Science & Technology - Fiction, Multicultural Detectives - Fiction, Occupations - Fiction, Police Stories
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Overview
Detective Sergeant (and amateur archaeologist) Wesley Peterson hoped that a transfer from the lively but frantic pace of London to the bucolic river port of Tradmouth would have a positive effect on both his personal and professional lives. But Wes's first day on the job has hardly begun before he finds himself heading up an investigation into the murder of an unidentified young woman whose face has been brutally disfigured. And it's not long before Wes discovers that the Tradmouth force is as hopelessly overstretched as London's Met; in addition to the unidentified murder victim, the local police have been embroiled in a frantic search for a missing child. As Wes and his fellow detectives try to determine the identity of the young woman in hopes of catching her murderer, a strange parallel emerges between this case and a nearby archeological dig being conducted by Wes's college friend. Two skeletons have been unearthed in the ruins of a seventeenth-century merchant's house, one of them the apparent victim of a four-hundred-year-old murder. At first Wes is interested on a purely personal level, but strange connections between the murdered girl, the missing child, and the murder that occurred four hundred years ago soon begin to surface. Wes must act quickly to prove his suspicions, before another body joins those already residing in the dust of the merchant's house.Editorials
Library Journal
An exciting blend of historical and present-day police procedural, this first novel stars Wesley Peterson, a black British detective who majored in archaeology. Newly transferred to Tradmouth, Peterson chances upon a university buddy whose excavations at a building site have yielded a victim of Elizabethan murder. Up in the hills, meanwhile, the discovery of a grisly murder sends police off in the wrong direction until the supposed victim turns up alive. And elsewhere a little boy has disappeared. Peterson's skill and intuition make this is an involving, adventurous, nicely detailed work for all collections. Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.Kirkus Reviews
An engaging first novel introducing Detective Sergeant Wesley Peterson, who has just been transferred from London to Tradmouth, an ancient coastal town, has a degree in archaeology, and is black. His boss is D.I. Gerry Heffernan, an affable widower. Wesley and his teacher wife Pam have arrived at a stressful time in the village. Two-year-old Jonathon Berrisford has been missing for days and, almost as the Petersons arrive, the murdered body of a young woman is discovered by Dorothy Truscot on her daily walk to Little Tradmouth Head. A more cheerful event is Wesley's meeting with old friend and classmate Neil Watson, working for the County's Archaeological Unit on a nearby dig. He and his team have already unearthed two skeletons —one infant, one adult–from what was once the cellar of a 17th-century house. Meanwhile, Wesley and D.C. Rachel Tracey, searching for the identity of the murder victim, have settled on local model Karen Giordino—until she turns up very much alive after a trip abroad. There's more success when the name of Shirley Carteret surfaces and proves to be the one they're seeking. Why had she deserted her apartment in the house of elegant Mrs. Hughs? Where is the steady boyfriend who wears an earring? Who was paying into Shirley's bank account every month, and what was her connection with Mowbray Clinic and its Dr. Downing? A flood of questions with intriguing answers—all made more meaningful by excerpts from a 17th-century journal heading every chapter. A lively, unfancy prose style, an absorbing story, and believable characters make for a praiseworthy debut.Book Details
Published
May 1, 1999
Publisher
New York : St. Martin's Press, 1999.
Pages
246
Format
Hardcover
ISBN
9780312205621