Friday, December 28, 2007

Mischief

Yesterday I finished rereading "Mischief" by Ed McBain. This is one of my favorites. There is just so much going on.
First of all, the Deaf Man is back, and he's planning on stealing the police department's haul of illegal narcotics that are scheduled to be incinerated. To create a diversion, he has planned to incite a riot at an outdoor concert taking place the same day.
One of the women Eileen works with on the Hostage Negotiating Team is shot and killed while Eileen is "working the door" during a hostage crisis. Bert Kling meets Sharyn Cooke, the doctor who operated Georgia, the police officer who was shot, and even though she is black and he is white, and she's a chief and outranks him, and is a doctor to boot, they start dating.
As if all this weren't enough, Meyer and Hawes are dealing with a man who is taking old people at the request of their families, and dumping them off in various locations in the city, hoping they won't be identified and returned. Ouch. I know it's hard to care for an elderly relative, but still. Yikes. And, believe it or not, this is tied in to thefts from a local nearby homeless shelter. McBain packs a lot into these pages, and it's very good.

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