The roots of this suspenseful murder mystery go back to the Vista Program, the War on Poverty. A small group comes to poor, rural Mason County, Virginia in the 1960′s to serve a year. A few remained to live there, including Cam and Meredith Taylor, owner and editor of the local money-losing and virtually bankrupt local newspaper. Cam attempts to raise or borrow money but is rebuffed by all he solicits. Then the bodies of both are found, separately, murdered.
The prime suspect, a cartoonist who had recently moved to the town, is the son of a former Vista worker. He is a friend of Rachel Goddard, a veterinarian who also relocated to Mason County. Each has a secret from the past, he in New York City, she involving her family. The past, of course, muddies Deputy Sheriff’s Tom Bridger’s investigations into the murders, as well as his relationship with Rachel (which is complicated by the presence of his former girlfriend arriving on the scene because she’s the daughter of the murdered couple). Making his task more difficult is a subsequent murder and an attempt on Rachel’s life.
The plot is finely hone, leading the reader forward to a most unexpected ending. Of course, the specter of Rachel’s secret, which keeps popping up throughout the tale, was previously revealed in “The Heat of the Moon,” one of two preceding volumes in this series. The characters are well-drawn and the inter-play between Tom and Rachel and Tom’s former girlfriend add to the book’s tension. (The book has also been issued in paperback.]
Recommended.
