Like many mystery authors, I spend far too much time pondering lies and lying. Naturally, this means picking up books with “Lie” in the title.
IN A HOUSE OF LIES by Ian Rankin
Edinburgh detective John Rebus is back in a new novel by the master of tartan noir. By this time in the long-running series, Rebus is retired with a dog, Siobhan Clarke has moved up the police ladder, former internal affairs investigator Malcolm Fox is trying to live down his past—and still isn’t Siobhan’s love
interest—and mob boss Big Ger Cafferty is still Rebus’s nemesis.
With these pieces on the chessboard, an abandoned car is found in a gully near a stately home. The car’s dead owner is found inside with police-issue handcuffs around his ankles.
The victim is soon identified as a private investigator who disappeared in 2006. Rebus was one of the detectives assigned to the original missing persons case.
Fast forward and now it’s a murder investigation using cutting-edge forensic methods. Who killed the young man, left him in his car trunk for years, then towed it to the gully and dumped it? Siobhan takes a leading role in the new investigation. Fox is tapped to go through the old case files.
Expertly crafted secondary characters are connected to the case, from a slimy movie producer caught in an endless rivalry to a retired cop with sad secrets.
Irritating everybody, Rebus worms his way in, finding details to pick at. Unofficially, of course.
He targets two detectives who were in uniform in 2006, moonlighting as bodyguards for Edinburgh’s underworld. In turn, they put the squeeze on Fox to keep them informed about the current murder investigation. Were they the killers? Or was it the movie producer? Or his business rival? What about the victim’s
lover?
Meanwhile, Cafferty is pulling strings from behind the scenes. As in other books in the series, the dialogue between the mob boss and Rebus crackles with animosity, anger, distrust, and challenge. They are more alike than Rebus will admit; each stirring the pot for information and manipulate
outcomes.
Bottom line: Just when you think Rankin can’t take the Rebus series any farther, he delivers another brilliantly plotted drama. The writing is fluid, the sense of place is captivating and the outcome highly satisfying. The “house” of the title? Take your pick.
Get it on Amazon >>> https://geni.us/lies101
ONE LAST LIE by Paul Doiron
This is the latest offering in the 11-book Mike Bowditch series set in rural Maine. Bowditch is a state Game Warden, which is a law enforcement position, and is now the service’s criminal investigator.
He’s in a long-distance relationship with a state trooper, but grappling with residual feelings for his ex, a stormy biologist and pilot who moved to Florida. As the book opens, Bowditch is in Miami, investigating a job applicant whose resume doesn’t quite stack up, leading to an uneasy reunion.
But when Charley, Bowditch’s mentor and the ex-girlfriend’s dad, disappears leaving behind a cryptic letter, Bowditch drops everything to hunt for the missing man. A clue quickly turns up: an antique game warden badge sold at a flea market.
The badge was a keepsake owned by a young warden who investigated a poaching and drug smuggling outfit near the border with Canada several years ago. Undercover at the time, he was murdered but his body never found. The suspect drowned while trying to evade arrest.
The clue connects Bowditch with a retired warden who oversaw the murder investigation. The old warden has his own secrets and lies, however, making the case murkier than ever.
Most of the characters are deliciously gray. Bowditch can’t figure out their past, their motives, or what game they are playing with him now. Duplicity is laced throughout the book.
I really like this series for the descriptions of Maine’s rugged interior. Doiron uses all our senses to create an enveloping sense of place. Bowditch is genuine, too, with an easy inner voice. He doesn’t have life or his job nailed down, but is doing the best he can, with a few regrets along the way.
One thing surprised me about this book. In contrast to others I’ve read in the series, it is peppered with current political references, almost as if Doiron was handed a set of talking points and told to squeeze them in. Some references fit the narrative; others feel contrived. For example, Doiron espouses open borders
several times (“I thought about how every border on earth is a man-made fiction.”) but cross-border drug smuggling leading to the opioid crisis is a core plot element.
Get it on Amazon >>> https://geni.us/lies102
