The Cold Blue Blood
A Berger and Mitry Mystery
David Handler
Review: David Handler introduces Mitch Berger and Desiree "Des" Mitry in a new mystery series with the unsatisfactory The Cold Blue Blood. What is particularly disappointing about this debut is that Handler is the author of the consistently excellent Stewart Hoag mysteries.
There is little doubt that Handler is an accomplished writer with a strong sense of character, good dialog, and descriptive locales. And each of these components is present in The Cold Blue Blood in addition to an intriguing prologue. But the plot is incongruous and Handler simply doesn't bring all the elements together well.
The Cold Blue Blood is presented as a Berger and Mitry mystery, but Mitch Berger has a much larger role than Des Mitry in the story, yet Mitry is by far the more interesting character. There is potential for this series, and Handler is certainly capable of doing better than this first mystery would suggest.
Review Copyright © 2001 — Hidden Staircase Mystery Books — All Rights Reserved
Selected reviews of other mysteries by this author …
The Shimmering Blond Sister
Minotaur Books (Hardcover), October 2010
ISBN-13: 9780312574857; ISBN-10: 0312574851
Location(s) referenced in The Cold Blue Blood: Connecticut
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The Cold Blue Blood by David Handler
Publisher: Minotaur Books
Format: Hardcover
ISBN-10: 0-312-28003-3
ISBN-13: 978-0-312-28003-1
Publication Date: October 2001
List Price: $23.95
Synopsis (from the publisher): Mitch Berger, a top film critic with a major New York newspaper at a surprisingly young age, has become almost a recluse since his wife died one year ago. He spends his time secluded in his apartment or in the dark recesses of a screening room. Although he continues to dazzle moviegoers and the film elite with his criticism, his editor and good friend, Lacy Mickerson, is alarmed about him. As a scheme to pull him out of the doldrums of his grief, she gives him a nonfilm assignment - to do a color story on the wealthy and social home owners on Connecticut's Gold Coast. It takes some doing, but in the end Mitch agrees.
He is fortunate to find a cottage to rent on Big Sister, the absolute top-of-the-line private island outside the town of Dorset. His landlady, Dolly, is pleasant and friendly, but some of the other inhabitants of this small piece of land, although too well bred to come right out and say it, are not happy to have Mitch - born of parents only one generation away from Eastern Europe and raised on the city's pavements - arrive in their backyard. But Dolly, whose husband has recently left her, needs the money, and at least she is more than gracious.
The discovery of a body during a bout of optimistic gardening in Dolly's backyard brings on the other main player - Lieutenant Desiree Mitry, one of only three women on the Connecticut State Police major crimes squad, the youngest of the three, and the only black. A dedicated officer, she is the terror of everyone who doesn't really want to give a home to one of her stray cats. She is, as well, a closet artist and a complicated and beautiful woman, and she intrigues Mitch from the start.
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