Chain Reading

An Unsuitable Death is another in the Lambert and Hook series by J. M. Gregson. Maybe I've just been reading too many Gregson mysteries lately, but this one seemed kind of flat. The murder victim is a young woman who has been strangled and left in a ritualized pose in a cathedral. There has been a serial killer on the loose for several weeks, and at first it looks like this is his most recent victim. But the police soon determine that it is a copycat killing. They also learn that the victim was a heroin addict, with income that couldn't be accounted for. Clearly she was dealing drugs to support her habit, and that led Lambert to suspect that she had been killed by the local drug gang.

There's really no need to say more. Lambert and Hook just aren't interesting characters. The only other on-going character in the series is DI Rushton, and although there's a lot of potential there, Gregson just doesn't do more than describe his character - you never feel much attachment to the character.

This is a middling good mystery. The clues were available; an astute reader would have guessed (though not been able to prove) who was the murderer well before it was fully revealed. It's a solid mystery, but I was just not able to engage with it.