Crossbones Yard

December 10, 2012
British poet Rhodes provides an intriguing backstory for her lead, Alice Quentin, in her fiction debut, about a twisted serial killer. As children, Alice and her brother, Will, witnessed their father beat their mother. This domestic violence affected Will more than Alice. While Alice has become a successful London psychologist, homeless and mentally disturbed Will sleeps in a van he parks outside her apartment building. One morning, Alice is surprised to learn that all her appointments have been canceled so that she can assist the police. Morris Cley, who murdered a prostitute four years earlier, is about to be released from jail, and the authorities want Alice to predict the likelihood that he will kill again. She becomes involved in another criminal matter after she finds a woman’s corpse in Crossbones Yard, the site used until the 19th century as a graveyard for prostitutes. Might Will have committed this recent murder? First-rate writing helps make up for predictable plot developments. Agent: Teresa Chris Literary.

December 15, 2012
Rhodes' debut novel dips into the familiar waters of a woman in jeopardy confronted by a cunning killer. Psychologist Alice Quentin, tortured by a past dominated by an abusive father, submissive mother and mentally ill brother, finds the police on her London doorstep when a convicted murderer is due to be released. Police want Alice to meet the man and tell them whether they should watch him once he's out. It's all the more urgent since Morris Cley, the killer, was the bosom buddy of an infamous couple of serial killers who slaughtered young women and defaced their corpses with dozens of crosses cut into their skin. When Alice goes out for her daily run, she finds a dead body in Crossbones Yard, a London graveyard where hundreds of prostitutes were buried more than a century ago, and the young girl shows similar markings. Soon, Cley shows up at Alice's door, and she finds herself under unwanted police protection, but the police are depending on her as the best in her field to help them predict what the killer, who they believe is the now-missing Cley, will do next. Complicating matters is Alice's violent bipolar brother, who won't take his medication and insists on living in a camper in the parking lot of her building; her old childhood friend Lola, a gorgeous but unsuccessful actress who shows up on her doorstep; Sean, an abusive ex-flame; and Ben, a dark, serious police officer who finds himself drawn to the psychologist. Rhodes' writing is competent, but the predictable plot twists disappoint: The plucky, beautiful heroine constantly places herself in danger, every man she meets falls for her, and the police can't properly pull off the investigation without her help. Why the police need Alice, who is not an expert on serial killers, never quite becomes clear, serving instead as a glaring storyline weakness. The author stretches the reader's credulity by relying on coincidence after coincidence to propel the fragile plot forward.

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