So Say the Fallen

Starred review from July 25, 2016
In Edgar-finalist Neville’s excellent sequel to 2015’s Those We Left Behind, Det. Chief Insp. Serena Flanagan of the Belfast police investigates the apparent suicide of Henry Garrick, who was bedridden while slowly and painfully recovering from a serious car accident. It seems that his wife, Roberta, and a family friend, Rev. Peter McKay, gave him his evening medication of a packet of morphine granules mixed into a tub of yogurt, but after they left, he added an additional 10 packets and died during the night. But Roberta and McKay share a dreadful secret that eats at the reverend until he can barely contain it. Flanagan, who’s trying to focus on work despite serious family problems, suspects something is not as it seems, but he has no evidence and is constrained to accept the death as a suicide. The case is officially closed, but Flanagan can’t help following the remaining loose ends until something approaching justice is done in this complex and compassionate study of the human condition. Agent: Nat Sobel, Sobel Weber Associates.