WHODUNIT?

REVIEWS BY BRUCE TIERNEY

New mysteries start 2006 off right

It would be difficult to envision a more diverse selection of mysteries than those on offer this month: 1) a yarn of New York City power brokers and crooked politicians, and the iconoclastic PI who unearths their dirty deeds; 2) a harrowing tale of an English businesswoman with a secret after-hours life; 3) an atmospheric suspense novel of double-dealing and murder set in 1910 New Orleans; and 4) our Tip of the Ice Pick winner, a quirky and original Florida mystery featuring not one but two Jesuses, one of whom is a serial killer!

Speak of the Devil, the debut novel from writer Richard Hawke, is not really his first novel. Strictly speaking, Hawke is a pseudonym for popular mystery author Tim Cockey, whose tales of funeral director/detective Hitchcock Sewell have been entertaining fans for several years. Cockey has lost neither his wit nor his edge in Speak of the Devil, yet his central character is a marked departure from the aforementioned Sewell. Fritz Malone is the illegitimate son of a former NYC police commissioner, a city-hall insider who breaks more rules than he follows, thus making close friends and bitter foes with similar ease. When Malone witnesses a cold-blooded shooting at the Thanksgiving Day parade, he is instrumental in the capture of the shooter; immediately afterward, things get Alice-in-Wonderland bizarre: Malone is blindfolded, thrown into the back of a cop car and whisked away to an "unspecified location" for questioning/debriefing. Before the shooter can be interrogated, he is shot to death by one of his guards. To Malone, the whole scenario reeks of a cover-up. So, of course, he decides to do a bit of clandestine snooping. Fritz Malone is an engaging new character; Hawke is a welcome addition to the Mystery Hall of Fame!


A friend in need

I have said on numerous occasions, to anyone within earshot, that the best mystery novels are written in the first-person. In Catch Me When I Fall, author Nicci French (the nom de plume for journalists Nicci Gerrard and Sean French) adds a new spin: the first half of the book is narrated by Holly Krauss, a fast-track London advertising agency owner whose life is rapidly spiraling out of control. She plays fast and loose with her business, alienating co-workers and clients on an equal-opportunity basis. At night, she drinks herself into a stupor, ending up in the beds of more-than-willing strangers, awakening with only muddy recollections of the previous night's events. One by one, friends and loved ones desert her, and on one particularly depressing evening, Holly decides to take drastic action: swallowing a week's worth of depression medication with an orange juice chaser, she lies down to await the inevitable. Part two of Catch Me When I Fall is narrated by Holly's friend and business partner, Meg. The voice is distinctly different, as Meg is more businesslike and matter-of-fact. Together the two spin a tale of intrigue and betrayal, with the relentless, edge-of-the-seat thrills that Nicci French's readers have come to expect.


Murder strikes the Big Easy

Atlanta author David Fulmer got off to a great start with his Shamus Award-winning first novel, Chasing the Devil's Tail (2001). Now he's back with Rampart Street, the third Storyville mystery set in New Orleans nearly 100 years ago and featuring Valentin St. Cyr. Down on his luck, St. Cyr reluctantly accepts an assignment from a New Orleans parish boss: the investigation of the murder of a prominent Big Easy socialite caught with his pants down on the wrong side of town. Truth be told, almost everyone wants this case to go away, and with as little fanfare and publicity as possible. That said, the man's haughty daughter wants to know the truth, even if it turns out to be less than flattering to her late father's memory. When another pillar of society, an acquaintance of the first victim, turns up dead, St. Cyr begins to suspect a connection. It is a connection that no one is eager to see established, however, and pressure mounts for St. Cyr to whitewash his findings. Fulmer's plotting is spot-on, his dialogue laden with period slang, and his characters multifaceted and interestingly motivated. I'll definitely go back and catch the first two in the series.


MYSTERY OF THE MONTH

Listen up, Carl Hiaasen fans! There's a new kid on the block in Florida, and she can crank out a tale worthy of the quirkiest of the Sunshine State scribes. In her first mystery novel (after two previous literary efforts), author N.M. Kelby seems to have found her calling. Whale Season chronicles some very strange events in the tiny south Florida town of Whale Harbor. No whales have ever been spotted in Whale Harbor, mind you, but that didn't stop the Civil War-era developers from working their marketing magic on unsuspecting travelers. Whale Harbor may well be America's first tourist trap. Visitors to the town fall into one of two categories: the bushwhacked and the dreamers. Those who stay are both.

On Christmas Eve, the town has turned out en masse at the local watering hole to drink eggnog schnapps, which I sincerely hope exists only in the mind of the author. The cast of usual suspects: Leon, an RV salesman of limited means and talents, about to land the windfall of his career; Carlotta, Leon's girl, cast in the mold of '50s matinee dolls; Trot Jeeter, town sheriff, who has a major crush on Carlotta; Bender, town mayor and chief bartender, an odd sort who barks at irregular intervals like a noble Scottish terrier. Oh, and Jesus. Not just some bearded hippie type, but a full-on Jesus, complete with white robes, stigmata and scars from the crown of thorns. Plus "cosmic X-ray eyes." All in all, a Jesus to be reckoned with. Jesus and Leon are head-to-head in an epic game of poker; Jesus has bet his quarter-million dollar motor home against all of Leon's worldly possessions. "How about kings are wild?" Jesus asks. "That's been my experience." What Leon doesn't know is that Jesus is a serial killer, and what better time than Christmas for a murderous Prince of Peace? To tell more would be to give away critical plot points, so let's just say that Whale Season is witty, wise and laugh-out-loud funny, a must for fans of Florida literary icons Tim Dorsey, Carl Hiaasen and Dave Barry.


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