Still Waters - Hardcover

Harvey, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0805041494 ISBN 13: 9780805041491

Publisher: Henry Holt & Co, 1997

Synopsis

When the battered body of a young woman is discovered, the second corpse that is found, Charlie Resnick becomes involved in the case because his lover had been acquainted with the victim and her abusive husband and investigates the brutality that sometimes accompanies love. 15,000 first printing.

About this title

Reviews

It's that time of the year when crime-fiction readers everywhere jump at the chance to drop in on Detective Inspector Charlie Resnick and his fellow Midlands coppers as they sift through the remains of lives gone wrong. In Harvey's ninth Resnick novel, someone is dumping the abused bodies of young women in a city canal, and when one of the victims turns out to be a close friend of Charlie's lover, Hannah, the crimes take on a decidedly personal hue, bringing the issue of violence against women smack into Charlie and Hannah's own living room. As Charlie's team slogs ahead with the details of a difficult investigation, Charlie himself does what he does best--he broods, not just about the overwhelming sadness of the world as he finds it, but also about the fundamental ugliness that lies at the core of most of his work as a cop: "People having power over one another. Using them. Submission. Hurt." To find that ugliness on vivid display in a crime novel is not out of the ordinary, of course, but what has always made the Resnick novels different is Charlie's ability to locate the humanity within the squalor, personal as well as societal, and to struggle mightily, though often unsuccessfully, at keeping those sparks of human feeling alive. The struggle continues here, and Resnick's combination of doggedness and vulnerability continues to draw readers to his side. This latest installment breaks no new ground in the series, but it tills the familiar soil with the same careful, caring hand. Bill Ott

Charlie Resnick, the laconic British police investigator who has starred in previous Harvey novels (Rough Treatment, Avon, 1991) and short stories, is faced with the death of an abused woman, a friend of his lover, Hannah. At the same time, he tracks down the circumstances of an idiosyncratic art theft. This standard police procedural formula is given a bit of depth by passages detailing relationships, both business and personal, between the members of the Serious Crime Squad; however, the reader is left with the impression that the most interesting characters may be Resnick's cats. Too many references to events from previous books make this a purchase only for libraries who already own them.?Elsa Pendleton, Boeing Information Services, Inc., Ridgecrest, Cal.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Henry Holt & Co
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0805041494
• ISBN 13: 9780805041491
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 311