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Summary
Summary
VBI (Vermont Bureau of Investigation) head Joe Gunther and his team are called in to investigate a series of violent deaths that appear unrelated until telltale clues reveal a linkage between them and that all of the deaths are, in fact, murders. However, apart from a single drop of unexplained blood left at each crime scene, there are no obvious connections between the victims or the cases. The police are faced with more questions than answers including what do the mysterious deposits of blood mean, coming as they do from three additional unknown people. In their search for the elusive truth, the VBI must plumb the depths of every suspect's past, every victim's most intimate details, and examine each piece of evidence down to the smallest detail--an examination which includes a trip to the Brookhaven National Lab on Long Island and an exploration of cutting edge forensic technology.
Author Notes
Archer Mayor lives in Newfane, Vermont.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
A single drop of unexplained blood at each of three murder scenes perplexes Joe Gunther in Mayor's engrossing 21st novel to feature the Vermont Bureau of Investigation police detective (after 2009's The Price of Malice). The three victims-two middle-aged women and a young man who had a bright future-led apparently unblemished lives in rural Vermont. Gunther and his team take a detour to the Brookhaven National Lab on Long Island for lessons in cutting-edge forensics. Meanwhile, the gubernatorial race of Gail Zigman, Gunther's former girlfriend, spotlights the politics surrounding how the VBI was established and affects his current relationship with bar owner Lyn Silva. As usual, Mayor skillfully combines a gripping police procedural with a view of smalltown life balanced by bits of humor applied at just the right time. The suspense builds toward an ending that reveals a surprising motive and a chillingly realistic villain. Author tour. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* In Vermont, there are 10 to 12 murders per year. Most are ordinary crimes with obvious suspects: spouses or family members. But when three bodies turn up, and investigation shows them to be murders disguised as something else, Joe Gunther's Vermont Bureau of Investigation is under the figurative gun to find a clever serial killer. The victims seem sober, stolid Vermonters, but each body displays a single drop of blood, and the blood isn't the victims' or the killer's. Gunther turns to cutting-edge science unavailable to forensics investigators, but the solution must come from old-fashioned police work. This is the twenty-first Joe Gunther novel. Faithful fans have aged along with the shrewd and decent Gunther, and his team of detectives has passed from being inexperienced youths to seasoned investigators. Gunther has learned to laugh at Detective Willy Kunkel's enduring misanthropies even as he parries the demands of state politicians and aggressive journalists. Readers have been schooled in the state's societal changes over the last two-plus decades, and they've come to love Mayor's elegant tributes to Vermont's weather extremes and beauty. If this sounds like a valediction to one of the best police procedural series going, it's because Red Herring ends with Gunther pondering retirement. Mayor's faithful following will simply have to hope he returns.--Gaughan, Thomas Copyright 2010 Booklist
Kirkus Review
Joe Gunther (The Price of Malice, 2009, etc.) pursues a vindictive killer and pays heavily for catching him.Three people meet sudden deaths: two middle-aged women and a 19-year-old boy. A car wreck kills one; another dies horribly in the aftermath of a home invasion and rape; the third is an apparent suicide. None of them knew each other, or so it seems, yet soon enough the deaths turn out to be connected by three blood spots. Carefully placed on each lifeless body, they amount to a message, a catch-me-if-you-can taunt from a brilliant sociopath to a slew-footed police force apparently not up to the challenge. And for a while at least, Joe and his team at the Vermont Bureau of Investigation, lured into a frustrating cat-and-mouse game, do feel overmatched. Hubris, however, can lead brilliant bad guys into dumb mistakes. Seen through the smart scopes of a highly sophisticated forensics lab, those galling blood spots speak volumes. Meanwhile, Joe's former lover, beautiful, politically ambitious Gail Zigman"the most talked about woman in the state"is racing hell-for-leather to the governor's mansion. Will Joe's chase impinge on Gail's race? Yes, and explosively.Compassionate by nature, self-schooled to be tough when he needs to be, the sage of Brattleboro is as usual a pleasure to spend time with.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Library Journal Review
A rape homicide, a suicide, and a fatal traffic accident initially appear to be unrelated tragedies, but single drops of blood at each crime scene identify a serial killer at work. Amid a Vermont winter, Joe Gunther and his team use a combination of solid investigation and cutting-edge science to race to a solution. Mayor's (www.archermayor.com) 21st entry in this series, following The Price of Malice (2009), delivers a baffling mystery, well-defined characters, a shocking conclusion, and elegant prose. Unfortunately, actor/Audie Award nominee William Dufris's performance, while adequate, fails to exploit the novel's extraordinary atmosphere and suspense. Still, a treat for any mystery fan. [The Minotaur: St. Martin's hc received a starred review, LJ 9/1/10.-Ed.]-Janet Martin, Southern Pines P.L., NC (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Excerpts
Excerpts
CHAPTER ONE Doreen Ferenc slipped her nightgown over her head and let it fall the length of her body and gently settle onto her shoulders. This was the reward of every day, this threshold moment, when, as though dropping a heavy burden, she exchanged her regular clothing, complete with belts, buttons, zippers, and elastic, for the sensual, almost weightless comfort of a simple shift of light cotton. Not that the day had been more onerous than usual. Her mom had been in good spirits, minimally judgmental of the nursing-home staff. They'd served Indian pudding for lunch, a perennial favorite. Her mother had once been an expert at the dessert, and it had led them both down a path of happy memories while they'd worked on the quilt for Doreen's new nephew. Doreen's brother, Mark, had recently married a much younger woman in Nevada, where they lived, and she'd just delivered their first child. Doreen and Mark weren't particularly close, as siblings went, but they got along, and their mom loved them both. She preferred Mark, as Doreen well knew, but only because he was in a position to present her with a grandchild. Doreen had never found marriage appealing, and by and large didn't like kids, which, thank God, she was now safely beyond having anyway. The quilt had become a salutary talisman of good tidings to which Doreen could contribute guilt-free. She left the bedroom in her bare feet and dropped her clothes into the laundry hamper in the darkened bathroom, pausing a moment to admire the unexpected snow falling from the night sky onto the enormous skylight she'd spent too much money having installed. The house was an almost tacky prefab ranch--virtually a trailer with pretensions--but she knew in her heart that it was also the house she'd most likely die in, so why not splurge a little, like on the skylight and the heat she poured on to make the whole house as toasty as in mid- July? She loved winters in Vermont, including flukily premature ones like this year's. She'd known them her whole life, and had, at various times, enjoyed skiing, snowball fights, and even shoveling the driveway. But no longer. Now she just wanted to watch the weather from the comfort of an evenly heated, boring modern house that was fussed over by a handyman complete with a snowplow-- assuming he'd attached the plow to his pickup by now. She had started working full-time at seventeen, decades earlier, and now she was going to enjoy all the fruits of a slightly early retirement. Entertaining such thoughts, she pursued the next step in her nightly routine, and entered the small kitchen. There, she dished out a single scoop of vanilla ice cream, splashed an appreciable quantity of brandy over its rounded top, and retired to the living- room couch, which was strategically angled so she could watch TV from a reclining position. It was snowing--heavily, too--and only October. People hadn't switched to snow tires, sand deliveries were still being made to town road crews, and cars were going to be decorating ditches all over the state by morning. But Doreen didn't have to care about any of it. She was as snug as the proverbial bug. Settled at last, she hit the remote, dialed in her favorite channel, and heard the doorbell ring. "Damn," she murmured, glancing at the digital clock on the set. It was just before ten p.m. "Who on earth?" She placed her bowl on the coffee table, struggled up from her place of comfort, and sighed heavily as she crossed the room to the tiny mudroom and the front door beyond it. Enclosing herself in the mudroom to preserve the heat, she slipped on an overcoat from the row of nearby pegs, hit the outside light, and called out, "Who is it?" She could see the outline of a man standing before the frosted glass of the door. A weak voice answered, "You don't know me, ma'am. My name's Lyle Robinson. I've just wrecked my car about a half mile up. I was wondering if I could use your phone." So much for keeping immune from the woes of poor weather. She then heard him cough and bend over as he clutched his chest. "Are you all right?" "I think so, ma'am. I wasn't wearing my seat belt, like a damn fool … Sorry. Don't mean to offend. I think I just bruised my chest, is all." She hesitated. "Ma'am?" he said next. "Not that it'll matter, but I'm a cousin of Jim and Clara Robinson. They used to live just outside Saxtons River. I don't know if you know them." "I do," she blurted out. "So, you're related to Sherry?" "Yes, ma'am, although what she's doing way out west is beyond any of us." Doreen threw open the door. She was only aware of two things after that: the bare blade of an enormous knife, held just two inches before her eyes, and, behind it, a man disguised by a hooded sweatshirt worn backward, two holes cut in the fabric for his eyes. She now understood why his voice had sounded weak. "Okay, Dory," he said. "Drop the coat and step back inside. You and I are gonna get acquainted." Excerpted from Red Herring by Archer Mayor. Copyright © 2010 by Archer Mayor. Published in 2010 by St. Martin's Press All rights reserved. This work is protected under copyright laws and reproduction is strictly prohibited. Permission to reproduce the material in any manner or medium must be secured from the Publisher. Excerpted from Red Herring by Archer Mayor All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
