SATURDAY,FEBRUARY22,2020 | THEGLOBEANDMAIL O R9
Framed
BYS.L.MCINNIS
(GRANDCENTRAL,330PAGES)
Beth Montgomery is the woman
who has it all. Her husband is a
handsome up-and-coming film
producer. She has a small but
tasteful house in Beverly Hills,
Calif., and there’s room for an
anticipated baby. It all seems so
perfect – until we realize it’s not.
The great husband is a flirt and
the couple are in debt up to their
armpits. The planned-for baby
isn’t appearing and the great new
film needs a monied angel to save
the business, the house and the
marriage. To add to the misery,
Beth left a promising career as a
musician to give piano lessons to
children who have little to no tal-
ent.
Into this sad situation comes
Cassie Ogilvy, Beth’s college
roommate. Cassie is sexy and un-
inhibited and on the run from a
drug deal gone bad. After a dec-
ade of silence, she turns up at
Beth’s door needing a room “for a
couple of days.” With Cassie
comes chaos, but also memories
of other times and places and
that’s the real mystery here. What
is the bond between Cassie and
Beth? It’s a lot stronger than the
one that binds Beth to her perfect
life in Los Angeles.
This is a terrific debut for To-
ronto author McInnis, who has a
career in television journalism.
She is adept at not only setting
the scene but her characters,
including Beth’s husband, have
depth. At its core, this is a novel
about female friendships and
how they’re forged and how they
reignite after time. This is defi-
nitely a writer to watch.
Love,Heather
BYLAURIEPETROU
(CROOKEDLANE,280PAGES)
I suspect that this novel by Ryer-
son professor Laurie Petrou end-
ed up on my shelf by mistake. Pe-
trou already has two novels to her
credit and this book, her young-
adult debut, is set in the cockpit
of a modern high school. But it’s
not just for the under-30 crowd. If
you’ve ever survived high school,
you’ll appreciate this skillfully
written book. The central charac-
ter is Stevie, a very ordinary girl
who runs afoul of The Popular
Ones. As the mean girls bully and
harass, Stevie’s misery is en-
hanced when her best friend, Lot-
tie, the one person she thought
she could count on, betrays her
and joins the bullies. Alone, Ste-
vie turns to Dee, a rebellious out-
sider. Where else do you go when
your world collapses?
So far, this plotline is one that
novels about teenagers have ex-
plored for decades. That this one
has a twist, several, in fact, makes
it very different and extremely
compelling. To say more is to give
away bits of the plot and that’s re-
ally a crime in a book this good.
Just say that it’s been half a centu-
ry since I hated high school and I
remembered every horrible day
of it as I read this book. Save it for
a cold weekend. You won’t want
to put it down.AloneInTheWild
BYKELLEYARMSTRONG
(MINOTAUR,368PAGES)Alone In The Wildis the fifth novel
in Armstrong’s Rockton series
and it’s the best so far, largely be-
cause it calls into question one of
Rockton’s most unbreakable
rules: No one can move here if
they’re under 18. Rockton, as fans
already know, is the town where
people go to hide, to recover, to
lose bad pasts and bad memories.
Detective Casey Duncan came
here to find a friend and found a
new life and a new love with Sher-
iff Eric Dalton. In a town built on
secrets and surrounded by wil-
derness it’s good to have a holi-
day, and Casey and Eric are off
camping. They hear a baby cry-
ing, not a normal sound in the
forest. They come upon a woman,
murdered, the baby still in her
arms: Who was she? Is the baby
hers? What happened? Most ofall, can the baby be taken into
Rockton?
If you haven’t already discov-
ered Ottawa writer Kelley Arm-
strong, who has three other series
on the go, this is the perfect book
to pick up, although you may
want to read the other six Rock-
ton novels first to find out just
how Casey comes to this place
and how very different the citi-
zens of Rockton are. Armstrong
has built a complete world, with
its own rules, morals and customs
and populated it with fascinating
people and even a little dash of
romance to deepen the charac-
ters. This is definitely one of her
best books.Foresight
BYIANHAMILTON
(HOUSEOFANANSI,336PAGES)I didn’t think anything could top
Ian Hamilton’s Ava Lee novels for
originality and style, but his back-
story about the rise of Uncle
Chow is even better. These novels
(this is the second in the series)
take place in China when major
political and social changes are
happening and those events are
worked into the plotlines as Un-
cle builds his empire. For a history
buff like me, it’s irresistible.
This time out, it’s 1980 and
Deng Xiaoping plans to turn Chi-na into a superpower to best the
United States and the USSR. To
begin, he establishes Special Eco-
nomic Zones along the coast. The
plan is to entice foreign invest-
ment and to build China trade.
The Chinese Communist Party
may see the possibilities in capi-
talist trade but the Triads are way
ahead of them. Uncle has overex-
tended himself with his mainland
China business and another Triad
is attempting to move into his ter-
ritories. And, of course, he’s been
outside China a long time. Things
have changed.
Hamilton’s extensive knowl-
edge of Chinese history and busi-
ness practices are on show in all
his novels, but this one is one of
his best. This one should net Ha-
milton another Arthur Ellis nom-
ination.TheAbsolution
BYYRSASIGURDARDOTTIR,
TRANSLATEDBYVICTORIACRIBB
(MINOTAUR,368PAGES)Devoted readers of Scandinavian
crime fiction are beginning to see
the differences between the cul-
tures in thrillers. Iceland, for in-
stance, focuses tightly on the
crime and its effects on commu-
nity. Think ofTrappedor any of
Arnaldur Indrioason’s novels
incorporating local history andhabits of hunting and encounters
with nature.The Absolutionis very
much in that vein. Sigurdadottir,
one of the country’s finest writ-
ers, spins a terrifying tale that be-
gins on Snapchat. A young wom-
an begs for forgiveness. From
whom? When her body is found,
it’s marked with the number two.
Detective Huldar, Sigudardot-
tir’s regular, is in charge and there
are no clues, no forensics. In the
absence of it all, he brings in child
psychologist Freya as backup.
Getting teenagers to talk, espe-
cially about one that’s dead, re-
quires a specialist. Freya is able to
get some information, most of it
negative. The dead girl wasn’t the
angel her parents and friends
want everyone to remember.
Then another girl goes missing
and the clock is ticking. Will she
be number three? If you haven’t
already discovered Sigurdardot-
tir, this is the book to begin.TheTenant
BYKATRINEENGBERG,
TRANSLATEDBYTARACHACE
(SCOUT,356PAGES)If Iceland is small-town, Denmark
likes the culture and elegance of
the city. Copenhagen is the set-
ting for this brilliant first novel by
Engberg, a Danish choreogra-
pher. There are several tenants in
the book and the first one, an el-
derly man, is taking out his trash
when he sees that the door to the
flat of two young women is open.
He pushes it in, calling out, and
then collapses. When he comes
to, he realizes he’s on top of
someone’s leg.
The discovery of a dead wom-
an brings detective Jeppe Korner
and his partner, Anette, to inves-
tigate. The building is owned by
retired professor Esther De Lau-
renti, a rather bohemian woman
with a young lover and many se-
crets. She was born in the build-
ing, which houses a café, as well
as the flats rented out. She knows
everyone in the building well.
Strangers do not live here. So how
did the girl end up beaten to
death in her own home with no
one hearing a thing? Anette and
Jeppe have their work cut out.
As always in these novels, we
have a backstory. Jeppe is just re-
turned from leave after a difficult
divorce. Anette has her issues
with him. Engberg is excellent at
building character and she builds
suspense at the same time. The
plotline is solid police work, as
hallmark of good Danish crime
fiction, and the police dig for the
clues. While the police work will
remind readers of Jo Nesbo, the
cultural milieu is far closer to the
elegant novels of Peter Hoeg or
the Department Q books. Very
Danish. Very good.SpecialtoTheGlobeandMailThrillersyouwon’twanttoputdown
Fromyoung-adultfictionwithbroadappealtoanIcelandiccrimestory,
MargaretCannonroundsupsixgrippingnovelsthatwillleaveyouwantingmore
P
art of the point of series
mystery fiction is affording
readers a chance to spend
some solid hang time with char-
acters they’ve grown attached to.
Detective novels, in particular,
find their audience in a sort of
blind-friend-date initiated by
opening that first book. You may
find that Dave Robicheaux’s guilt
spirals and obsession with the
dead aren’t quite offset by the
charms of his pet raccoon and
his noble obsession with duty,
and skip James Lee Burke’s Loui-
siana-set series. (Which, inciden-
tally, I would wager is an in-
fluence on Thomas King’s se-
ries). And Travis McGee’s cool
boat, his brilliant friend Meyer
and his prescient visions of the
need for environmental preser-
vation may not do enough to
counterbalance his outdated ru-
minations on relations between
men and women, and you’ll say
farewell after (or midway
through) John D. MacDonald’s
opening novel in the series,The
Deep Blue Good-by.
But in this rich and ever-grow-
ing field, you’re going to eventu-
ally find a detective who you may
want to have a drink with, such
as Nick and Nora Charles, or Hap
Collins and Leonard Pine.
Barring that, you’ll at least
find an obsessive weirdo from
the Sherlock Holmes mold that
you can’t stop being fascinated
by.
I like hanging out with
Thumps DreadfulWater, the hero
of King’s so-far five-volume se-
ries, which started back in 2002.
He has more than a dash of the
obsessive about him, particularly
in this latest outing, but there’s a
good reason for that. Enjoying
Thumps and his friends is crucial
to enjoyingObsidian, which finds
DreadfulWater coming back
home in part to decide if he has
any place there after a brief and
destabilizing trip back to Eureka,
Calif., where he used to be a cop.
Obsidianhas a deceptively lei-
surely pace, and a great part of
that leisure is spent in the com-
pany of the book’s large cast hav-
ing many breakfasts and talking- not just to amuse readers, but
to amuse each other. Thankfully,
unlike most writers, King actual-
ly is funny when he intends to be.
He also has a sense of what
makes people worth talking to,
and not just in an interrogation
room.
What seems to be a slow rein-
troduction to the northwestern
U.S. town of Chinook and its
adjacent Blackfoot reservation
masks the tight plot ofObsidian.
Each scene of small-town charm,
banter and cultural exchange –
whether Thumps is exchanging
barbs with Leon Ranger, a Black
cop who moonlights as a ro-
mance novelist, or trying to
avoid a lecture on South Amer-
ican literature from local book-
store owner and superb research-
er Archie Kousolas – effectively
deepens a connection, advances
the plot or drops a false (but fair)
lead.
The first bodies, and the most
meaningful to Thumps, have fall-
en long before this fifth volume
of the series begins. His girlfriend
and her daughter, killed in Eure-
ka, are presumed to have been
victims of a serial killer known as
“the Obsidian killer,” as he leaves
a fragment of that stone in the
mouth of each victim.
This gothic stone-chip busi-
ness in an otherwise straight-
shooting mystery has a bit of a
Hannibal-ish touch that King has
cleverly undermined and ex-
plained by the end of the book.
Thumps has been drawn back in-
to this mystery, putting his pro-
fessional photography on hold
and reluctantly playing the cop
again,by the death of a true-
crime documentary maker who
had begun to investigate thecase. Poring over his long-dead
girlfriend’s past, and discovering
that she kept a significant part of
her life private when they were
together, leaves Thumps feeling
even more confused about his
current relationships in Chinook.
His on-and-off romantic partner,
Claire, is heavily invested in hav-
ing a child, and Thumps isn’t
sure he can invest in anything
beyond finding out who killed
the woman and child he loved as
a younger man.
When the Obsidian killer
shows up in town, leaving shards
of stone first and bodies later,
Thumps’s personal dilemmas
would take a backseat to the plot,
if King hadn’t so skillfully twined
them together while you thought
characters were just arguing
about waffles and vintage auto-
mobiles.
King has written across genres,
from literary novels to his classic
non-fiction book,The Inconve-
nient Indian,andObsidianis an-
other demonstration that a writ-
er remains the writer they are, no
matter what they happen to be
writing. Detective fiction is an ex-
cellent showcase for both the in-
ternal ruminations that one
might associate with high litera-
ry fiction and the social realism
that defined much 19th-century
prose. Reading King means you
get a good dose of both. Thumps
is better at detection than he is at
managing his life crises (and dia-
betes), but he is a sharp observer
of the world around him, a
knower of people and politics:
It’s a side effect of detection.Special to The Globe and MailThecharactersshineinThomasKing’slatestdetectivenovel
NABENRUTHUM
BOOKREVIEWTheObsidianMurders:
ADreadfulWaterMystery
BYTHOMASKING
HARPERCOLLINS,376PAGES
Whatseemstobea
slowreintroduction
tothenorthwestern
U.S.townof
Chinookandits
adjacentBlackfoot
reservationmasks
thetightplot
ofObsidian.ARTS&BOOKS|