Book Review: "Fatal Blow" by James L. Thane

It's a tale as old as time: a woman realizes her husband is being unfaithful to her, and she needs to decide how to handle it. Does she confront him? Ignore the evidence, because at least he's some other woman's problem now? Or should she try to punish him for his transgressions?

When Becky Miller discovers that her husband Walter is having an affair with a cocktail waitress, she tries to figure out what her next move should be. After spying on the email communication between her husband and his mistress, when the woman's threats to end the relationship if he doesn't leave Becky turn to suggestions that they'd be better off if Becky were out of the picture, Becky realizes she needs to act—fast.

When a female corpse is fished out of a drainage canal, Phoenix homicide detective Sean Richardson and his partner Maggie McClinton need to figure out who she is and what happened to her—no mean feat given that the corpse is missing its head and arms. DNA tests reveal the corpse is Becky's, and after doing some digging, her husband is identified as the leading suspect in her apparent murder.

But while it seems like a fairly open-and-shut case, despite Walter's vehement protests of innocence, there are definitely some anomalies that Sean and Maggie can't figure out. The deeper they dig, the more complicated the case actually becomes. It turns out Becky, who is quite the fan of crime novels, created a scheme or two before her apparent death. And as both Sean and Maggie deal with personal challenges of their own, this case is more work than they bargained for.

I really enjoyed this book and found it both a compelling crime novel and a well-written story to boot. I figured things out before the facts started to be revealed but found myself devouring the book anyway, as I wanted to find out how James Thane wrapped everything up.

While this is the third book in Thane's Sean Richardson series, it's the first one I've read, and I'll definitely be going back to read the first two books. I really enjoyed these characters and their complexities—Thane drew them as much more detailed than your typical detectives. In particular, Sean had some emotional issues to deal with, but they didn't leave him damaged or brooding, just trying to cope and move on, and that made his character refreshing.

Fatal Blow is a well-told, solid, and compelling crime novel as well as an enjoyable character study. You might not have heard of Thane or read any of his books, but if you're a fan of this genre, you should add him and this series to your reading list.

The author provided me a copy of the book in exchange for an unbiased review. Thanks for making this available!