Cage of Bones

January 14, 2013
At the start of British author Carver’s pulse-pounding third novel featuring Det. Insp. Phil Brennan (after 2012’s The Creeper), laborers set to demolish an abandoned Colchester house, which is not “just derelict but desolate, collapsing under the weight of its own despair,” make a horrific discovery in the basement: a feral boy inside a cage of bones. Brennan, who’s with Essex Police’s Major Incident Squad, is disturbed to find strange symbols on the wall of the basement room as well as indications that whoever abused the boy had killed previous captives. Meanwhile, the Elders (known only as the Lawmaker, the Missionary, and the Teacher), who are somehow connected with the crime, seek to impede the police inquiry. In the end, Carver (the pseudonym of the husband-wife writing team of Martyn and Linda Waites) ensures that the plot twists all pay off handsomely with one surprising but logical revelation after another.

February 15, 2013
When a feral child is found caged in the basement of a building slated for demolition, Detective Inspector Phil Brennan (last seen in The Creeper, 2011) finds himself personally entwined in the case. Corrupt cops and connected con men abound, leading the reader on a complicated yet fascinating ride through the worst of what human beings can do to one another. But there is more going on here than just your average serial killerit seems there is an entire network of sociopaths who have been at work for decades, and Brennan is part of their history. Adopted as a child, Brennan had no recollection of his early lifeuntil this case starts giving him nightmares of a masked man keeping him in a cage of bones. At times the story verges on being too over-the-top to believe, but Carverwho has a knack for knowing just when and how to slow the story down for explanation, and when to pick it up for nail-biting suspensemanages to infuse enough realism into her characters and their surroundings to keep readers engaged to the end.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)