Death in A Mood Indigo - Hardcover

Mathews, Francine

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0553104632 ISBN 13: 9780553104639

Publisher: Bantam, 1997

Synopsis

A skeleton is discovered on a bone-chillingly cold Siasconset beach by two children playing on the windswept sands. Is the dead woman the latest victim of a killer who has already preyed upon five women in Massachusetts? Or could the half-buried corpse be the beautiful Harvard-educated psychiatrist whose disappearance baffled Nantucket police? And if so, how is that mystery linked to the sensational disappearance of the flamboyant sculptor Ian Markham, who vanished in his boat, A Mood Indigo, that very same morning, seven years ago?

As the FBI and the media swarm over the island, Nantucket police detective Merry Folger finds herself caught in the web of old passions and crimes, a web whose net continues to ensnare victims. For whoever the dead woman may be, her murder is a death that, like all shocking events in the past, has repercussions in the present. Deadly repercussions.

About this title

From the Inside Flap

s discovered on a bone-chillingly cold Siasconset beach by two children playing on the windswept sands. Is the dead woman the latest victim of a killer who has already preyed upon five women in Massachusetts? Or could the half-buried corpse be the beautiful Harvard-educated psychiatrist whose disappearance baffled Nantucket police? And if so, how is that mystery linked to the sensational disappearance of the flamboyant sculptor Ian Markham, who vanished in his boat, A Mood Indigo, that very same morning, seven years ago?

As the FBI and the media swarm over the island, Nantucket police detective Merry Folger finds herself caught in the web of old passions and crimes, a web whose net continues to ensnare victims. For whoever the dead woman may be, her murder is a death that, like all shocking events in the past, has repercussions in the present. Deadly repercussions.

Reviews

Third in this series set in Nantucket, where Meredith Folger is a detective in the small police force headed by her father John (Death in Rough Water, 1995, etc.). During the quiet off-season, a skull and some bones are dug up on the beach by a dog belonging to the Markham family--widow Julia, a taciturn chain-smoker, and her children, 11-year-old Cecil and his younger sister Nan. Husband Ian, a sculptor, died eight years ago when his boat sank in a squall, at a time when his affair with rich and beautiful Dr. Elizabeth Osborne was general gossip fodder. Elizabeth also vanished on that stormy night, never to be seen again. The FBI, following the trail of a serial killer, takes an interest in the Nantucket find, sending their expert forensic psychiatrist Dr. Tucker Enright to the scene. The skull is identified as that of Elizabeth; strangulation, it would seem, was the cause of death. Meredith interviews Elizabeth's husband Jack in Boston, and is startled to discover that Enright too had known and loved Elizabeth--all of them having been members of Cambridge's intellectual community. Matters take on a more immediate and threatening tone when--even as the Boston police have jailed a promising suspect in the serial killer case--two women on the island are found strangled and Meredith becomes the target of slyly threatening letters. A byzantine plot that defies compression eventually leads to great peril for Meredith in a gripping, edge- of-your-seat climax. Leisurely and literate--though a shade too heavy on introspection and psychobabble, with too many unlikely twists and turns in the plotting. But nonetheless absorbing. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Detective Meredith Folger loves Nantucket, her home since childhood. So when two children discover a skeleton buried on Sconset beach, Meredith feels as if her personal space has been violated. When the bones are analyzed, the lab declares that the deceased, a young woman, was strangled, perhaps as recently as eight years earlier. Meredith suspects the deaths are linked to an ongoing serial-killer investigation, and even when a suspect is arrested, she isn't convinced the police have the right man. Struggling to unravel the puzzling case, she is drawn into the lives and secrets of Nantucket residents, both past and present. Meredith is a smart, savvy, appealing heroine who's definitely worth getting to know, and her latest adventure is one more fine entry in a series that just keeps getting better. An excellent choice for mystery collections of all sizes. Emily Melton

Detective Meredith Folger of the Nantucket police relishes the thought of solving an eight-year-old murder, especially since the initial missing person's investigation was flubbed by an incompetent. Meredith feels that she "owes" the dead woman, a prominent female psychiatrist, some kind of resolution regardless of their impact on her children?the same children (offspring of the woman's last lover) who discovered the body. Vivid description, good interrogative technique, psychological undercurrents, and island atmosphere characterize this good Nantucket series.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Bantam
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0553104632
• ISBN 13: 9780553104639
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 304