Book Review: Dead Center by David Rosenfelt

By Sandy Amazeen May 28, 2006, 16:55 GMT

Edgar( Award finalist and recent Today show Book Club pick David Rosenfelt returns with a tale of murder and deadly secrets in an ultra-secretive religious community. ...more

New Jersey defense lawyer Andy Carpenter is attempting to rebuild his life four and a half months after ex-girlfriend Laurie Collins dumped him to take a job in her old hometown in Wisconsin as acting chief of police. Laurie saw it as a great career move with the advantage of living in her hometown while Andy simply could not give up his law practice, he also couldn’t let go his deep feelings for his ex. Just when he decided to move on, Laurie calls him to look into what appears to be an open and shut murder case. She has made an arrest and the evidence stands up to scrutiny but she knows 21-year-old Jeremy Davidson and believes he is just not capable of double homicide.

Andy cannot flatly turn down the father’s request to look into the case any more then he can resist seeing Laurie again. Packing up his opinionated dog along with his intentions to move on, Andy goes to Findlay, Wisconsin where he finds a strong religious undercurrent. In the nearby town of Center City nearly everyone is a member of a mysterious religious sect known as the Centurions, a group so secretive they don’t accept outsiders into their congregation, a fact that could play a huge part in the motive as Jeremy, an outsider, wanted to marry one of the murdered women.

Strong forces are at work making this more then a simple murder investigation and it won’t be long before Andy is renting a house, getting embroiled in local politics and finding himself facing the wrong end of a gun. Told with plenty of dry wit, the action moves forward with equal doses misplaced suspicion, inspiration and self depreciating humor.