U is for undertow
Ratings12
Average rating3.3
Calling T is for Trespass "taut, terrifying, transfixing and terrific," USA Today went on to ask, "What does it take to write twenty novels about the same character and manage to create a fresh, genre-bending novel every time?" It's a question worth pondering. Through twenty excursions into the dark side of the human soul, Sue Grafton has never written the same book twice. And so it is with this, her twenty-first. Once again, she breaks genre formulas, giving us a twisting, complex, surprise-filled, and totally satisfying thriller.It's April, 1988, a month before Kinsey Millhone's thirty-eighth birthday, and she's alone in her office doing paperwork when a young man arrives unannounced. He has a preppy air about him and looks as if he'd be carded if he tried to buy booze, but Michael Sutton is twenty-seven, an unemployed college dropout. Twenty-one years earlier, a four-year-old girl disappeared. A recent reference to her kidnapping has triggered a flood of memories. Sutton now believes he stumbled on her lonely burial when he was six years old. He wants Kinsey's help in locating the child's remains and finding the men who killed her. It's a long shot but he's willing to pay cash up front, and Kinsey agrees to give him one day. As her investigation unfolds, she discovers Michael Sutton has an uneasy relationship with the truth. In essence, he's the boy who cried wolf. Is his current story true or simply one more in a long line of fabrications?Grafton moves the narrative between the eighties and the sixties, changing points of view, building multiple subplots, and creating memorable characters. Gradually, we see how they all connect. But at the beating center of the novel is Kinsey Millhone, sharp-tongued, observant, a loner—"a heroine," said The New York Times Book Review, "with foibles you can laugh at and faults you can forgive."
Series
Featured Series
24 primary books25 released booksKinsey Millhone
Kinsey Millhone is a 25-book series with 24 primary works first released in 1981 with contributions by Sue Grafton.
Reviews
Popular Reviews
Reviews with the most likes.
You know what you're getting when you follow Sue Grafton. Years ago I started to read her books in alphabetical order. I don't remember how far I got until I was bored with her formula of storytelling. I've thought about going back to her over the years and then a friend loaned me this book. The formula is the same and each of her books give enough bio info on Kinsey that they don't need to be read in any order. Having said that, I found the book, at over 400 pages, too long. The story was great, though confusing at times, with the back of forth between 1988 and 1967. But you could always count on Sue Grafton for an entertaining mystery and I'm sorry to see her gone from us.
Grafton again goes for a multi-perspective, bouncing back and forth between Kinsey's present and the case's past approach to this book. It weaved an interesting arc, once you put all the pieces together. I see why she's using it, I appreciate the skill, but it's a trick she's relying on too often, I fear. It's starting to dull the effectiveness.
This wasn't a typical case for Kinsey – other than the cold-case nature of it, which she seems to do a lot of lately. A missing persons case this time, brought to her by – never mind, it'd take to long to explain, you're better off hearing it from the client.
Typically, in a PI/mystery novel, you get hardened criminals, seemingly destined for it since birth – sadists, psychopaths, just generally mean people, that sort of thing. But really, crimes are probably just as often perpetrated by the stupid, the bored, the desperate – it's good to have reminders of that. It's also entertaining, because it's the last people you'd think to look for, so when someone like that pops up in a book, it's refreshing.
I did really appreciate the self-aware flash of insight Kinsey has while listening to someone unloading a well rehearsed recital of family sins against her. Kinsey sees what she must sound like to others when she does so. Not often that someone as self-assured as she is has such a moment of clarity, and it's nice to see that Kinsey's capable of it.
Even better is that this insight led to a very promising leap forward in the ongoing story about Kinsey's estranged family.
Oh, as an added bonus...there's some pretty helpful writing advice tucked away in here.
Another worthy entry in this long-running series, not much else to say, really.
This is the Sue Grafton I remember loving way back at the middle letters of the alphabet. Kinsey is back working on an old mystery. I like how Grafton moves backward and forward in time.
