Another Alex Delaware/Milo Sturgis book that’s a real treat…

I came late to Jonathan Kellerman’s Alex Delaware books, based on a bad assumption on my part: that books featuring a psychologist as a protagonist would necessarily be psychological thrillers, which I’m generally not fond of. However, a few years ago, I was lucky enough to receive a review copy of Serpentine, and found out that, due to Alex’s partnership with LAPD homicide detective Milo Sturgis, the books are essentially police procedurals, which I definitely like. (See my reviews of earlier titles here and here and here.) And The Ghost Orchid is another great example, where solid detective work from Milo and his team meshes with Alex’s valuable insights – and also a bit of his own detective work – to eventually lead to a solution.

The Ghost Orchid opens with two bodies shot by a pool. At first glance, they seem to be pretty different people, who had simply gotten together for a bit of illicit nookie. So it seems unlikely it was “truly” a double murder, and more likely that one of the two unfortunately was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. But which was the intended victim, and thus more likely to lead to identification of the killer? Milo’s and Alex’s investigative skills get quite a workout: both victims’ pasts are a bit murky, there may (or may not) have been a similar homicide a few days later, and the female victim’s husband seems pretty suspicious. It was a lot of fun following along as the layers got peeled back.

In the end, the solution was sobering in the extent of the pure evil involved. But it was simultaneously almost banal in how the perpetrator, once identified, actually got caught, and the contrast really added to the punch of the ending. And as always, Kellerman’s smooth writing made the book fly by. (His writing reminds me of a great technical writer I used to work with, who structured his reports so that, just as your mind was asking the next logical question, he was answering it. Which made you want to keep reading. And, although fiction and technical writing are rather different, Kellerman pulls off the same trick.) I highly recommend this book, and my thanks go to Ballantine Books and Net Galley for the review copy.