Over Tumbled Graves
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Overview
During a routine drug bust, on a narrow bridge over white-water falls in the center of town, Spokane detective Caroline Mabry finds herself face-to-face with a brutal murderer. Within hours, the body of a young prostitute is found on the riverbank nearby. What follows confronts our fascination with pathology and murder and stares it down, as Caroline and her cynical partner, Alan Dupree—thrown headlong into the search for a serial murderer who communicates by killing women—uncover some hard truths about their profession . . . and each other.
Rich with the darkly muted colors of the Pacific Northwest skies, Over Tumbled Graves established Jess Walter as a novelist of extraordinary emotional depth and dimension.
Synopsis
Spokane, Washington: a bustling city in the Pacific Northwest, cut through by the hurtling whitewater of the Spokane River Falls. One afternoon a young woman's body is found buried in a park by the riverbank—then a second, then a third. Before the week is out, Detective Caroline Mabry is plunged into a full-bore hunt for a serial murderer whom Caroline's older, more cynical colleagues have nicknamed the Southbank Killer.
What follows is a novel of uncommon texture and psychological drama, as Caroline and her troubled mentor, Alan Dupree, bridle under an investigation overrun by headline-grabbing "specialists" and bean-counting statisticians. As Caroline and Alan negotiate the rocky terrain of the killer-hunting industry, each of them is forced to confront dark truths about our culture's fascination with violence—and about their attraction to each other. And, as they close in on their suspect, they come face-to-face with an evil very different—and far more alarming—than the one they thought they were chasing.
At once gripping in its story and provocative in the questions it raises, Over Tumbled Graves is a novel that will leave no reader undisturbed.
About the Author:
Jess Walter has covered the rash of Pacific Northwest serial-killer murders, including their recent arrest of alleged serial killer Robert L. Yates in Spokane this spring, for the Washington Post and other national media. Coauthor of Christopher Darden's #1 bestseller, In Contempt, and author of the nonfiction book Every Knee Shall Bow, Walter lives in Spokane with his family.
Washington Post Book World - Katy Munger
Instead of fixating on the lurid details of torture or playing to readers' fears, Over Tumbled Graves primarily follows the emotional journey of the detectives trying to stop the violence. The book also uncovers the hypocrisy and ego that plague what the author calls the "serial killer industry" -- the ever-growing tribe of reporters and so-called serial-killer trackers who specialize in turning fear into profit. In doing so, Walter offers readers a wonderfully plotted story and a very effective emotional subplot involving the relationship between his two main protagonists.
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
The Barnes & Noble ReviewVeteran journalist Jess Walter (Every Knee Shall Bow) has just written what might be termed the first postmodern serial killer story. In his debut novel, Over Tumbled Graves, Walter takes the standard elements of an overworked form -- the string of brutal killings, the protracted manhunt, the speculative, specialized psychological profiles -- and effectively turns them on their head.
Over Tumbled Graves -- a title derived from T. S. Eliot's The Wasteland -- begins in Spokane, Washington, in April 2001. (And April, as Eliot reminds us, is the cruelest month.) In the opening pages, a drug-related sting operation goes tragically wrong, and undercover operative Caroline Mabrey watches helplessly as one of her two targets pushes the other -- a small-time drug dealer -- into the rocky, churning rapids of the Spokane River and then makes his escape.
Police identify the escaped killer as Lenny Ryan, a recently paroled ex-convict. Lenny soon evolves into a one-man crime wave, murdering two more people within a 24-hour period. As the hunt for Lenny progresses, a parallel development takes place. The decaying body of a teenage prostitute is discovered in a shallow grave on the riverbank. The victim has been shot and strangled, and two $20 bills have been placed in her hand. Shortly afterward, a second, identical corpse turns up in the same location. When a third victim appears in the general vicinity, Spokane police draw the obvious conclusion and begin the process of tracking down a serial murderer.
Two deeply sympathetic figures dominate the subsequent manhunt. One is Caroline Mabrey, a fallible, intuitive detective haunted by her mother's recent death and by an assortment of disquieting memories. The other is Sgt. Alan Dupree, Caroline's friend and mentor, a flippant, old-fashioned policeman with personal issues of his own. As Mabrey and Dupree -- aided by a pair of headline-hunting, FBI-trained "experts" -- work through a maze of dead ends and inconclusive clues, they discover unexpected connections between Lenny Ryan's crime spree and the gradual accumulation of murdered prostitutes. Their investigation ultimately leads to a startling revelation in which the "rational" motives of a sane, calculating killer and the irrational behavioral patterns of a serial murderer meet and merge.
Over Tumbled Graves is an intellectually satisfying, psychologically acute novel that defies conventional expectations, breaking new ground in the process. It is also an involving, immensely readable book marked by credible characterizations and a steadily increasing narrative momentum. Jess Walter is clearly a writer worth watching. (Bill Sheehan)
Bill Sheehan reviews horror, suspense, and science fiction for Cemetery Dance, The New York Review of Science Fiction, and other publications. His book-length critical study of the fiction of Peter Straub, At the Foot of the Story Tree, has been published by Subterranean Press (www.subterraneanpress.com).
Otto Penzler
"[An] intelligent, gripping, and genuinely scary novel..."Philadelphia Inquirer
"An original page-turner in this overcrowded genre."The Seattle Times
"(Walter's) powerful fiction debut....stands out from run-of-the-mill serial killer novels...."Sun Sentinel
"Shifting like...currents, the story moves swiftly, promising a fast-paced thriller filled with inner turmoil as well as action."Booklist
"(Walter’s) first novel is an accomplished character study...A very satisfying debut."New York Times Book Review
"Disquieting. Walter(’s)...incisive sensitivity...emerges as a bitter metaphor."The Washington Post Book World
"Outstanding. Riveting. Never sacrifices action for emotional impact."The Dallas Morning News
"Suspenseful,challenging and intelligently written, Over Tumbled Graves is a first novel of considerable depth and insight."The Mystery Review
"Breathtaking.Moving.Insightful. Excellent quality of writing."Oregonian
"First rate writing speeds us to a perfectly foreshadowed plot twist and a gripping conclusion."Katy Munger
Instead of fixating on the lurid details of torture or playing to readers' fears, Over Tumbled Graves primarily follows the emotional journey of the detectives trying to stop the violence. The book also uncovers the hypocrisy and ego that plague what the author calls the "serial killer industry" -- the ever-growing tribe of reporters and so-called serial-killer trackers who specialize in turning fear into profit. In doing so, Walter offers readers a wonderfully plotted story and a very effective emotional subplot involving the relationship between his two main protagonists.— Washington Post Book World