Double Prey

October 11, 2010
In Havill's entertaining 17th Posadas County mystery (after 2009's Red, Green, or Murder), retired undersheriff Bill Gastner helps current undersheriff Estelle Reyes-Guzman and her crew make sense of the death of 18-year-old Freddy Romero, who apparently drove his ATV off the bank of an arroyo, and the skeletal remains of a homicide victim found in a remote cave. The discovery of a rare jaguar skull poses a different sort of challenge. Guzman makes the most of the laid-back Gastner's deep knowledge of Posadas County, N.Mex., history as she deal with such diverse and complex characters as ranchers Herb Torrance, Miles Waddell, and Gus Prescott. The consummate professionalism of the sheriff's department is a refreshing change in a genre that thrives on corruption and incompetence. The police combine insight and patience with technology to fit all the puzzle pieces together for a fully satisfying solution.

January 1, 2011
Its spring in Posadas County, New Mexico, but Undersheriff Estelle Reyes-Guzman isnt enjoying the weather. In fact, the high-desert landscape and its natural inhabitants seem to have turned particularly malevolent, what with a boys eye being pierced by a rattlesnake fang and the discovery of a jaguar skull reminding everyone of just what a forbidding place the desert can be. The finding of the jaguar is connected to the accidental death of a teenager, brother of the boy bit by the snake, and eventually to more unearthed bones, but these are decidedly human and require Reyes-Guzman and her former boss, retired sheriff Bill Gastner, to unpeel the layers of a years-old dispute turned violent. Havill is a master at using procedural details to expose the complexities of small-town relationships, but he also excels at drawing meaning from landscape. Like an archaeologist sifting history from the ground, Reyes-Guzman digs clues from the guano-splattered floor of the cave where the jaguars skull was found. One of the stronger entries in an always-satisfying series.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)