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ST ALBANS FIRE
by Archer Mayor
Mysterious Press, October 2005
320 pages
$24.95
ISBN: 0892968168


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

I'll admit it -- one of the tasks I hate about reviewing is that one-line summary you get asked to provide. It's as bad as trying to assign numbers of stars, or ratings. I'm lousy at it. The summary is always a plot summary which doesn't tell much about a book's interesting nuances. This latest Archer Mayor book really intrigued me, but I doubt my dry recitation of the story line would tell you much.

Still, I glommed onto this book because mysteries about arson are often interesting; there's usually forensic evidence stuff that I don't know, and it's a crime that often involves other crimes. This offers a more interesting-than-average plot.

What I liked particularly about this story was that Joe Gunther differs from so many other cops. His particular strengths are his humanity, his ability to sympathize and he uses that to do his job. When it's manipulative, which is almost never is, he feels it. He tends to respect people, and it shows. I liked that instead of saying "ma'am, I can't discuss that aspect of the investigation with you" Gunther would say "no, I don't consider you a suspect."

It's not done perhaps -- at least in so many mysteries where the cops are all deadpan, never giving anything away, blah blah blah -- but I like that he does it. It makes him more interesting, more likeable and it shows why he's a good cop. He is nice, as often as he can be; some of it is the need to be diplomatic in his job and some seems to be his nature, pure and simple.

When he heads down to Newark with former NYC cop, Willy Kunkle, Gunther does not come across as a hick either; there are things he's aware are different in the big city but he's a resourceful guy, and he's seen a lot in his years as a police officer. I appreciate that at no time do any of Mayor's cops seem stereotypical. It's too easy to do in police procedurals and one reason I stopped reading most of them over the years. Mayor's Vermont cops are all individuals with personalities that aid and hamper their investigative style.

A little less successful for me was the ongoing story of Gunther's relationship with Gail Zigman. I have only read one other in this long-lived series but I never got a real good feel for her here and I found the stuff about her sort of, well, boring. That may be because in part I'm not familiar with the story line, but not completely. The switches between crime story and personal were a bit jarring to me; they simply didn't work as well as the narrative involving solving the arson case that killed a teenager.

While plot is often the least absorbing part of a mystery novel for me, this story was absorbing. I did skip several pages of the first chapter when the crime occurred. Once again, it had the feeling of prologue where someone dies -- pretty standard in a mystery, I know -- but I had no desire to watch someone 'die' in a fire.

Did I know who dunnit? I had my suspicions and that's another thing done well in this book -- no freak arsonists out of left field ten pages from the end, no 'hurry up' solutions. It made sense but was not too easy.

Joe Gunther is a sympathetic man and that's meant in all the ways that phrase is used; he clearly means it when he offers sympathy to someone for a loss, he also is someone you can sympathize with. He's clear-spoken and warm and friendly, while still coming across as a complete professional. He's a good cop.

Reviewed by Andi Shechter, October 2005

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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