"The Absence of Mercy"

"The Absence of Mercy" by John Burley is this physician's first novel.  Burley himself is an emergency medicine physician in northern California and his novel features Dr. Ben Stevenson who lives in a small Ohio town with his family practice physician wife, Susan.  They have a teenage son, Thomas, as well as a second son, Joel, who is 8 years younger thanThomas.  Thonas was conceived on their honeymoon while they were both still in medical school.  In addition to his work at the hospital, Ben is the county coroner and has a young assistant, Nat.

The novel begins with the savage murder of a teenage boy found in the woods behind the high school.  This kind of thing doesn't happen in this small town and it shakes up not only Ben and Susan but the entire town where everyone has been living with a sense of knowing their neighbors and having no need to fear anyone.

When a second victim  (a teenage girl) is found barely alive, she is flown to a trauma center and eventually recovers physically from her wounds but has a lot of rehab work -- physically and mentally -- to do.  Thomas, who had seen her earlier in the evening of her attack at a party both attended, befriends her as she recovers and they become close.  Ben sees nothing wrong with it but Susan fears the relationship will end up hurting the girl again.

When a severed hand appears at the door of the coroner's office at the beginning of the first snowfall, the police and Ben are just awaiting the discovery of another body.  So, as his family decides to visit Susan's parents in Sedona, AZ, over the holidays, Ben feels he must stay behind in case the body is discovered.  Although he misses them, he's also glad to have them safely out of the area.  Little does he know how all of these murders will impact his entire family and their lives.  It's just beginning!

Burley is an excellent author and I thoroughly enjoyed reading his novel and loved the way it progressed with  all the information I might have needed to solve it myself if I'd been paying close enough attention to the clues.  In some ways, it is left hanging at the end which to me means there could be a sequel to this one.  When I looked to see if he'd written another book ("Absence of Mercy" was published in 2013), I discovered that he does have a book coming out on 2/10/2015, entitled "The Forgetting Place" but I don't know if it is a stand alone novel or a sequel to this book.  His work is outstanding enough that I've already marked my calendar to look for this one next year. pazt