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CRUEL SEASON FOR DYING, A
by Harker Moore
Mysterious Press, July 2003
307 pages
$24.95
ISBN: 0892967749


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

In a troubled world, we often call upon ideal images to help us face the trials of daily life. There are many people who feel they are guided by angels, who put their trust in some sort of spiritual being. What is one supposed to feel when confronted by a killer who turns his victims into "fallen" angels, who arranges their naked bodies almost beatifically and inserts white swan wings into their shoulders to complete the angelic pose? What message is he trying to convey? More importantly, what is driving him to behave in this bizarre way?

Those are the questions that NYPD Homicide Detective James Sakura must answer. Certainly, nothing in his background has prepared him to determine the motivations of such an unusual perpetrator. At first, the victims seem linked by their sexuality, but that connection evaporates when an 8-year-old child is killed. Sakura has to call on the skills of a wide range of people, including serial killer expert Dr. Wilhelmina French, and a former member of the department who left after a botched investigation, Michael "Kenjin" Darius, to help him begin to understand the motivations of this terrifying killer.

Sakura is an interesting protagonist in that he is Japanese-American and spent part of his youth under the care of his grandparents in Japan. As such, he brings a kind of Japanese sensibility to his job. He is married to a blind Japanese woman by the name of Hanae, and she offers him the kind of support that would one would be hard pressed to find in a typical American marriage. Hanae serves as his sounding board and balances his life; but as the body count increases, Sakura's every waking hour is devoured by the case. He's neglecting those he loves, and there is a price to be paid for that.

The investigation is intrinsically interesting, since the killer operates out of such a different mind set from the normal homicidal maniac. The case is at times compromised by such things as an internal leak to the press, which adds to the difficulty in bringing it to a conclusion. As is often the case, the killer escalates his activity, and the sense of suspense and danger increases with every page.

Moore has done an excellent job of presenting the clash between the Japanese and American cultures and portraying a villain who is quite different from those the reader may have run across before. There are a few too many clichés, and after a certain point, the killer seemed very obvious to me. However, on the whole, I give Moore high marks for creating a unique work. A Cruel Season for Dying had a quiet intensity to it that matched the dignity of its protagonist, leavened with just enough psychological suspense to keep the pace moving. A well-written debut novel.

Reviewed by Maddy Van Hertbruggen, July 2003

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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