Book Review: The Dead Sit Round in a Ring

Reviewed By: Harriet Klausner

[5 stars]

The Dead Sit Round in a Ring Amazon US PB Amazon US HC Amazon UK PB Amazon Canada PB Amazon Canada HC
David Lawrence
Class/Genre: Mystery Woman Main Character Noir Police Procedural
Series: Detective Sergeant Stella Mooney # 1
Dunne, May 2004, $23.95, 352 pp.

In London, Detective Sergeant Stella Mooney leads the inquiries into the macabre deaths of four people sitting in a ring. Three of them are ruled suicides, but the other is a homicide that looks like a professional technician committed the crime. The victim Jimmy Stone was an amoral wastrel with the reputation of selling his soul for cash as he ran a web store peddling memorabilia from crimes and items owned by renowned killers.

The investigation leads Stella and her squad to a notorious crime family that treats their prostitutes with scorn peddling the flesh of forlorn fraught females from the residue of the deadly hot spots of the former Soviet Union. Still what could have a stone cold seller like Jimmy offered for sale that upset the Tanners so that they most likely killed a fellow dealer? Interfering with her work on finding proof is nightmares involving murdered children from a case she failed to solve and her own miscarriage and her shaky relationship with her lover, frustrated with Stella’s inability to share with him what haunts her.

THE DEAD SIT ROUND IN A RING is an extremely dark police procedural that is quite exciting and realistic, but very different from the typical London cop tale. The story line is more urban noir and even the heroine has an intense gloomy outlook that combined with her obsessive compulsive behavior serves her well as she learns (along with shocked readers) the atrocities in Serbia have come with the young female victims and continue in London. This is a terrific tale, but needs a label not to read if suffering from depression.

Harriet Klausner

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Harriet Klausner