Redemption
A
Jane Perry Mystery
Laurel
Dewey
Story
Plant (Hardcover)
ISBN-10: 0-9816087-5-2 (0981608752)
ISBN-13: 978-0-9816087-5-4 (9780981608754)
Publication Date: June 2009
List Price: $24.95
Synopsis (from
the publisher): Jane Perry has resigned from the Denver Police
Department and is trying to make a living as a private investigator,
but she finds her past haunting her at every turn and her old demons
rising up to torment her.
Seeking some level of comfort at an AA meeting, Jane encounters a woman
who knows what Jane does for a living. The woman wants Jane to drive
with her from Colorado to Northern California in search of a man who
matches the description of the killer who murdered her granddaughter
many years before. She's convinced that the man has started to kill
again and she wants to stop him.
Jane thinks the woman is crazy--especially when she discovers that
she's a New Age devotee--but Jane is desperate for work. They head on
the road, gathering critical information about the killer, and
themselves, along the way. Jane has recently experienced several events
in her life that seem to border on the paranormal, though she is a
complete skeptic in that regard. Now, those experiences come with
greater frequency. And when the trail of the killer leads to a
fundamentalist church, the consequences of belief and faith propel her
toward a deadly confrontation.
Review: Redemption
is the second thriller by Laurel Dewey to feature hard drinking, chain
smoking, rough talking former Denver police officer, now private
investigator, Jane Perry.
Jane has quit the force and is trying to sober up by attending AA
meetings. Catching a smoke outside one evening, she comes upon
Katherine "Kit" Clark. Kit, a throw-back from the 70s, knows who Jane
is, having watched her on Larry King during her investigation of a mass
murder a year earlier. Kit, dying of cancer, offers Jane $5000 to
find, and prove, that a man recently released from prison on a
technicality, Lou Peters, kidnapped, raped, and killed her 14-year-old
granddaughter over a decade ago.
It's hard for Jane to be objective here. Her own grandfather was a
cruel man, forcing his sons, one of whom was Jane's father, to fight
each other until one fell from exhaustion or pain. Jane's father
subsequently beat her and her brother. Her self-abuse today, whether
from alcohol or tobacco, is a consequence of her own internalized pain.
Kit wants Jane to help her break a cycle of abuse, and possibly help
herself in the process.
In many ways it's hard to like Jane. Harder still when the language she
uses is so vulgar, and really so unnecessary. She's a smart, complex
woman but seems to come off as 1-dimensional, or as common as the thugs
she used to put away as a cop. The story, which in and of itself is
quite intriguing, at times spellbinding, could have been just as
suspenseful, just as compelling without Jane cursing at every
opportunity. Here is a situation where the author's misguided attempt
at authenticity backfires badly, where her characters could, and
should, be defined by, and remembered for, their actions and deeds, not
by the foul language they use.
Special thanks to guest reviewer Betty of The Betz Review for contributing her review of Redemption and to The Story Plant for providing a copy of the book for this review.
Review Copyright © 2009 — Hidden Staircase Mystery Books — All Rights Reserved
Have you read Redemption? How would you rate it?
Mysteries in this series ...
Protector
ATN Group Publishing (Hardcover), February 2007
ISBN-10: 1-884820-85-9 (1884820859)
ISBN-13: 978-1-884820-85-4 (9781884820854)
Redemption
Story Plant (Hardcover), June 2009
ISBN-10: 0-9816087-5-2 (0981608752)
ISBN-13: 978-0-9816087-5-4 (9780981608754)
Omnimystery
keywords for Redemption
...
Location(s) referenced: Denver,
Colorado.
