Giles Blunt, Black Fly Season

Giles Blunt, Black Fly Season - Near Algonquin Bay, Canada, the patrons were enjoying their drinks at World Tavern when the woman entered. Black fly bites were all over her body and she flitters from one table to the next. When locals try to pick her up, starting with asking her name, she says she has no idea. They call her "Red" for obvious reasons. However, another patron, local cop Jerry Commando, takes the baffled woman to City Hospital.

Doctors quickly realize the cause of her perplexity and amnesia has nothing to do with frying her brain on drugs; instead the docile woman was shot in the head as there is a bullet lodged in her brain; she does not remember the incident. Homicide Detectives John Cardinal and Lise Delorme head the investigation that includes keeping Red safe because both law enforcement officials believes that the person who injured her shot to kill and once he or she learns she still lives will be back to correct their mistake.

The return of Cardinal and Delorme (see THE DELICATE STORM AND FORTY WORDS FOR SORROW) bluntly means a great time for police procedural fans. Their latest entry is terrific as usual, starting from the moment Red enters the remote locals' bar, through a medical procedure to remove the bullet, and continuing as the two detectives know that she is a target, but to insure her safety may have to use her as bait. The motive for the attempted killing will chill the audience much more than winter in Ontario as it is based on real cult murders on the Mexican-United States border. BLACK FLY SEASON is a complex chiller that will shake the audience with its art imitates life premise.

Putnam, Jun 2005, $25.95, 352

ISBN: 0399152555

Harriet Klausner