V.I. WARSHAWSKI IS STILL KEEPING CHICAGO SAFE FROM CRIME - SARA PARETSKY'S "BREAKDOWN"

“Breakdown” is Sara Paretsky’s fifteenth V.I. (stands for Victoria Iphigenia) Warshawki novel.  Even though V.I. (Vic to some) is somewhere north of 50, she is still the same tough talking, hard hitting private eye.  The book begins with V.I. doing a favor (what else is new?) for her cousin Petra.  Petra has a summer job as the moderator of a book club for tweenage girls.  The girls are reading a series of book featuring Carmilla, a shape-shifter who can turn into a raven (among other things).  The girls sneak away from the apartment where the book club meeting is being held to attend an initiation ritual in a local cemetery.  Petra begs V.I. to round up the errant girls before their parents find out they are missing.

When V.I. gets to the graveyard, however, she not only finds the wayward middle schoolers, but a dead body.  The male corpse is splayed atop a crypt, his heart pierced through with a large piece of steel.  The body is very close to where the tweens are playing their Carmilla games.  Being American young people, they all have cell phones with attached cameras so there is a risk that the girls took pictures of the crime being committed while snapping shots of the initiation ceremony.

Two of the book club members belong to very important Chicago families.  One of the girls is the daughter of Sophy Durango, a liberal candidate for the United States Senate.  The other is the granddaughter of Chaim Salanter, a wealthy Jewish businessman who is a huge contributor to Mrs. Durango’s senatorial campaign.

V.I. is, of course, the only p.i. in Chicago who can solve the case of the dead body in the cemetery.  The corpse turns out to be Miles Wucknik, also a p.i., though one with little moral fiber.  It appears that Miles has been blackmailing anyone and everyone (whether he worked for them or not) so there is a long list of those who would benefit from murdering Wuchnik.

To make the situation even more complex, V.I.  receives a desperate phone call from her old law school pal, Leydon Ashford.  Leydon has just been released from a mental hospital.  She wants to tell V.I. about something terribly wrong happening at the hospital.  But before the two can meet, Leydon is pushed off a balcony at the University of Chicago Rockefeller’s Chapel.

The one character (besides V.I.) who brings the many threads of the story together is Wake Lawton, a right wing TV journalist who works for a station very much like Fox News.  Lawton spends all his time slandering liberals like Senate candidate Sophy Durango and her wealthy supporter Chaim Salanter without ever checking his facts.  Lawton is pretty much a one note bad guy, not nearly as interesting as some of the three dimensional criminals found in Paretsky’s earlier V.I. Warshawski detective novels.

At the end of “Breakdown” Paretsky has V.I. stage a very unrealistic media event to make the killer admit their guilt.  She used the same kind of trick in her previous Warshawski book “Body Work” and it didn’t work there either.  “Breakdown” is an interesting, well-plotted mystery, except for the hokey conclusion.  In my opinion a mystery with an unsatisfying finish is not much of a mystery at all.  V.I. Warshawski is a fascinating protagonist.  I just hope Sara Paretsky doesn’t let V.I. solve any more crimes unless she can solve them the old fashioned way – with shoe leather, intuition, guts and a lot of heart.  That formula has worked for most of the Warshawski detective novels.  If only Paretsky can remember what made her female p.i. such a great character to begin with.

LOOK OUT ARIZONA CRIMINALS! ALI REYNOLDS IS ON THE CASE. "LEFT FOR DEAD" BY J. A. JANCE

Arizona native Ali Reynolds has been a reporter, a news anchor and a police officer.  After her second husband’s death Ali became an independently wealthy woman.  (Technically she is a widow, although Reynolds was in the process of divorcing her husband when he died.)  Ali enjoys helping her friends.  After learning that Deputy Sheriff Jose Reyes, a classmate from the police academy, has been shot while on duty, she drives to Tucson to look after Reyes’ pregnant wife and two small children.

At Physicians’ Medical Center in Tucson, Ali is surprised to see her close friend Sister Anselm.  The Taser toting nun is a patient advocate for a young woman who has been raped, severely beaten and left for dead in the Arizona desert.  The border patrol officer who finds the girl and takes her to the hospital assumes that she is an illegal alien.  This is also believed by the authorities at the hospital.  When the young lady wakes up, however, Sister Anselm discovers that she speaks very little Spanish.  She turns out to be a runaway by the name of Rose Ventana whose desperate parents have been searching for her for years.

Ali Reynolds and Sister Anselm work together and determine that a serial killer is behind Rose’s attack.  The two women also join forces to find out who shot Deputy Reyes.  Besides being wounded, Jose is accused of being a drug dealer.  Drugs have been found in both his patrol car and his house.

Reyes’ wife Teresa is adamant about the fact that her husband is not a criminal.  Mrs. Reyes has a great deal to cope with.  Besides her spouse’s problems, she has two little girls to take care of.  She certainly doesn’t need the mother of her first husband threatening to obtain custody of the two toddlers.  As well Teresa is nine months pregnant.  Is it any wonder that the young wife and mother is forced to have an emergency C-section?

The superhero team of Ali Reynolds and Sister Anselm solve both cases as well as take care of Teresa’s little girls and reunite Rose with her family.  In a lesser writer’s hands this might seem like an implausible story.  J.A. Jance’s skill at developing both an exciting plotline and fascinating characters turns “Left for Dead” into an enjoyable and believable mystery.  Ali Reynolds is an excellent protagonist.  She uses what she learned as an investigative reporter and police officer along with her many community contacts to protect all her friends and relatives in Arizona.  I can only hope that J.A. Jance writes many more Ali Reynolds thrillers.

INSPECTOR LYNLEY GOES ON A ROAD TRIP - "BELIEVING THE LIE" BY ELIZABETH GEORGE

 “Believing the Lie” is Elizabeth’s George 17^th Inspector Lynley mystery.  The patrician Thomas Lynley is still suffering from the senseless murder of his wife and unborn child.  David Hillier, Assistant Commissioner of New Scotland Yard, asks Lynley to look into the death of Ian Cresswell.  Ian’s uncle, Lake District industrialist Bernard Fairclough, is not satisfied with the local coroner’s ruling of accidental death by drowning.  Hillier tells Lynley to investigate Cresswell’s death on the qt.  Thomas is also told not to mention anything about this inquiry to his immediate superior (and sometimes lover) Detective Superintendent Isabelle Ardery.

Lynley is accompanied on his trip to the Lake District by his friends Simon and Deborah St. James.  Simon is a forensics expert and Deborah is a photographer.  Thomas’ usual partner at New Scotland Yard is Detective Sargent Barbara Havers.  Havers stays in London and secretly helps Lynley research the many angles of the Ian Cresswell drowning.

When Thomas and the St. James arrive in the Lake District, they find a large number of suspects, most of them connected to the Fairclough family.  With fantastic skill, George weaves the many subplots into a truly thrilling and fascinating novel.

Chief among the suspects is Nicholas Fairclough, Bernard’s only son.  Nicholas is a recovering meth addict who is married to a beautiful Argentine woman named Alathea.  Also under consideration by Lynley are Bernard Fairlough’s twin daughters Manette and Mignon.  Manette and her ex-husband Freddie, with whom she still shares living quarters, are executives at Fairclough Industries.  Mignon, who suffered a head injury when she was a child, does nothing but cause family drama and accept free room and board from her aging parents.

Drowning victim Ian Cresswell’s ex-wife Niamh is still furious that her former husband left her for a man.  She wants nothing to do with their two children, troubled fourteen year old Tim and sweet ten year old Gracie.  The children have been left in the care of Ian’s lover Kaveh Mehran.  Cresswell had wanted to marry Kaveh, but Mehran kept putting him off.  Now Kaveh is planning on moving his parents and bride-to-be into the house Ian left him in his will. 

There is even a tabloid journalist, Zed Benjamin, who desperately needs to discover something scandalous about the Fairclough family so he can keep his job.  Benjamin enters into an alliance with Deborah St. James.  Deborah is fixated on Nicholas’ wife Alathea.  The Argentine beauty is dealing with infertility issues, as is Deborah herself.

I am a huge fan of Elizabeth George’s Inspector Lynley mysteries.  “Believing the Lie” is a worthy addition to the series.  I sometimes feel, however, that George’s novels would benefit from a few less characters and subplots.  This is only a very small criticism.  I am glad to see that Thomas Lynley is finally starting to recover from the death of his beloved wife Helen.  Like many Lynley fans I hope Thomas will find happiness again in a future Elizabeth Geroge thriller.

A SAD AND LONELY POLICE DETECTIVE SAYS GOODBYE - "THE TROUBLED MAN" BY HENNING MANKELL

“The Troubled Man” is Henning Mankell’s 10^th and last Kurt Wallander mystery.  Wallander is said to be the most popular fictional detective in Europe, perhaps even in the world.  His dour personality is a perfect complement to the landscape of Skane, the Swedish province where Kurt lives and works.  The unhappy inspector drinks too much, eats too much, doesn’t exercise and is always unlucky in love – whether the woman is his ex-wife Mona, or the love of Wallander’s life, the Latvian professor Baiba Liepa.

In “The Troubled Man” Wallander is 60 years old, and after suffering several memory lapses, is afraid he may be succumbing to Alzheimer’s disease.  His daughter Linda gives him his first granddaughter, a beautiful little girl named Klara.  Linda’s partner (and Klara’s father) is Hans von Enke, a financier.  Hans’ father is the retired naval commander Hakan von Enke.

One day Hakan goes on his usual morning walk and never returns.  Not long after Hakan’s disappearance his wife, Louise, who is originally from East Germany, also vanishes.  Louise’s dead body is discovered a month later.  Even though Haken’s disappearance and his wife’s death happen out of Wallander’s jurisdiction, Kurt, of course, jumps in to solve these crimes.  Soon Wallander uncovers connections to the cold war and even the 1986 assassination of Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme.

The mystery of what really happened to the von Enkes is well plotted, but “A Troubled Man” is really about Kurt Wallander’s struggle with his own mortality.  Wallander’s life is lonelier than the topography of his native Skane.

This is a man who desperately needs a soul mate, but he’s never been able to hold on to a lover.  His wife Mona divorced Kurt years before.  While solving the murder of Latvian police officer Major Liepa, Wallander falls passionately in love with his widow Baiba.  Baiba returns Kurt’s love, but does not want to marry another policeman.  In “A Troubled Man” the Latvian professor visits Wallander and tells him she is dying of cancer.

The only lights in Wallander’s life are his daughter Linda and granddaughter Klara.  As the novels ends Kurt has difficulty recognizing the little girl.  Henning Mankell makes it very clear that “A Troubled Man” is the very last Kurt Wallander mystery.

Henning Mankell’s Wallander is a wonderfully rich character, one I will truly miss.  Kurt’s depressed personality is sometimes seen as a metaphor for Sweden in the early 21^st century.  Sweden is suffering from many of the same problems faced by other industrialized countries.  The economic uncertainty, political corruption, teen suicides and public lack of faith in the system – all these are problems familiar to Americans.  Inspector Kurt Wallander will be sorely missed, but perhaps it is time for him to take his leave from the fictional dectective stage.  The series ends on a very sad note, but Mankell remains true to his gloomy policeman.  “The Troubled Man” is a book to be savored, not only by fans of Kurt Wallander, but anyone who enjoys a beautifully written police procedural.

A MOTHER'S WORST NIGHTMARE - TAMI HOAG'S "DOWN THE DARKEST ROAD"

“Down the Deepest Road” is another one of Tami Hoag’s eerily suspenseful novels.  It is set in 1986, in the days before DNA testing.  Lauren Lawton was once a happy wife and mother, living in a quiet town near Santa Barbara, California.  But four years earlier Lauren’s sixteen year old daughter, Leslie, never returned home from a high school softball game.

The police suspected Roland Ballencoa, a photographer and convicted sex offender.  Lauren is convinced that Ballencoa kidnapped her daughter, but the police could not find evidence that the photographer committed the crime.  Two years after Leslie’s disappearance, Leslie’s husband died when his car fell off the edge of a mountain.  The official report found that Lauren’s husband had been drinking and declared the death an accident.  Lauren, however, believes that her husband had had enough of the conjecture and allegations concerning his role in Leslie’s disappearance and that his death was intentional.

So Lauren is left alone with her younger daughter, Leah.  In 1986 Leah is almost the age Leslie was when she disappeared.  Trying to move on with their lives, Lauren and Leah move to the small California town, Oak Knoll.  Oak Knoll in the 1980s is the setting for two other Tami Hoag mysteries – “Deeper than the Dead” and “Secrets to the Grave”.  Both are wonderfully suspenseful thrillers, but it is not necessary to have read them in order to understand Hoag’s latest novel.  “Down the Darkest Road” stands on its own.

While shopping in her new town, Lauren is convinced she sees Roland Ballencoa.  Soon Leah seems to be a target of the photographer and Lauren is afraid she will lose the only child she has left.  With the help of Oak Knoll homicide detective, Tony Mendez, Lauren is able to both protect Leah and discover what really happened to Leslie four years earlier.

As always, Tami Hoag writes a page-turner likely to keep readers awake at night.  Hoag excels at showing ordinary people caught up in nightmarish situations not of their own making.  Leslie and Leah Lawton could be anyone’s daughters.  Roland Ballencoas live in American towns both large and small.  Hoag’s many plot twists and turns are up to her usual high standard.  “Down the Deepest Road” is a novel all fans of crime fiction should read.

A MOBSTER'S SON FALLS IN LOVE - FAYE KELLERMAN'S "GUN GAMES"

“Gun Games” is Faye Kellerman’s 23^rd Peter Decker/Rina Lazarus mystery.  I have been a huge fan of the series since the first book “Ritual Bath”, but “Gun Games” is in a part a disappointment.  The weak portion of the novel involves the character of fifteen year old Gabriel Whitman.  Gabe is the son of gangster Chris Whitman Donatti, who first appeared in the Decker/Lazarus story “Justice” back in 1995.

Gabe’s mother, Terry, has run off with her lover to India.  Gabe’s father, Donatti, is in Nevada overseeing his chain of bordellos.  Police lieutenant, Peter Decker, and his wife, Rina Lazarus, agree to foster Gabe until he leaves for Juilliard.  (Gabe is a piano prodigy.)  Gabe meets and falls in love with a fourteen year old Jewish girl whose parents are from Iran.  Gabe’s young love, Jasmine, cannot tell her parents that she is seeing a white Catholic boy.  So they text constantly and meet secretly at the Coffee Bean.  Romeo/Juliet relationships are the basis of many good (sometimes great) novels, but this one just does not ring true.

The dialogue between Gabe and Yasmine, whether it’s by text or in person, seems very forced and unnatural.  Do teenagers really say “I adore you” or “What’s wrong, my love”?  The characters of Gabe and Yasmine don’t seem real.  I found myself not caring about either one of them.  The relationship between Gabe’s parents, damaged bad boy Chris Whitman Donatti, and bookish good girl, Terry McLaughlin, first seen in Kellerman’s novel “Justice” in 1995, is much more interesting.  Even though he only has a small part in “Gun Games”, 30 something Chris Whitman Donatti leaps off the page.  As already mentioned, I can’t say the same about his son, Gabe.

The other plot, which concerns two suicides at an exclusive Los Angeles prep school, is considerably more suspenseful.  The mother of the first victim, Gregory Hesse, does not believe her son could have committed suicide.  She asks police lieutenant, Peter Decker, to look into the case.  When another student from the same school takes her life six weeks later, and it is discovered that both suicides used stolen guns, the plot, as they say, thickens.  Decker and his team unearth some very unpleasant teens who are running the show at their prep school Bell and Wakefield.  These young bullies are much more faithful to life than Gabe and Yasmine.

“Gun Games” would be a much better mystery if Faye Kellerman had only concentrated on the teen suicides and the characters of Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus.  She should stick to what she does best and leave the teen romance to writers like Judy Blume.