Fucking fantastic. Anyone who’s read my work knows I have a soft spot for private eyes who talk to ghosts, so when I caught the premise of the Marie Jenner mysteries, I was pretty much on board from the start. In the great tradition of mystery books, this is technically a sequel (or at least in a series?) but I don’t appear to need any of the others for context.
What I’m most impressed by, though, is the opening. Even with having read the book blurb, the sheer violence of the murder surprised me – in a good way! I love violent books and so often, a book that promises gore doesn’t quite deliver. But “Brown Eddie”‘s death scene is brutal, tragic and miserable – from his resignation that these things happen to him to the growing realization that he isn’t going to make it out of this one.
Our introduction to Marie Jenner herself is less brutal but excellent in terms of catching us up on an established character without feeling like we’ve missed something. Within the first chapter, we’re told all the important beats; that Marie sees ghosts, that Marie isn’t the ‘real’ PI, that she’s currently working out a romantic entanglement with the inherited owner of the ‘real’ business… Complex, but not confusing. Marie herself is fun as hell to read, although I’m definitely curious to see if she’s more of a Kinsey Millhone or a Columbo.
Excellent so far — excited to keep reading!
This was a 2016 Aurora nominee for Best Novel; I downloaded it at the time as part of a bundle and am finally reading it now.
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Elliott Dunstan 