The mystery thickens when Sebastian finds a small wooden doll clutched in the murdered girl’s hand and Gemma hears whispers of a shadowy romance. But that isn’t the darkest secret hidden behind the high hospital walls. As time runs down on the investigation, Gemma won’t give up. But could the shocking discovery she makes be her last?
Comment: This is the third installment in the Tate and Bell mysteries by Irina Shapiro, a series I'm buddy reading. So far, we have been enjoying these investigations...
In this story, which follows very closely after the events of the previous one, Sebastian and Gemma have agreed that they might become more than friends in the future and they will take some time to get to know each other better. However, that has to wait because the alert comes that a child was found dead at the foundling hospital where Gemma works and she is scared it might be the little girl she has bonded with. It turns out that it wasn't but who would want to murder an innocent and likable child like that, and for what reason? Sebastian knows that it is necessary to avoid scandals if the hospital wants to retain its benefactors but the life of a child has to be as important as anyone else, right? Still,the pursuit of the truth keeps placing roadblocks on his path...
These books have a formula that has been working for me and for my buddy read friend. The main characters find themselves investigating a crime, they combine their personal abilities and take risks while at the same time, we get to see the very slow development of their inner thoughts and feelings. I think the mood of these books leans more towards the bleak than the optimist but I hope that this will keep changing the more comfortable they are with one other.
The case here involves a child who was murdered and it seems there is no logical reason because the girl was sweet and biddable and since she was an orphan there is no monetary motif. Of course, as the clues pile up, we get to realize nothing is a simple as this and the girl did have a secret, although nothing terrible. What develops from this little fact is what made the story captivating. I suppose it is appropriate to say we uncover layer after layer the more little things get known.
For me, the interesting elements in these novels have been mostly two. First, as always when it comes to crime investigation plots, the way the investigators go on following clues is always quite an exercise because in our daily lives how many of us can have time to process stuff like that? To make it even more challenging, this is an historical and the police can't use the contemporary devices/methods we would right now. Obviously, this means some things would not be legal either, and some transitions have to rely on coincidences...
The second element I like is that the protagonists, despite their flaws, are good people, are people who do the right thing even if it includes things we might not agree with but the times in which they are would have required different set of rules to follow. I do like it when main characters aren't perfect but are people we can root for and even cherish, as I feel towards Sebastian and Gemma. I think their efforts combined worked out very well for them to figure out who the killer was.
I also think the author did a good job pacing things in this novel, more so than in the previous one. Some sequence of events seemed to be presented in a smooth way and I liked it that everything had a certain logic and didn't rely only on possibilities. I was surprised by the identity of the killer and for the reason... I mean, it's not this complex plot,no, but it still felt like a nice twist to the usual choices we find in these series of mystery books.
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