V is for Vengeance

By Sue Grafton.

Previous book here.

It all starts when Kinsey's shopping for underwear and spots a shoplifter. Kinsey's inner ex-cop who used to work property theft kicks in and she squeals to an employee. The original shoplifter is caught, but her secret partner in crime nearly runs Kinsey over as she escapes. A few days later, Kinsey reads the newspaper and finds out that the shoplifter, Audrey, threw herself off a bridge. Or did she? After going to Audrey's funeral with William and William blabs to Audrey's fiance Marvin about Kinsey, Marvin hires her to look into the situation. (Though Marvin is in some pretty heavy denial about Audrey's actual career.) Kinsey doggedly works on the case, which ties into a shoplifting ring run by the local loan shark. However, it turns out that her case is tied into a heavy-duty police investigation involving Len Priddy, a friend of Kinsey's first ex-husband who can't stand her. And there's confidential informants. And Kinsey's occasional criminal client Pinky Ford (otherwise known as "the guy who gave her the lock picks") ties into it as well. There's also Diana Alvarez from the previous book, still driving Kinsey up a damn wall as she noses about in Kinsey's case.

The "chapters from other people's POV" mostly feature Nora Vogelsang, a rich society wife who finds out that her husband is cheating on her. While accumulating a bunch of money by selling things off just in case, she's introduced to Lorenzo Dante, Jr., the aforementioned local loan shark. Oddly enough, Dante is about the most decent, least homicidal, gangster sort you've ever seen in fiction. They fall into an affair, but his impending investigation and the one person they have in common (you'll figure out who that is after reading the opening of the book) may doom their budding new love. While I wouldn't normally find folks like this terribly sympathetic, I found myself actually kind of rooting for those folks.

I will say that it seems a little odd that Kinsey--for a character who starts out basically gloating at catching a shoplifter in the act and hoping she gets what she deserves-- kind of switches over to the side of the not-so-law-abiding in this book at the end. She has an odd soft spot for Pinky Ford--I had less of one for him, somehow, because he was sweet and loves his wife and all, but uh, he's pretty dumb for a criminal. I kept picturing him as looking like Dr. Elmo (of "Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer" fame). And Kinsey actually tries to help out Dante, which is odd given the cat-and-mouse at a distance sort of relationship that's been going on. On the other hand, I can't help but like Dante myself. The man is smart, takes care of those who are loyal to him, and he's not a killer. (His idiot brother Cappi, on the other hand....) I oddly rooted for him myself. Go figure. And I found myself enjoying the twists of this book-- eventually circling back to who was it that gave Kinsey a birthday punch in the face.

While I normally <a href="http://fullmoon.typepad.com/books/2006/01/s_is_for_silenc.html">gripe about a lack of Henry</a> in the books where he's not really in them, and this one has Henry out of town for most of it again, at least there's some good plot reasons for that.

Note to Sue Grafton: I find it amusing that you had a character killed off on our birthday. Interesting choice there.

I am rather sad to say that most of the last few books in the series just haven't been memorable to me in the way that earlier books (I'm thinking of G and H and J in particular, which aren't reviewed here) do. Looking at the four reviews I have on the site, I actually don't remember reading S and T at all at this point and vaguely remember U. (I don't actually remember Diana Alvarez as being in that book, though I do remember her brother.) But I think I'll actually remember this one for its own brand of memorable. I enjoyed this case and how it went. So while I'm a little questionable on having Kinsey lean towards the non-law side of things, I'll give it three and a half stars.