#1 Chloe Newcomb/ Dudley (Bisbee), ArizonaPublished: July, 1996
Adult Murder Mystery
232 pgs.
St. Martin's Press
Rating: 5 Loved it, couldn't put it down - luscious writing, here's a totally random passage:
"I drove back to Dudley through the red dirt desert slowly, my headache still there but better. The heat would soon be turning the silver-green grasses to gold and the little frogs on the edges of the rain ponds at Randall's would be dead, little dried-up husks, after all the lying watery promise. The air still smelled burnt, but I couldn't see flames, smoke, anywhere, more like the air itself was not air at all but colorless fire."
Chloe Newcomb has moved to small town (TINY town) Dudley in the very southeastern corner of Arizona, in the middle of the desert, but surrounded by the mountains. It's late summer, monsoon season, and Betsy Thornton's descriptions of the landscape, the weather, the town/s, are equisite, rich. Chloe is a volunteer "Victim Witness", helping the Cochise County Sheriff's department notify and help victims of violent crimes and their next-of-kin. This also entails giving the "bad news" to families. And this story is about one such notification, one that becomes very personal and keeps you guessing and wondering....and sometimes smiling....until almost the very end.
Leroy Harris/Randall Hartmann has shot himself in the head, but of course, since I've already crowed about this being a great murder mystery, it does turn out to be murder. But there's so much more, since the dead guy ends up being Chloe's first love, from college, and she keeps this a secret, telling no one. We're introduced to a great cast of characters, an interesting community, and the start of a series that I'm excited to dive into!
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