The ending may not be a surprise, but characters enmeshed in a diligent investigation never fail to mesmerize.
Two detectives working for the FBI chase a killer choosing seemingly random victims from around the United States in this debut thriller, the first of a proposed series.
Elijah Warren, recruited by the FBI from a homicide task force, doesn’t get along with Aurelia Blanc, the bureau’s best forensic pathologist. But Director Clint Adams can’t deny that the two work well together. After they close a case in New York in early 1997, Adams makes them indefinite partners and puts them on a plane to Nashville, Indiana. There, small-town residents are shocked by the discovery of a body “melted” and cut into pieces. The detectives scrutinize the crime scene and question locals but don’t make much headway. That is, until Elijah and Aurelia both receive notes left in their hotel rooms, poetic stanzas clearly from a killer watching and toying with them. Meanwhile, in Colorado, rangers find the remains of a woman with an accompanying poem. Now pursuing a serial killer, the detectives follow a trail of victims from different states, while the now-dubbed Poetic Murderer leaves behind additional clues. In one instance, a man’s name is provided at the scene of someone else’s body, and it’s soon apparent that the killer has abducted said individual, all part of an appalling plan. Though readers will likely spot a significant clue before Elijah and Aurelia, Cady’s novel is a solid detective story thanks to a meticulous investigation. Numerous characters, for example, have input, from a medical examiner to Adams, who brags he’s found the best lead (“You’re welcome,” he adds). A slowly developing relationship between Elijah and Aurelia eases the mutual tension, and Cady fortunately keeps the light romance from overwhelming the ongoing case. Rich prose is at its most indelible when detailing perspective from the vicious “man wearing black”; vibrant descriptions are gloomy but no less fascinating, like a man who’s mentally and physically “being twisted in a barbwire blender of what made him human.” The killer coldly conversing with his victims makes him even more disturbing, telling someone his death will “help prove a point.”
The ending may not be a surprise, but characters enmeshed in a diligent investigation never fail to mesmerize.Pub Date: April 14, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4834-4867-1
Page Count: 230
Publisher: Lulu
Review Posted Online: Jan. 18, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
The fine Israeli writer Yehoshua (Open Heart, 1996, etc.) makes a lengthy journey into the year 999, the end of the first millennium. Indeed, it is the idea of a great journey that is the heart of the story here. Ben Attar, a Moroccan Jewish merchant has come a long distance to France to seek out his nephew and former partner Abulafia. Ben Attar, the nephew, and a third partner, the Muslim Abu Lutfi, had once done a lucrative business importing spices and treasures from the Atlas Mountains to eager buyers in medieval Europe. But now their partnership has been threatened by a complex series of events, with Abulafia married to a pious Jewish widow who objects vehemently to Ben Attar’s two wives. Accompanied by a Spanish rabbi, whose cleverness is belied by his seeming ineffectualness; the rabbi’s young son, Abu Lutfi; the two wives; a timorous black slave boy, and a crew of Arab sailors, the merchant has come to Europe to fight for his former partnership. The battle takes place in two makeshift courtrooms in the isolated Jewish communities of the French countryside, in scenes depicted with extraordinary vividness. Yehoshua tells this complex, densely layered story of love, sexuality, betrayal and “the twilight days, [when] faiths [are] sharpened in the join between one millennium and the next” in a richly allusive, languorous prose, full of lengthy, packed sentences, with clauses tumbling one after another. De Lange’s translation is sensitively nuanced and elegant, catching the strangely hypnotic rhythms of Yehoshua’s style. As the story draws toward its tragic conclusion—but not the one you might expect—the effect is moving, subtle, at once both cerebral and emotional. One of Yehoshua’s most fully realized works: a masterpiece.
Pub Date: Jan. 19, 1999
ISBN: 0-385-48882-3
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 1998
Above-average formula fiction, making full display of the author’s strong suits: sense of place, compassion for characters...
Female rivalry is again the main preoccupation of Hannah’s latest Pacific Northwest sob saga (Firefly Lane, 2008, etc.).
At Water’s Edge, the family seat overlooking Hood Canal, Vivi Ann, youngest and prettiest of the Grey sisters and a champion horsewoman, has persuaded embittered patriarch Henry to turn the tumbledown ranch into a Western-style equestrian arena. Eldest sister Winona, a respected lawyer in the nearby village of Oyster Shores, hires taciturn ranch hand Dallas Raintree, a half-Native American. Middle sister Aurora, stay-at-home mother of twins, languishes in a dull marriage. Winona, overweight since adolescence, envies Vivi, whose looks get her everything she wants, especially men. Indeed, Winona’s childhood crush Luke recently proposed to Vivi. Despite Aurora’s urging (her principal role is as sisterly referee), Winona won’t tell Vivi she loves Luke. Yearning for Dallas, Vivi stands up Luke to fall into bed with the enigmatic, tattooed cowboy. Winona snitches to Luke: engagement off. Vivi marries Dallas over Henry’s objections. The love-match triumphs, and Dallas, though scarred by child abuse, is an exemplary father to son Noah. One Christmas Eve, the town floozy is raped and murdered. An eyewitness and forensic evidence incriminate Dallas. Winona refuses to represent him, consigning him to the inept services of a public defender. After a guilty verdict, he’s sentenced to life without parole. A decade later, Winona has reached an uneasy truce with Vivi, who’s still pining for Dallas. Noah is a sullen teen, Aurora a brittle but resigned divorcée. Noah learns about the Seattle Innocence Project. Could modern DNA testing methods exonerate Dallas? Will Aunt Winona redeem herself by reopening the case? The outcome, while predictable, is achieved with more suspense and less sentimental histrionics than usual for Hannah.
Above-average formula fiction, making full display of the author’s strong suits: sense of place, compassion for characters and understanding of family dynamics.Pub Date: Feb. 9, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-312-36410-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2008
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
