nomadreader

The backstory: Robert Ellis is my favorite mystery writer. Murder Season  is his third novel to feature Los Angeles detective Lena Gamble (he also has two stand-alone mysteries.) I adored the first two novels in this series, City of Fire ( my review ) and The Lost Witness ( my review ), immensely, and I eagerly awaited the publication of Murder Season  this month. In anticipation, I re-read both City of Fire  and  The Lost Witness  this year, and both earned 5 stars from on the re-read, even though I remembered 'who did it.' Note: because I believe this novel could work as a standalone, this review will not include any spoilers from the first two novels. The basics: Lena gets called to investigate a brutal double murder at a hot Hollywood nightspot. Both the identity of the victims, one famous and one infamous, and the fact the two were even associated with one another, surprises everyone. My thoughts: Admittedly, I went into this novel with high ...

The backstory: I first read City of Fire in the summer of 2007 and fell in love with it. I went on to read its sequel, The Lost Witness , as soon as it was released in February of 2009. When word broke of a third book , Murder Season , in this fantastic series, I knew I wanted to re-read the first two before Murder Season comes out in December. The basics: Lena Gamble, a Los Angeles homicide detective, still mourns the loss of her older brother, a musician, five years ago. His murder remains unsolved, but Lena is busy trying to solve a new string of grisly murders. My thoughts: When I sat down to reread City of Fire , I was curious how it would go. I don't often re-read novels, and I thought I remembered what happened. I soon found myself gripped with this tightly-wound narrative and thoroughly enjoying its intricacies. Robert Ellis is a masterful plotter, pacer and storyteller. I knew what happened, and I was still on the edge of my seat. What I soon discovered was that al...