Backstabber
Tim Cockey
Hyperion, Jul 2004
ISBN: 0786867132

In the Baltimore area, Sisco Fontaine has a slight problem. Lying on the kitchen floor is the murdered corpse of Jake Weisheit with a knife protruding from his back. Sisco has been sleeping with Jake's spouse Polly and recently in a public display of ire he threatened to kill Jake. Obviously the cops can back up with evidence that Sisco had motive, means, and apparently opportunity making him the prime suspect in what appears to be a murder of passion.

A bit upset, Sisco knows only one person who works with the dead, former classmate mortician Hitchcock Sewell. He calls Hitch, but all he wants from his newly rediscovered buddy is to dispose of the body as he knows what will happen to him if the police investigate the murder. Hitch refuses, but puts aside the other bodies, a horde of females wanting to share a coffin, and the formaldehyde high to determine whether Sisco is a BACKSTABBER.

The fifth Hitchcock amateur sleuth investigation is a solid entry in a series a bit off the norm, but always fun to read. As usual, once the audience accepts Hitch as an expert crime investigator, which takes a bit of acceptance, fans will have the usual good time. Hitch is the center of the tale as he keeps it glued together whether he prepares a corpse for a funeral service or making inquiries that lead to the local police wanting to bury him for his interference. Tim Cockey provides an amusing look at the art of dying from the two perspective approaches that one of Baltimore's finest protagonists brings to those who dearly departed.

Harriet Klausner