Reviewed By: Harriet Klausner
Darkness Peering
Amazon US PB Amazon US HC Amazon Canada PB Amazon Canada HC
Alice Blanchard
Class/Genre: Mystery
Bantam, Aug 1999, $23.95, 352 pp.
Flowering Dogwood, Maine sounds like a serene community where a family can safely be raised. For years that was true. However, everything changed in 1980 when someone strangled an innocent Down’s Syndrome child. Police Chief Nolan Storrow, a moralistic and honorable person, investigated the case. When he saw which way the direction of the evidence was pointed towards, he killed himself.
Eighteen years later, Nolan’s daughter Rachel, a detective, obtains permission to reopen the 1980 murder case. At about the same time Claire Castillo, the lover of Rachel’s disturbed brother, disappears. Later on, she is found barely alive. She dies in the hospital. Claire’s sister and her boy friend also vanish. Like her father, Claire prays that someone near and dear to her is not the killer in spite of the growing evidence to the contrary.
No one who reads this dramatic psychological suspense wrapped inside a gritty police procedural will believe this is an author’s debut novel. Alice Blanchard provides fans of the sub-genre with a thriller that rivals those of the masters. The heroine is a wonderfully flawed character who chooses to follow her heart rather than her head as many people do when confronting problems with loved ones. DARKNESS PEERING is a winning work that triumphantly announces a new and excellent voice in the genre.
Harriet Klausner
Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Harriet Klausner
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