WALKING SHADOWS by Faye Kellerman
Whenever I sit down to read a Fay Kellerman “Decker & Lazarus” novel I get a warm fuzzy feeling because these books are mysteries but they are also stories about family. Pete Decker and Rina Lazarus are a married couple living in a small town in New York. Pete is a detective on the local police force. The couple moved from Los Angeles because they thought Greenbury, NY would have less crime and their lives would be more peaceful. However since the Deckers moved to town the number of homicides seems to have increased.
Kellerman’s latest novel WALKING SHADOWS starts off with the discovery of a new dead body. The investigation of this murder indicates it has connections to other crimes which Decker wants to follow up on. However there are jurisdictional issues that hamper Decker’s efforts. Not a patient man, Decker detests the red tape that has to be cut through in order to proceed with his investigation. He knows he has to “make nice” with the other authorities and he will, but he doesn’t have to like it.
Keeping to the family theme, Pete relies on his wife to do some detecting for him. She is always good at research and this case requires a good bit of that. He also utilizes the skills of his “adopted” son Tyler McAdams. Tyler is a law student who works for the police department during his summers off from school. His relationship with Pete is funny and loving. He works with Pete and also likes to hang out at their home with Rina. He loves her for the person she is and also for the food she can cook.
Kellerman is great at creating interesting plots and characters. She is also extremely adept in building relationships. The banter between Pete and Rina as well as the quips exchanged between Pete and Tyler are superb. They enhance your knowledge of these characters and also add a depth to the plot. You care about a book such as WALKING SHADIWS because you care so much about the basic characters.
There is one part of the book I did not care for and that is when Kellerman creates a conversation between Peter and Rina about books to read. Rina opines about the works of author Jonathan Kellerman (Faye’s real life husband) and his character Alex Delaware. The conversation is an inside joke that doesn’t work. Faye Kellerman’s work can stand on its own without bringing in references to her better known author husband.
Faye Kellerman has long been one of my favorite authors because of her writing style and grace. She uses both again in WALKING SHADOWS and comes out with another winner.
WALKING SHADOWS is published by William Morrow. It contains 384 pages and sells for $27.99.
Jackie K Cooper
www.jackiekcooper.com
I was especially bothered by the reference to Jonathan Kellerman, because if I am not mistaken in a few of the earlier books in this series, she references the characters Milo Sturgis and Alex Delaware as if they are real people, being consulted on cases by the character Peter Decker. Suddenly, in this book, she forgets that and references them as characters in a novel. Very inconsistent, a glaring error to those of us reading since the beginning.