The Stranger You Know (Maeve Kerrigan #4)

I enjoyed the first two mysteries of this series, but got bogged down with the third and this the fourth. Maeve Kerrigan is an interesting heroine for a series of police procedurals, but author Casey has surrounded her with a supporting cast of paper thin characters. There’s her superior Derwent who’s a misogynistic rage-aholic–yet somehow also has a heart of gold? Then there’s the super handome boyfriend who is just too nice and the super handsome boss who seems to have a fatal flaw. All three read like stock male characters from a romance novel. There’s a promising lesbian colleague, but she’ll no doubt be killed off–the inevitable fate of lesbians in pop culture renderings.

The other problematic element as the series advances is Casey’s tendency to embed red herrings that continue from book to book. There’s
a stalker who is achieving Moriarity status and repeated hints that her widely admired boss is corrupt. Not bad plot points, but some resolution please!

My disappointment with The Stranger You Know also involves the type of crime it portrays: a serial killer who mutilates his female victims. So many crime novels are built around this particularly gruesome plot line which invites us to read the victims as somehow complicit in their terrible fate. Much of the detecting focuses on the killer’s presumed fantasy life and it all adds up to a fascination with dead, dying and tortured women as a category. Crimes against men in such books tend to be personal and individual.

I just started the Maeve Kerrigan series this summer and I read them in order (The Burning, the Reckoning, The Last Girl & The Stranger You Know) and I’m awed. So many British series with female detectives promise so much, specifically that they’re the next Jane Tenneyson series you’ve been waiting for, but Casey delivers a terrific character and mystery with Kerrigan. As a detective working with Major Crimes for the MET in London, Kerrigan still has a lot to learn-she has to deal with comments from her (male) colleagues, how to be diplomatic with superior officers, and to balance her personal life and work life. It’s acknowledged that Kerrigan is talented as a detective but that she has a lot tol learn.This is the 4th in the series and Kerrigan is working through issues with her personal and work partners-while trying to catch a serial killer who strangles single women. I don’t want to give too much away but there are internal issues with her boss and colleagues which make this case a challenge. While I have read the series, I have to say I think this one (as opposed to The Last Girl) is the easiest to pick up without any background on the series

The plot could have been suspenseful except for the major problem of most police parties trying to fit up a colleague for the crimes. Once it became evident that DI Una Burt would be allowed a personal vendetta to color the direction of the investigation with the blessing of “god” Godley and even the complicity of Maeve Kerrigan, I lost interest. All three tried to fit the facts to their theory rather than the other way around. It made them all seem ineffectual and downright stupid. Burt even offers the explanation that DI Derwent “hired” someone to kill when he had an airtight alibi for one death. Oh, please. DI Derwent, though, did become a very recognizable an even sympathetic character because of the attempt to railroad him. Why all parties would even entertain that, given the facts, seemed thin indeed. The final denouement wasn’t believable; the reason for the serial killings is never explained satisfactorily. And throwing in a child’s paternity at the end has no bearing on the story at all – just serves to link to the next book, I’ll bet. This installment just did not live up to the beginning when current crimes are seemingly linked to one twenty years prior. That premise could have been suspenseful and tense if handled differently. I generally like this series, so I’ll give it a go next time, I expect, but I can hope for a better plot executed in a better way.

I’ve been away from this series for a while, and found this book a bit hard to get into. I persevered because I’ve previously enjoyed her books, and this did improve greatly as it moved on.

I alternated between reading this on my Kindle and listening to it on Audible. While listening to it I started to crack up because I don’t think the author realises how much she uses the word glowering. In fact, her characters exhibit this facial expression at least several times each throughout the book, and I don’t think there’s a single chapter that doesn’t toss two or three your way.

Oh, the unplanned for hilarity!

She is now my best author

Galaxyaudiobook Member Benefit

- Able to comment

- List watched audiobooks

- List favorite audiobooks

- Bookmark will only available for Galaxyaudiobook member