She Treads Softly: Insidious Intent

Sunday, December 10, 2017

Insidious Intent

Insidious Intent by Val McDermid
Grove/Atlantic: 12/5/17
eBook review copy; 400 pages
ISBN-13: 9780802127167
Tony Hill & Carol Jordan #10

Insidious Intent by Val McDermid is a highly recommended tenth installment to the series featuring psychologist Tony Hill and DCI Carol Jordan.

There are dual plotlines in this fast-paced, intense procedural. Carol Jordan has been asked to return to head the newly formed Regional Major Incident Team (ReMIT) and she has handpicked her colleagues. All of Carol's skills and Tony's insight are needed and tested with the Wedding Killer. They must find a serial killer who finds his victims at wedding receptions. The killer seeks out a woman who seems to be alone, courts her, and eventually kills her. Then he sets fire to their lifeless bodies in their cars, not only destroying the bodies, but destroying any evidence that would connect him to the crime.

While trying to catch the killer, crime reporter Penny Burgess has made it her goal to end Carol's career. At the same time DS Paula McIntyre is being urged by Carol to take her inspector's exam so she can take over for Carol - if she has to step down. To add to the complications, Paula and her partner Dr. Elinor Blessing must figure out why their teenage ward, Torin McAndrew, is suddenly acting moody and secretive. DC Stacey Chen is back and using her mad IT/computer skills to help solve the cases.

This is a great long-running series with well-developed, well-established characters. The writing is excellent and the dialogue is well-done. McDermid keeps the action fast and the tension building in this outing. The team is seriously stumped and there are so many peripheral things happening that could distract them from the case. All the various plot-thread keep moving along as the stress levels of the team rise along with the pressure. There is a reason McDermid is such a successful crime writer. The ending on this one is a shocker.

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of Grove/Atlantic.

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John Updike's six rules for reviewing:

1. Try to understand what the author wished to do, and do not blame him for not achieving what he did not attempt.

2. Give him enough direct quotation--at least one extended passage--of the book's prose so the review's reader can form his own impression, can get his own taste.

3. Confirm your description of the book with quotation from the book, if only phrase-long, rather than proceeding by fuzzy precis.

4. Go easy on plot summary, and do not give away the ending.

5. If the book is judged deficient, cite a successful example along the same lines, from the author's oeuvre or elsewhere. Try to understand the failure. Sure it's his and not yours?

To these concrete five might be added a vaguer sixth, having to do with maintaining a chemical purity in the reaction between product and appraiser.....Review the book, not the reputation.... Better to praise and share than blame and ban. The communion between reviewer and his public is based upon the presumption of certain possible joys in reading, and all our discriminations should curve toward that end.