Cambridge Blue

November 17, 2008
In Bruce’s assured debut, idealistic 25-year-old Gary Goodhew, recently promoted to detective constable at Cambridge’s Parkside Station, gets a chance to prove himself to Parkside’s seasoned veterans after the discovery of a young woman’s body atop a heap of trash bags on Midsummer Common. Like many a British police procedural, the novel opens with a flurry of activity and the introduction of numerous characters, but the action soon slows to a series of scenes, marked by descriptive passages full of precise details, in which the victim’s actions leading to her murder come into focus. Fortunately, halfway through, the pace picks up as the workaholic Goodhew pursues every twist in the case. By the end, readers will be flipping back to the beginning to suss out those clues that they may have missed. Bruce is also the author of two works of nonfiction, including Cambridgeshire Murders
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October 15, 2008
A clever young detective almost puts paid to his career in his first murder investigation.

DC Gary Goodhew is well-educated, well-off and intense. The youngest detective at Cambridge 's Parkside Station, he has taken to sending helpful anonymous tips to his boss DI Marks. While out on what he considers a routine interview, he 's alerted to the corpse of an attractive young woman with "I 'm like Emma " written on the palm of each hand. The late Lorna Spence worked at the Excelsior Clinic, dated her boss Richard Moran and was a friend to his sister Alice. Paired with smart, ambitious, unfaithful DC Kincaide, Goodhew soon wanders off on his own path of investigation after he finds that an old schoolmate was an acquaintance of the dead girl. The Moran family becomes a center of interest when Richard 's younger sister Jackie, who lives in the country with her beloved horses, is named a possible suspect in a cold case: the disappearance of Jackie 's college friend Emma after she briefly dated Richard. Though Goodhew irritates his boss by working well outside police protocol, his quirky methods ultimately solve the mystery.

A pleasingly different police procedural.

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Starred review from December 15, 2008
DC Gary Goodhew is first on the scene when the body of a young woman is found in a desolate part of Cambridge, England. Aiming to be a superior investigator, Goodhew cuts corners in following police procedure, which gets him into trouble with his boss but does produce results. The ensuing case pits the Cambridge CID against a number of suspects with much to hide. When the threads of evidence tie together, a horrid little motive is revealed. This debut mystery by a British nonfiction crime writer accelerates like a train speeding to its destination. Highly recommended for all collections where British police procedurals, such as those by Peter Lovesey, are popular. [See Prepub Mystery, "LJ" 9/1/08.]

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