The Cold Room

Ex-cop turned defense lawyer Knightly knows his way around New York City crime, as shown by his second police procedural featuring NYPD’s Harry Corbin (after 2009’s Bodies in Winter). Corbin, a pariah at his job because he’s aired departmental dirty laundry in public, is in his fifth precinct in nine months. When a subway disaster on the Brooklyn Bridge leaves his unit shorthanded, Corbin welcomes the opportunity to serve as the crime scene and investigating officer on a grisly murder in Williamsburg. With no one rushing to identify the female victim, the case gets low priority. Corbin finds evidence the dead woman was a Polish immigrant with a link to a Catholic church, but the shield of the confessional bars further progress. While Corbin lacks the sophistication of the best examples of leads in this subgenre, Knightly makes him interesting enough to sustain the reader’s attention. (Feb.)