Mortal Grace - Hardcover

Stewart, Edward

3.33

63 ratings by Goodreads

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 038531132X ISBN 13: 9780385311328

Publisher: Delacorte Press, 1994

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A posh, upper East Side Episcopal church throws a garden party, and the dismembered body of an unknown teenaged girl is found in a long-buried hamper. Called in to investigate, Lieutenant Vince Cardozo discovers a "communion killer" on the loose in New York City. Preying on homeless teenagers, the elusive killer leaves as his trademark a communion wafer in the mouth of each victim. Cardozo's suspicions focus on three priests: Father Chuck Romero, a Catholic struggling against his attraction toward young people; Father Joe Montgomery, a flamboyant Episcopalian, confessorand companion tothe city's moneyed and powerful; and Reverend Bonnie Ruskay, a beautiful and dedicated young mother trying to breach the walls that divide rich from poor, good from evil, and herself from her own children. Searching, Cardozo finds only riddles: Why does the D.A. deny church involvement? Why have four identical murders been investigated as unrelated homicides? Why have the media blacked out the killings? Why -- when the case is finally solved and the killer jailed -- do the communion killings begin again? Racing the clock, disobeying his superiors' command to back off, fighting a cover-up at the highest level of city and church politics, Cardozo must uncover the grisly truth before another child is killed.
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From Kirkus Reviews:

Stewart (Deadly Rich, 1991, etc.) and his ace homicide detective Vincent Cardozo are at it again--tracking and thwarting another Manhattan serial killer through the gripping and blood- spattered pages of this tidy thriller. The boundary between New York's blessed and depraved becomes blurry as brutally butchered adolescent bodies--those of homeless hookers and junkies--begin cropping up in styrofoam baskets around town and all clues point to Father Joe Montgomery's Upper East Side Episcopalian church, St. Andrews. Father Joe and his loyal reverend, Bonnie Ruskay, stage musicals for promising teens, counsel upper-crust parishioners, and provide outreach to dysfunctional, down-and-out, and dangerous youths. The cases of the murdered kids are covertly parceled out to different detectives in a move that looks to hawk-eyed Cardozo like a conspiracy between the nervous cardinal and the obliging DA But Cardozo links forensic evidence--wax burns, incense traces, drugs, gruesome butchery, and wafers on their tongues--and discovers that a headshot of each murdered urchin appears in Father Joe's photo talent files. The Communion Killer (as he comes to be known for the last rites he administers) must be a priest, luring the kids into his trap through a complicated network comprised of a ruthless runaway, a transvestite hooker, a wealthy therapist, and a shady lawyer, among others. Cardozo forces the investigation, digging deep into the ugly and Byzantine pasts of the priests, the junkies, and himself, all the while stepping on the toes of strait-laced bureaucrats, St. Andrews's rich neighbors, and the retiring police captain. The suspenseful plot hurtles to its startling and satisfying conclusion, delivering all the lurid titillation that a Stewart novel promises: chase scenes, rapes, be-pearled aristocratic ladies contrasted with pregnant HIV-positive hookers, red herrings, secretive clergy, a clever cop, and lots of blood. Same thrills, different book. (Literary Guild and Mystery Guild selections) -- Copyright �1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

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