Burke, Alafair: Dead Connection

  Amazon  

In Alafair Burke's stand-alone police procedural Dead Connection, rookie NYPD policewoman Ellie Hatcher is temporarily assigned to homicide to assist in the investigation of a series of related murders. Ellie is just the demographic the killer seems to be interested in--thirty-something, single--but Ellie's assignment to the case may have more to do with her new partner's tendency to court media attention than to her potential as bait. As the daughter of a policeman who allegedly killed himself after years of obsessing over another serial killer, the press can be expected to lap up details about her personal life along with news about the case.

The victims in the case are apparently being stalked by someone they've met on an online dating site, FirstDate.com, which is headquartered in New York and thus conveniently located for the investigation. The book's plot certainly makes it timely--the scary side of internet relationships and identity theft being much in the news. Ellie is a likable character--devoted to her family and dedicated to her job. The plot of the story is a complex one. Perhaps too complex at times, actually, because in the last quarter of the book, when all the loose ends are being tied up, the who- and howdunits revealed, it takes some concentration to remember just who everybody is and what victim was killed for what reason. Less than 24 hours after finishing the book, I'd be hard-pressed to provide a summary of the various murders without rereading. The book slows down at the end, as well, or at least it did for me, and becomes a bit of a slog. There was one detail that seemed unrealistic to me, Ellie's too quick assumption that a pseudonym used by the killer was selection based on a popular translation of a Biblical text. Otherwise the story held together well (I think, though to be certain I'd have to diagram all the facts related to those different victims). It's certainly not an edge-of-your-seat read, but perfectly readable, if slow going toward the end.