Library Limelights 177

Sara Blaedel. The Undertaker's Daughter. NY: Grand Central Publishing/Hachette, 2018.

Everything you never knew you wanted to know about the death industry. The popular Danish author begins a new series featuring Ilka Jensen, whose father Paul long ago abandoned his Denmark family to become a funeral home owner in Wisconsin. Ilka had rather aimlessly fallen into her husband Erik's photography job after being widowed. But all her life she's yearned to connect with her father. Word comes that Paul died, and no one is more surprised than Ilka when she learns that he bequeathed his business to her. Her only course, it appears, is to wind it up and sell it; maybe she will find some meaningful bits of his life in his belongings.

Woops. Ilka is sucked into action even before she can recover from the long flight to America. Various funeral arrangements are in progress and employee Artie is shorthanded. Volunteer helper Sister Eileen is not friendly. Business debts have piled up; suppliers won't cooperate; Paul's second family rejects her; aggressive corporate interests want to take over. One of their bodies is a murder victim. Ilka stumbles through the challenges, making it up as she goes, sometimes comically, still not learning enough about her father. But learn she does, everything from caskets to cremation to mourning families, with some irreverence. It's not Jessica Mitford, but the subtext is transparent. The quirkiness delivers an entertaining story (the murder is solved) and promises to be a unique series with a singular heroine.

(Mitford: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/525561.The_American_Way_of_Death)

One-liners:

▪ What in the world is going on? she thought as she sat there blabbering away at this grieving family, as if she'd been doing it all her life! (32)

▪ "So right now, every single hour that goes by without us trying to save your father's business is a complete waste of time." (54)

▪ She liked the personality of the hearse, a bit grouchy but with a strong will. (109)

▪ True, she had a healthy and natural appetite for men, but Howard Oldham wasn't on her to-do list. (147)

Two-liners:

▪ It was hard for her to imagine the man she had known and missed all these years, living his life here. In a residential district, so dull that it reminded her of a stage set, and with a family as stiff as starch. (211)

▪ She smiled. What a mess. (241)

▪ It was hard for her to understand that Americans could charge whatever they wanted, though she didn't know anything about it. It just seemed so improbable that there weren't regulations. (262)

A beloved husband:

Ilka thought again about Erik. After his funeral, their apartment had felt empty and abandoned. A silence hung that had nothing to do with being alone. It took a few weeks for her to realize the silence was within herself. There was no one to talk to, so everything was spoken inside her head. And at the same time, she felt as if she were in a bubble no sound could penetrate. That had been one of the most difficult things to get used to. Slowly things got better, and at last—she couldn't say precisely when—the silence connected with her loss disappeared. (36)

A little boy's request:

"Maybe we're not supposed to do it?"

"Maybe not, but we can just not ask anyone about it."

"But aren't you the one who decides?" He looked at her suspiciously.

Ilka nodded. "Yes, but you didn't ask me, either. You said this is what you wanted to do. And rule number one is that the nearest relatives should decide how they want to send someone off. I think this is very thoughtful of you, to give your grandmother a few of her favourite dishes on her last journey. That's how they did it a very long time ago. They gave the dead something to eat for their journey."

Ilka should have stuck a bottle of red wine in Erik's coffin; she just hadn't thought of it. (201-2)

It takes all kinds:

The daughter's hair was graying, and a fine set of wrinkles softened her face. In her fifties, Ilka guessed.

"I couldn't stand him," Lisa McKenna said when she returned from the bathroom. "If it was up to me, you could pour his ashes in a can and take it to the dump."

Ilka froze; so much for her plan of action. It looked like they wouldn't be needing the Kleenex.

"He was an egotistical, self-centered asshole. But for some strange reason my children want him to be brought home and buried in our cemetery." (232)

A mission, at last:

Sitting there at Sister Eileen's desk, she realized she'd just made the first clear decision of her career. It may have been spur of the moment; it was definitely a rash decision. And it was stubbornness, not ambition, that had motivated her to become a funeral home director. But she didn't give a damn, because she was going to show them. (239)

Robert Galbraith. Lethal White. NY: Mulholland Books/Little, Brown and Company, 2018.

Worth the wait and worth the weight! Galbraith's (aka JK Rowling) newest is her most brilliant tale yet of PI Cormoran Strike and his partner Robin. Robin learns to go undercover for their business's most lucrative and high profile commission yet, but her fine detecting instincts do not extend to her personal life when she marries (that jerk) Matthew. Stopping the blackmailers of a cabinet minister leads to fear that some old secrets will be exposed. Surprised by a staged suicide, Strike and Robin are almost confounded by the ramifications. While Robin struggles privately with her misguided marriage, Strike ‒ the allegedly ugly, dishevelled man ‒ contends with two problematic romantic interests. It seems the two partners will never stop outguessing each other's unacknowledged feelings.

From the inbred upper classes and the halls of parliamentary power to the protesting underclasses, Galbraith nails political dissatisfaction during the time of the London Olympics. When Strike's assignment abruptly ends, it turns into two more perplexing cases. White horse imagery starts to occur more often, alluding to the title. The cast of perfectly defined characters includes Jasper the gruff minister; Kinvara the high-strung trophy wife; Izzy the complaisant daughter; vengeful Winn and his blind wife; Billy the schizoid; the relentlessly reckless Charlotte; and so many more, so many strands subtly woven, challenging the reader above and beyond. The only negative is the long wait for the next book.

One-liners:

▪ The best you could say for his appearance was that he had managed to grab matching shoes before heading for Yorkshire. (5)

▪ If he had said "come with me" she knew she would have gone: but then what? (25)

▪ She wanted to discuss a subject other than the awful form that dominated the room in its grotesque lifelessness. (285)

▪ Strike had spent many hours of his life trying to guess what he had done to cause the sullen silence of a woman in his vicinity. (332)

Two-or-more-liners:

▪ "I think that's mainly her husband. He's an accountant. And a bit of a tit," he added, enjoying saying it. (84)

▪ Izzy Chiswell was bearing down upon them, beaming, her pink face clashing with her orange dress. She was, Strike suspected, not on her first glass of wine. (274)

▪ So he hadn't been with Charlotte. Even in this extremity, Robin registered the fact, and was glad. (285)

Cool client:

"Billy claims," said Strike, "that he witnessed the strangling of a small child when he was very young."

Chiswell did not recoil, horrified; he did not bluster or storm. He did not demand whether he was being accused, or ask what on earth that had to do with him. He responded with none of the flamboyant defenses of the guilty man, and yet Strike could have sworn that to Chiswell, this was not a new story.

"And who does he claim strangled the child?" he asked, fingering the stem of his wine glass.

"He didn't tell me—or wouldn't."

"You think this is what Knight is blackmailing me over? Infanticide?" asked Chiswell roughly.

"I thought you ought to know why I went looking for Jimmy," said Strike.

"I have no deaths on my conscience," said Jasper Chiswell forcefully. He swallowed the last of his water. "One cannot," he added, replacing the empty glass on the table, "be held accountable for unintended consequences." (102)

To the manor born:

"Oh, come on, Raff, you must have heard about Tinky," said Izzy. "That ghastly Australian nurse Grampy married last time round, when he was getting senile. He blew most of the money on her. He was the second silly old codger she'd married. Grampy bought her a dud racehorse and loads of horrible jewelry. Papa nearly had to go to court to get her out of the house when Grampy died. She dropped dead of breast cancer before it got really expensive, thank God." (170)

Therapy letter?

The email ran to nearly a thousand words and gave the impression of being carefully crafted. It was a methodical dissection of Strike's character, which read like the case notes for a psychiatric case that, while not hopeless, required urgent intervention. By Lorelei's analysis, Cormoran Strike was a fundamentally damaged and dysfunctional creature standing in the way of his own happiness. He caused pain to others due to the essential dishonesty of his emotional dealings. Never having experienced a healthy relationship, he ran away from it when it was given to him. He took those who cared about him for granted and would probably only realize this when he hit rock bottom, alone, unloved and tortured by regrets. (382)

John Harvey. Darkness, Darkness. 2014. Large print. UK: Charnwood/ William Heinemann/ Random House, 2015.

Billed as definitely the last Resnick book, this novel runs at a slower pace than others in the series. The retired crack detective has been working as a part-time civilian investigator for the Nottingham police. Mainly deskbound, he's pleased at the invitation to join DI Catherine Njoroge's team for what seems like a cold case. The remains of a possibly murdered body have been uncovered in Bledwell Vale, a place familiar to Resnick when he was stationed at the prolonged miners' strike of thirty years before. Identified as Jenny Hardwick, she had gone missing at that time. Resnick knew many key players, some of them still living but not always easy to find or help with tracking Jenny's last movements. A convicted serial killer becomes one of their suspects, as Njoroge struggles to obtain more support for her team.

The bitter mining wars of strikers vs scabs, the disillusion with their union and Thatcher's politics, the desperation of no-income families—it's all here. Part of that comes from flashbacks to Jenny's last days as an activist opposing her own husband's position. Resnick's down time is filled more than ever with his passion for jazz. The attraction between Njoroge and the mellowed Resnick is given just the right touch; but not enough to save her from an ex-lover's scary stalking. Darkness in more ways than one but persistence in procedure pays off, as ever in Harvey's gritty world. Go easy and be well, Resnick. Time to explore some of the other abundant John Harvey offerings.

One-liners:

▪ What had her mother told her about men with red hair? (72)

▪ "Nor was she the only one, of course — changed a lot of women's lives, strike did." (116)

▪ Like many things seen through water, the truth was often refracted, never quite what it seemed. (131)

Two- and multi-liners:

▪ "Nobody gave a bugger, not then, not really, that's the truth of it." He laughed. "An' here you are, thirty years too bloody late." (66)

▪ Needle, Resnick thought. Haystack. (88)

Scapegoat in waiting:

She took a breath. "Why me?"

"Here long enough to get your feet under the table, feel your way around. Time to get stuck into something more than a walk in the park, show us what you can do. Live up to all those references. Commendations."

Catherine bridled, bit her tongue.

"Andrew and I discussed it, of course. Something for me, he thought, potentially high profile, media interest. Only natural, I suppose. But I thought, no, why not Catherine? Time to get that light out from under its bushel."

The smile again, slimier than before.

You bastard, she thought. I can see what you're up to. You either tyhink this is going to fizzle out in a mess of false trails and dead ends, or else it's going to blow up in someone's face. Mine. No way you'd be delegating this otherwise. Designed to fail.

"Thank you, sir," she said. "I appreciate it. The vote of confidence. Just as long as you're sure." (31-2)

Lying in:

Resnick woke, turned on his side, squinting at the clock in the semi-darkness of the room. 6:43. Fifteen minutes, a little more, to lie there and pretend it was just another day. Rolling back, he dislodged the cat from where it had been sleeping, curled into the V of his legs. Funerals, he'd had enough. More than enough for a lifetime. Graham Millington, his old sergeant, had been the most recent. A stroke. His wife putting on a brave face, taking Resnick by the arm, blue veins at the back of her hand. "He loved you, Charlie, you know that, don't you? Not that he'd've ever said. Not in a million years." (108)

Jenny's visitor:

She swivels her head. A sound at the back door? Someone knocking? She clicks the radio off.

A shadowy shape through the frosted glass.

Cautiously she opens the door; not all the way. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Come to see you, didn't I?"

"What d'you mean, come to see me?"

"What d'you think?" A quick look back over his shoulder. "Now for fuck's sake, let me in."

"I'll do no such thing."

"I'm breaking me bail conditions bein' here. Anyone sees me, they'll have 'em revoked, have me back up in court." (230)