The calls to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension
came in fast and furiously. Agnes O’Leary—shot dead during a robbery. Emmet
Williams, gunned down as he got in his car. An older couple, the Welshes, shot
to death in the kitchen of their home. Murders never happen in Shinder, located
in remote western Minnesota,
so odds were, the four were somehow connected. Lucas Davenport, head of BCA,
directed investigator Virgil Flowers to get himself to Shinder and figure out
what was going on.
Jimmy Sharp, Tom McCall, and Becky Welsh had themselves a
goal: steal the diamonds that former Shinder
High School homecoming
court member Marsha O’Leary wore to her 35th high school reunion. Becky
saw the bling when she served Mrs. O’Leary some sheet cake. Becky, the “hottest
girl to ever come from Shinder,” only wanted the stones; she and Tom were
horrified when Jimmy pulled his gun and capped Marsha’s adult daughter, Agnes.
When their getaway car wouldn’t start, they also shot Emmett Williams and stole
his car. After that, it was easy: they went around town killing anyone they pleased:
those they thought might have money, their parents—really, anyone, for any
excuse.
Virgil Flowers works with the locals to try to get to the
bottom of the Charles Starkweather/Caril Ann Fugate-esque crime spree. Each new
victim made a bizarre sort of sense, but the initial shooting of Agnes O’Leary didn’t
fit the pattern. Virgil focuses on that killing as a way of understanding the
rest, while the sociopathic trio evades the cops and the bodies keep stacking
up. The addition of a cop to the list puts the spree in a whole new category.
It’s all Virgil can do to try to take the killers alive before the locals
eliminate any chance of him learning what set them off in the first place.
John Sandford’s Virgil Flowers mysteries are just as good as
his Lucas Davenport series always was. His books are immensely readable and
they never disappoint. This one is terrific.
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