Slow Kill - Hardcover

McGarrity, Michael

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 052594799X ISBN 13: 9780525947998

Publisher: Dutton Adult, 2004

Synopsis

Santa Fe Police Chief Kevin Kerney travels to a California ranch looking to buy some prime quarter horse breeding stock. Instead, he finds himself the prime suspect in a possible homicide when the ranch owner, Clifford Spalding, is found dead. Confronted by a determined cop unwilling to let him off the hook, Kerney decides to conduct his own investigation. As he digs into the victim's background, he learns that Spalding's ex-wife refuses to believe that her son, a soldier killed in Vietnam some thirty years ago, is dead.
Kerney digs deeper and soon finds himself sharing the woman's doubts: Did Spalding's current wife, a much younger woman, orchestrate his murder with the help of a lover? Did a California cop collude with Spalding to keep his ex-wife from learning the truth about her son?
Slow Kill races from West Coast to East Coast, as Kerney tries to extricate himself from a situation that could ruin his career by finding the answers to a thirty-year-old mystery.

About this title

About the Author

Michael McGarrity is the author of the Anthony Award–nominated Tularosa, as well as Mexican Hat, Serpent Gate, Hermit’s Peak, The Judas Judge, Under the Color of Law, The Big Gamble, and Everyone Dies. A former deputy sheriff for Santa Fe County, he established the first Sex Crimes Unit. He has also served as an instructor at the New Mexico Law Enforcement Academy and as an investigator for the New Mexico Public Defender’s Office.

Reviews

In McGarrity's latest Kevin Kerney procedural, Kerney, police chief of Santa Fe, N.Mex., is drawn into a messy murder investigation while vacationing at a California ranch. A wealthy hotel magnate, Clifford Spalding, dies of poisoning in the guest room next to Kerney's. Finding himself a suspect, Kerney decides to pursue the case on his own for a few days, uncovering some peculiar circumstances and characters in Spalding's background. They include an unfaithful trophy wife and her shady boyfriend, a deranged and bitter ex-wife and a missing son who presumably died in Vietnam 30 years ago, as well as a couple of police officials who are not as forthcoming as one would expect. Within a few days, Kerney is cleared by California authorities and returns home to more familiar ground. But because of the case's Santa Fe connections, he and his stable of detectives continue the pursuit. As in McGarrity's eight previous Kerney novels (Everyone Dies; etc.), the author excels at detailing police procedures as well as creating a homespun, wry tone that suits setting and characters. His action sequences are shakier, however, and several highly dramatic moments—the arrest of the main suspect, her release and eventual capture—are flat and hurried. A bit more attention to pacing and momentum could give this appealing series a needed shot of adrenaline.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Santa Fe police chief Kevin Kerney is visiting a Santa Barbara ranch, looking to buy quarter horses, when he stumbles on the dead body of another guest staying at the ranch. Kerney looks like a prime suspect, which prompts him to make a few inquiries of his own. The trail leads Kerney on a crisscrossing journey around the country, with a stop-off at FBI headquarters in Virginia, near where his wife, Sarah, a career army officer, is stationed at the Pentagon. As in past episodes in this long-running series, McGarrity juggles police procedural and domestic story lines effectively, drawing readers into the dynamics of Kerney's long-distance marriage just as he unerringly charts the painstaking investigative work that defines the lives of real-world cops. Precise realism remains McGarrity's hallmark; his own experience as a deputy sheriff and as a therapist working with abuse victims informs his fiction on every page. This is not a series for those who hope to find either high-octane excitement or existential angst in their cop novels. McGarrity's milieu is the quotidian reality of a cop's life. Bill Ott
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Dutton Adult
• Publication date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 052594799X
• ISBN 13: 9780525947998
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 288