the XCCW is far from the glamour and money of the WWE. Its wrestlers often perform in venues with dozens of seats. The owner, Bert Grasby, XCCW is shrewd and sleazy.

The members of the XCCW are a colourful group of characters. I have not watched professional wrestling for a long time. In Cobra Clutch Devlin portrays the matches as physical theatre. The performers work hard and frequently suffer injuries in their shows. With my background in judo I appreciated the skillful use of leverage.

Jed has a hard time getting anyone to take his investigation seriously.

Matters become very serious when a ransom drop goes badly. Both Ginger and Mamba are dead. Mamba’s throat has been slashed.

There is a brilliant scene of a necropsy (reptile autopsy) of Ginger. She died from ingesting a rare methamphetamine.

The lovely Detective Constable Rya Shepherd will lead the murder investigation for the Vancouver Police Department.

The busty Stormy Daze, Mamba’s ex-girlfriend and a XCCW star, is ready to be comforted over her loss.

When photos demonstrate Mamba was having an affair and Stormy publicly threatened the other woman Stormy rises to the top of the suspect list.

Jed finds the P.I. work more interesting than expected. He has been stoutly resisting his father’s invitations to join him in the business.

The violence is at an American noir level. There is a double digit body count.

The story flows easily in the tradition of the best tough guy P.I.’s.

There is deft jabbing wit. The bulky, oft banged up Jed is referred to as “McDreamy”.

Jed is self-deprecating.  Explaining his appearance to a police inspector:

“Don’t let the shaggy mop and designer stubble fool you, bub,” I said.

“This is a carefully crafted look.”

I was reminded a lot of Sam Wiebe’s tough guy sleuth, Dave Wakefield, who also works the mean streets of Downtown Eastside. Dave and Jed would have a good time together.

In a cover blurb Sam described the book as “intense and cinematic”. I would agree. Cobra Clutch would be well suited to being made into a movie.

Devlin’s master’s degree in screenwriting and subsequent experience as a screenwriter are evident in the dialogue.

Devlin is an excellent new young Canadian crime fiction author. I definitely want to read the next in the series. (I would recommend a more attractive cover for his next book.)