The Last Girl

March 4, 2013
In Casey’s uneven third crime novel featuring Det. Constable Maeve Kerrigan (after 2012’s The Reckoning), Kerrigan and her misogynistic partner, Det. Insp. Josh Derwent, investigate the brutal murders of Vita Kennford and one of her 15-year-old daughters, Laura, in their posh London home. Vita’s husband, Philip, was battered in the attack, while Laura’s twin, Lydia, survived physically unscathed. When Philip, a notorious defense lawyer, appears oddly unconcerned about the terrible loss of his wife and daughter, Kerrigan and Derwent wonder whether Philip’s flattened affect is as deeply suspicious as it seems or merely a distraction from the true killer. A cursory examination of the family reveals a surfeit of secrets and enemies who might strike at Philip through those closest to him. The police proceedings will keep readers turning the pages, but the final revelations and the reasons for the murders may strike some as implausibly lurid and clichéd. Agent: Zoë Pagnamenta, Zoë Pagnamenta Agency.

March 1, 2013
How far would a daughter go to get her father's attention? It's hard to believe that a young teen would slash the throat of her twin sister, stab her mother over 30 times, then knock her father unconscious, no matter how much she'd been ignored. Yet Lydia is the only one left standing when London coppers Josh Derwent and Maeve Kerrigan (The Reckoning, 2012, etc.) arrive at the Wimbledon home of defense attorney QC Philip Kennford. She's hysterical, but once he recovers from his bashing, her father hardly seems to care; he simply packs her off to his dead wife's sister to recover, leaving Derwent and Kerrigan to ponder whether Daddy, Mummy or one of the twins--sexually adventurous, now-dead Laura, or introverted Lydia, with her eating and self-cutting disorders--motivated the murderer. Superintendent Godley, who has his hands full trying to deal with the Skinner-Goldsworthy drug wars, urges diplomacy in dealing with the high-powered QC, but Derwent is incapable of discretion, and Kerrigan is distracted by whether to leave her live-in boyfriend, Rob, and deal with a stalker on her own. Savannah, Philip's beautiful daughter from his first marriage, has earned his enmity by falling in love with Zoe, and the homophobic barrister is most displeased when Lydia decides to move in with them. An overdue admission brings Kerrigan and Derwent to Savannah and Zoe's Sussex farm, where one daughter lies dead, another is ready to immolate herself, and an unacknowledged half sibling finally breaks down and identifies the object of all this carnage. So many plots, so few pages to contain them. And Derwent is so irritating that readers may well wish the killer's list had included him.

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March 15, 2013

In her third outing (after the acclaimed The Burning and The Reckoning) Maeve Kerrigan, a detective constable in London's Metropolitan Police, is again partnered with the offensive Detective Inspector Derwent. The two are investigating the brutal murder of the wife and one of the twin daughters of a well-known London defense attorney. When questioned, it becomes clear that the surviving family members are keeping secrets that complicate the case. At the same time, Kerrigan is getting some unexplained mail that threatens her already shaky romantic relationship. All of this occurs during a London heat wave that has everyone on edge, including Superintendent Godley, who is acting very out of character. VERDICT The third time is the charm with this exciting thriller, and Casey's growing fan base will snatch up the latest entry in what has turned out to be a can't-wait-for-the-next-one series.--Lisa O'Hara, Univ. of Manitoba Libs., WinnIpeg

Copyright 2013 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2013
Womanizing defense lawyer Philip Kennford evokes little sympathy from the London police, what with his lack of emotion over the murders of his wife, Vita, and Laura, his favorite of their 15-year-old twin daughters. The Kennford murders distract the coppers from the deadly gang wars that continue even with one of the gang leaders in prison. DC Maeve Kerrigan and her bluff, misogynistic supervisor, DI Josh Derwent, are unable to make progress on the Kennford case until they track down Kennford's daughter from his first marriage, supermodel Savannah Wentworth. Meanwhile, as the two cases overlap, and Maeve witnesses compromising behavior by her respected superintendent, her old stalker reappears, making deadly threats against her police-officer boyfriend. Suspense increases until the Kennford case reaches a violent conclusion. The frenetic action seems a bit over the top at times, but the third Maeve Kerrigan mystery remains an engaging procedural with well-drawn characters and a principled protagonist whom readers will want to follow.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)