Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Review: Too Many Murders

Author: Colleen McCullough
Format: Simon & Schuster (2009), Hardcover, 371 pages
Characters: Detective Carmine Delmonico, Desdemona Delmonico
Subject: murder and espionage
Setting: small town Connecticut
Series: Carmine Delmonico novels
Genre: Mystery- police procedural
Source: public library

Aptly titled, there were almost too many murders to keep track of in this mystery.  At first I thought I'd never be able to keep all the players straight without a scorecard, but that proved to be an unfounded worry.  Suddenly on April 3rd, twelve people are murdered in the small town of Holloman Connecticut.  Police detective Captain Carmine Delmonico is faced with not only trying to solve each of them, but trying to figure out whether the police are dealing with one murderer or twelve totally unrelated deaths.  Each murder was separate in place, method, and discovery. Some of the victims worked together, but others seemed to have no connection to any of the others.

McCullough uses some very interesting police investigative techniques that allow the reader to track these crimes and the police who are tasked with finding the answers.  In doing so, we are quickly and aptly able to follow all the separate threads.  It was a tightly woven story that kept me on the edge of my chair, and surprised me several times.  Even the very ending is a surprise.  I will not spoil it any more than that.  And I will definitely be going to look for others in this series.  In fact, according to FictFact there's a new one due out later this month!  I'm off to find it.

3 comments:

  1. Hmmm . . . interesting. It does sound complicated though keeping track of all those murders. I'll have to check out the author. Have a good week, happy reading and stay warm.

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  2. I would worry about all the people...but I will trust you when you say it is not an issue.

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  3. Your quote of the day sounds like Yogi Berra rather than Joe Dimaggio, doesn't it?

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