Samantha Kincaid is a deputy District Attorney in Portland, Oregon. She is asked to oversee the case of a black investigative reporter, Percy Crenshaw, who was found beaten to death outside his condo. Initially there are no clues or apparent motives for the crime but eventually the police arrest a likely suspect and secure a confession; Sam, however, is uncomfortable with the methods used to extract it. This case is politically sensitive even without the racial tensions in the city following a police shooting of an unarmed woman, and it proves to be dynamite for Sam both personally and professionally. Her pursuit of the truth puts her in the middle of conflicts in the courtroom, with the police, and with her new live-in boyfriend, Detective Chuck Forbes.
This book is as much about loyalties, and the turning of perpetrators into victims, as it is about the securing of a conviction for murder. It is both a legal and a police procedural, and the tension between these two sometimes-competing strands of investigation produces a satisfyingly complex story, highly charged with atmosphere. Sam’s conflicts with her colleagues and adversaries over her role in the case lead to testing moral dilemmas, which leave her sometimes unsure of herself but always determined not to compromise when justice is at stake.
Not being very well acquainted with the American legal system, I found some of the jargon difficult to grasp at the beginning but once I got the hang of it, I was engrossed. I found Sam sassy and dedicated with a nice line in self-deprecating humour that stopped her from ever tipping over into being a dry ‘legal-eagle’. Her character is contrasted by that of an ambitious but naïve newspaper reporter, Heidi Hatmaker, who is desperate to secure her first big story and whose leg-work eventually uncovers what lies behind Percy Crenshaw’s death. The male police officers were less engaging - and a lot more shadowy - but this in no way detracted from the heart of the story.
I had to concentrate (a good thing) whilst reading this book and learnt a lot
(an even better thing); Close Case easily pays back the effort involved because
there is just so much going on. I highly recommend it.
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Ruth Wade
Alafair Burke has written two previous Samantha Kincaid mysteries: Missing
Justice and Judgement Calls.