Book Review

A Lonely Death, by Charles Todd

An Inspector Ian Rutledge Mystery

 The Inspector Ian Rutledge mysteries began about twenty years ago, and I've read most of them. 

The author is not one person but two, a mother and son writing duo. 

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003ZSHUK2/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 

This series is critically acclaimed and has won several awards. My own impressions of this particular story will pretty well express my views of this mystery series as a whole. In any long running series of stories in any fiction genre, the reader will have favorites. I haven't found an author yet who is at the top of their game in every single book they put out - that had probably been stated in Upbeat Book Talk before. 

The time period is the years following WWI. Rutledge manages to return to his former position at Scotland Yard, but he's a badly damaged man and has to hide it. Due to the physical and emotional trauma he suffered the inspector has a private ghost, Hamish MacCleod, a soldier under his command he liked and respected - and had to execute. Only the doctor who was instrumental in Ian Rutledge's recovering enough to function in daily life and his profession knows this secret, and he said Hamish will fade as his former patient's scarred psyche heals - but so far Hamish is still with him, albeit
his presence isn't as marked as it was at the beginning. 
This is not a light-hearted read. Rutledge's cases are complicated, intense, as tragic an affair as murder is apt to be, with revenge and hatred and long held offenses acting out in killing. After the huge losses of life among his men, Rutledge's sanity is put to the test by willful murder. This book deals with not one but 3, then 4, deaths that are not self-inflicted or natural, veterans of the war every one.
As usual the reader follows the complicated thread of the case, where clues are murky and people usually reluctant to come forth with information due to secrets of their own or mistrust of the police. And meanwhile you are privy to Inspector Rutledge's private war going on within himself at the same time.
You will like him; he's a very decent and likable man as well as an extremely intelligent one who is tenacious in following every line of inquiry.

My two objections to this story, and many of the others, is a plot that becomes so complex at times that if the reader misses a small clue you can get lost in what's going on. Usually the author(s) do a good job of holding your attention, but if the story becomes tedious for you, beware. 
Also Todd has a habit of not tying everything together until the last minute. Sometimes that works well, and it is not a problem here. But in a couple of the others it was very irritating, leaving me with questions where the answers about loose ends were hidden somewhere in previous pages.

And there's one more, a complaint I've heard from many of the fans of Inspector Ian Rutledge, and
concur with. It is taking too long for him to heal more emotionally, to the point it doesn't seem realistic anymore. With the ability to do his job so well under such immense internal and external pressures, if he hasn't been able to put Hamish to rest most of the time by now, you'd think he would be back in a mental ward. 

But definitely, if you enjoy more complex mysteries of a quality write try these; and start at the beginning.