The Murder Book

April 1, 2020
The killing of Gunnar Jonsson evokes bad memories for Buffalo homicide detective Lauren Riley and comes to have international implications. Jonsson had traveled from his native Iceland to see his biological father, John Hudson, for the first time; after the meeting, Jonsson was bludgeoned to death near his hotel on the night of a "full cold moon," which occurs every December. Riley is reminded of an unsolved cold case: the disappearance of a 12-year-old boy in 1978 on the night of another full cold moon. She's haunted, too, by the brutality of Jonsson's murder, as she investigates Hudson's two other children for possible financial motive, then learns that Jonsson's boss had come with him to the U.S. but soon vanished. Riley and her cohort, FBI Special Agent Matt Lawton, are sent to Reykjavik to pursue the case as it twists and turns. The fourth entry in the Cold Case Investigation series by retired homicide detective Redmond is on the mark as a police procedural, humanized by Riley's enigmatic relationship with former partner Shane Reese, and enhanced by its Icelandic setting.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)