Book Review: The Big Gamble

Reviewed By: Woodstock - RAM

The Big Gamble     Amazon US PB Amazon US HC Amazon Canada PB Amazon Canada HC
Michael McGarrity
Class/Genre:   Mystery   Police Procedural
Series: Kevin Kearney # 7
...

This is the seventh in McGarrity's enjoyable Kevin Kerney series. Now working as police chief of Santa Fe, New Mexico, Kerney has recently learned that he has an adult son - born to a woman who chose to raise him on her own, not telling Kerney of her pregnancy. As it happens, Kerney's son - Clayton Istee - has been working as an Apache tribal policeman, and recently has accepted a position in the sheriff's department of a rural New Mexico county.

A long abandoned road side produce stand goes up in flames, and investigators find two bodies in the ashes. One of the deaths is recent, the second proves to be the body of a young woman reported missing several years earlier.

Kerney and his son find themselves lead investigators on each of the two deaths, and as events unfold, the two cases are connected in several ways. Well known influential New Mexicans are involved, prostitution rings, legal & illegal gambling, lots of unsavory stuff occurs. McGarrity does a nice job of weaving the two cases together in a believable manner.

Kerney and his son are basically strangers to each other, and the two men learn ways to communicate with each other as the story evolves.

I like this series a lot - and I look forward to the next installment.

Woodstock - RAM

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