This is a whodunit, albeit one of the more genteel ones you are likely to come across. There is a murder, there is always a murder, but the sheriff who sets out to solve the case is a gentle man, a little harried by his domestic partner and a newly-orphaned feline. Bill Crider‘s book is definitely one of the nicer mystery books I’ve read this year. This is a novel based in Texas, but it could just as easily have been Canada, or Yorkshire.
There are chainsaw-wielding maniacs and all-American football heroes, inflamed geriatric passions and violent lovers, but there is an all-pervading air of politeness and genteel respectability as our Southern hero nudges things to a finish. Our protagonist, Sheriff Dan Rhodes, is a good-looking man who belongs more in a 70s soap, but he is capable and steers matters towards their final climax. The murderer is safely apprehended and our sheriff ends up with a pet feline, despite his allergies.
Definitely a good alternative to all the sex-and-violence primitive-exciter-pushing dopamine-feeding books out there.
ISBN: 978-0-312-34809-0