Sunday, June 8, 2008

Singularity-Kathryn Casey

Singularity
Kathryn Casey
St. Martin's, Jul 2008, $24.95
ISBN 9780312379506

In his Galveston beach house, someone murders affluent Houston businessman Edward Travis Lucas III and his apparent lover attorney Annmarie Knowles; the killer placed the bodies in ritualistic way to maximize the scandal; thius pointing elsewhere. Galveston and Houston Police Departments claim pieces of the investigation; the Texas Rangers and the FBI also insist they have jurisdiction. In front of the media everyone is cooperative, but at the crime scene and elsewhere away from the spotlight, squabbling her begun.

Recently widowed and single mom Texas Ranger profiler Lieutenant Sarah Armstrong works the case along side FBI profiler David Garrity; neither accept the local department’s theory that Lucas' wife, Priscilla killed both of them. Instead the two profilers believe a serial killer with a track record in Texas committed the homicides and disguised them to look like a crime of passion. They plan to prove their theory.

This is a terrific Texas police procedural with the jurisdictional war kept in the background rising just enough to make for a strong investigation by the profilers. However, the key to this fine yet standard murder mystery is the grieving mother and daughter as each struggles with the recent death of the man in their lives and that in turn deepens the audience’s understanding of the caring mother who uses work as a psychological defense mechanism because she cannot mourn her loss too openly at home; her daughter needs her emotionally strong. Fans will enjoy Kathryn Casey's fine insightful tale.
Harriet Klausner

No comments: