Contemporary crime noir at its best, mined from the dark pit of the human psyche.
Thriller author Cleave (The Laughter House, 2012, etc.) opens the door on the haunted history of his disgraced detective Theo Tate.
In this dark mystery, originally published in New Zealand in 2008, Cleave presents Tate’s earlier narrative to North American readers. Once with Christchurch police, Tate is now a private detective. He’s a man eaten up with grief, a man battling anger, depression and guilt with alcohol and self-isolation. Tate’s daughter died in a car-pedestrian accident, and his wife rests in a convalescent center, catatonic from a brain injury suffered during that tragedy. After the accident, Tate "fell into the abyss," with this novel a first-person narrative of his ongoing battle with existential despair. The novel opens with Tate being hired to look into a death he ignored while a police detective. Henry Martins is two years dead, but his daughter always believed he was murdered. Since Martins’ widow, remarried, has had another husband die, Tate has secured an exhumation order so that Martins’ corpse may be autopsied. But Martins’ body isn’t in his coffin. It’s among several grave robbed and tossed into a nearby lake, all to find spaces for a serial killer’s victims. Cleave is a powerful writer, conjuring a malevolent atmosphere, creating a relentless momentum propelling Tate deeper into a moral swamp. However, given Cleave’s psychological insight, it’s ironic the narrative catalysts—a priest and the serial killer—are the two least-defined among the story’s characters. Others among the attending cast are magnificently drawn, including the retired cemetery caretaker, a malignant drunk with dark secrets and a discredited television reporter willing to manipulate sound bites in a vendetta against Tate.
Contemporary crime noir at its best, mined from the dark pit of the human psyche.Pub Date: June 18, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4516-7783-6
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: March 31, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
An anodyne visit with Tricia and her friends and enemies hung on a thin mystery.
Too much free time leads a New Hampshire bookseller into yet another case of murder.
Now that Tricia Miles has Pixie Poe and Mr. Everett practically running her bookstore, Haven’t Got a Clue, she finds herself at loose ends. Her wealthy sister, Angelica, who in the guise of Nigela Ricita has invested heavily in making Stoneham a bookish tourist attraction, is entering the amateur competition for the Great Booktown Bake-Off. So Tricia, who’s recently taken up baking as a hobby, decides to join her and spends a lot of time looking for the perfect cupcake recipe. A visit to another bookstore leaves Tricia witnessing a nasty argument between owner Joyce Widman and next-door neighbor Vera Olson over the trimming of tree branches that hang over Joyce’s yard—also overheard by new town police officer Cindy Pearson. After Tricia accepts Joyce’s offer of some produce from her garden, they find Vera skewered by a pitchfork, and when Police Chief Grant Baker arrives, Joyce is his obvious suspect. Ever since Tricia moved to Stoneham, the homicide rate has skyrocketed (Poisoned Pages, 2018, etc.), and her history with Baker is fraught. She’s also become suspicious about the activities at Pets-A-Plenty, the animal shelter where Vera was a dedicated volunteer. Tricia’s offered her expertise to the board, but president Toby Kingston has been less than welcoming. With nothing but baking on her calendar, Tricia has plenty of time to investigate both the murder and her vague suspicions about the shelter. Plenty of small-town friendships and rivalries emerge in her quest for the truth.
An anodyne visit with Tricia and her friends and enemies hung on a thin mystery.Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-9848-0272-9
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2019
This ran in the S.E.P. and resulted in more demands for the story in book form than ever recorded. Well, here it is and it is a honey. Imagine ten people, not knowing each other, not knowing why they were invited on a certain island house-party, not knowing their hosts. Then imagine them dead, one by one, until none remained alive, nor any clue to the murderer. Grand suspense, a unique trick, expertly handled.
Pub Date: Feb. 21, 1939
ISBN: 0062073478
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Dodd, Mead
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1939
SEEN & HEARD
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