William G. Tapply Out Cold

Out Cold

William G. Tapply

St. Martin's, Sep 2006, $24.95

ISBN: 0312337469

On a freezing morning in Boston's Back Bay, attorney Brady Coyne wakes up thinking about how he misses his "virtual spouse" Evie as he lets Henry their Brittany spaniel companion out the back door into four inches of snow. However, instead of taking care of business and getting back inside to warmth and breakfast, Henry growls and paws at the snow. Frustrated because Henry ignores his commands, Brady goes out side in the cold to retrieve his canine only to learn why the dog refused to come home. A teenage girl lies probably dead as EMT arrives to try to and save her.

His secretary tells him the girl was rushed to Suffolk County Medical Center, but learns what really happened to her when Boston homicide cop Saundra Mendoza visits to question him. She tells him the girl was most likely dead before he found her from hypothermia and a loss of blood from a miscarriage, which Brady thinks means in this case amateur abortion. Brady needs to know who teenage Jane Doe was and why she crawled into his backyard to die. As he digs someone watches him just in case.

Brady Coyne's latest investigation is a terrific cautionary story that is at its best when the lawyer is obsessed to learn the truth about the girl who died in his backyard because he feels some guilt though he logically knows he did everything he could for her. The story line loses some of its deepest meaning though retains the exhilaration when it veers into the culprit trying to insure he never learns the truth. OUT COLD is a fabulous mystery in which William G. Tapply warns that abolishing legal abortion will drive it into the back allies for the poor (and overseas for the middle and upper classes).

Harriet Klausner