Michael Connelly
FBI agent Terry McCaleb was felled not by a bullet by a heart virus. He spent a couple of years on the waiting list and received a heart transplant. Now he lives on disability and spends his recovery restoring his father’s boat, the Following Sea. When the sister of the heart’s donor visits, however, McCaleb finds himself drawn back into the old life. She wants him to find who killed her sister, and she believes the man who received her heart would feel a debt to her. McCaleb agrees, running afoul of an egotistical LAPD detective but energizing a sheriff’s deputy’s career. It turns out that Gloria Rivers murder bears a lot more in common with an ATM robbery a couple of weeks earlier. Because of the way the killer behaved, both caught on surveillance tape, it’s clear these were not simple robberies. McCaleb, a career profiler, recognizes the signs of a serial killer. While explaining this, he rattles off a list of killers he’s dealt with since coming to Los Angeles, several familiar to fans of Connelly’s Harry Bosch series.
This one is a bit different from Connelly’s Harry Bosch series. McCaleb’s methods are almost like that of Mycroft Holmes, preferring to stare at evidence already gathered for long periods. He does this as well in A Darkness More than Night, in which Bosch is a major character. In Blood Work, however, McCaleb is only a few weeks out of the hospital and limited in mobility. He can get around well enough, but he is barred from driving, relying on a neighbor and on Graciela, Gloria’s sister, to get around LA’s sprawling metro area. The details of working with a transplanted heart are vivid, and in one scene, you cringe when a suspect panics and knocks McCaleb to the ground to escape. McCaleb’s chest is still knitting together, so any blow might damage his new heart. Not good, since he’s trying to find who killed the previous owner.
It’s a terrific crime thriller written by an author with an ear for language and an incredible eye for detail.
Terrie Farley Moran
Terrie Farley Moran, one of the Women of Mystery, releases a collection of her short stories. They run the gamut from a True Blood-type fantasy to an absurd Christmas story to a cynical look at lawsuits and their consequences. She begins with “The Awareness,” from which this book takes its title. A supernatural tale, it looks at that often-overlooked other-worldly denizen, the banshee. The protagonist is a 300-year-old banshee who lives in the guise of a young freelance reporter. When a member of a family she is to watch over is about to die, she assumes the form of the banshee so her wailing can guide the soul to the other side. Only this time, something’s not right. Her latest charge wasn’t supposed to die. It’s not nice to murder a banshee’s charge. She will get even.
The grittiest story is “Meet Me by the Priest,” referring to a statue near a church in Manhattan. A soldier in the waning days of World War II is looking to dodge a transfer to Alaska. Soon, he is dodging a thug who doesn’t appreciate him taking his girlfriend.
The story I liked best was “Civil Suit.” The mystery actually doesn’t happen until late in the story with a clever means of poisoning a victim in front of several witnesses. What makes this story is the circus that is municipal civil court. The bailiff, who narrates, paints an amusing picture of the characters involved in a lawsuit kicked down from the upper courts.
Than you for this lovely review of my collection, “The Awareness and other deadly tales.” And I am honored to be on the same page as Michael Connelly–Blood Work was an awesome read.