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CAUGHT DEAD
by Andrew Lanh
Poisoned Pen, June 2014
284 pages
$24.95
ISBN: 146420330X


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Ed Ifkovic has taken on the pen name of Andrew Lanh to craft a new mystery series based on the private investigative team of Rick Van Lam and his young sidekick, Hank Nguyen (who is training to become the first Vietnamese-American state trooper in Connecticut). Rick normally deals in low-key insurance claim investigations, but when Hank's grandmother calls on Rick to take on the case of the mysterious death of one of the two beautiful Le sisters, he can't turn her down.

Mary Le Vu lived an uneventful life, married to a local shopkeeper. So when she ends up dead, killed in a drug-infested neighborhood far from her usual haunts, the community is shocked. The police have dismissed the murder as a drive-by, in which Mary was at the wrong place at the wrong time. However, those who know her, including her beautiful sister Molly, cannot even begin to understand why Mary was there in the first place.

Molly is married to a rich Hartford car magnate, with two children the same age as Mary's. She appears to have no more clue than the police as to why this happened to her sister. An unraveling of closely held family secrets is the only key to solving this case for Rick Van Lam, but no one is forthcoming, and it will take all the wily skills and friends he can call on to help solve the case, which is destined to become larger before the story is over.

This well written look inside the Vietnamese-American community makes for a fascinating setting for this new mystery series. The characters are likable, and Ifkovic/Lanh's plotting is well executed. He keeps his readers guessing till the end.

§ Christine Zibas is a freelance writer and former director of publications for a Chicago nonprofit.

Reviewed by Christine Zibas, November 2014

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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