"Dead of Winter"

P. J. Parrish has written another winner in "Dead of Winter." Detective Louis Kincaid is starting over on the Loon Lake, Michigan, police force. As bodies begin to appear marked with coded death cards, Kincaid starts an investigation that uncovers a lot more than he or anyone else expected and compromises his romance with the new woman in his life. However, the new job has some benefits -- putting him closer to the foster parents who raised him with the added bonus of being able to spend time with them. This gives him an opportunity to reflect on what they taught him and his foster father inadvertently provides some clues for his investigation.

If I didn't have a full schedule for the next couple of weeks, I'd be off to find the next book in this series. Will Kincaid find a permanent base of operations? Will he find romance? Where will the next investigation lead him? I can hardly wait to find out! These are well written, insightful books giving them a depth not always found in mystery novels.

pazt

"Rebel Island"

It looks like Rick Riordan's Tres Navarre P.I. series has come to end as this last book in the series, "Rebel Island," was published in 2007. Since I've thoroughly enjoyed this series, I'm disappointed but "Rebel Island" does not disappoint. The story starts with Tres and his girlfriend, Maia, who is 8 1/2 months pregnant with their child, at their wedding. When a thunderstorm strikes moving the wedding indoors, it appears to be an omen of things to come. Navarre's brother, Garrett, convinces the newlyweds that they do need a honeymoon even though they hadn't planned one and he convinces them to take that honeymoon on Rebel Island at a hotel Garrett's friend owns so, naturally, Garrett tags along, too. Tres has given up his P.I. business in favor of a full-time English professorship at the university but a murder in the hotel sets him detecting again -- in the midst of a hurricane and power outages. The situation deteriorates from there with Tres in a race to find a killer before they all end up dead. As usual, this was a book I couldn't put down so I read it in about a day and highly recommend it.

pazt

"Mission Road"

This Tres Navarre series by Rick Riordan really heats up in "Mission Road" when Ralph Arguello, a close friend of Navarre's, comes to him for help to prove he didn't shoot his cop wife, Ana DeLeon. While they're on the run from police trying to find out who really did it, Ana is fighting for her life in the hospital and Navarre's lawyer girlfriend,Maia, is trying to help them while keeping a secret of her own. The investigation takes them back to a cold murder case that Ana was working on involving a not so nice mafia family in San Antonio. It starts out with a bang and the suspense doesn't let up. I couldn't put it down and now I'm off to the library to find the next book in the series!

pazt