Away from the Sun

In Brisbane’s muddled crime novel, police officer Kelsie Lee Ray pursues the Fable Killer—so named because the killer leaves a handwritten moral at every crime scene—in her hometown of Ridge Haven, Pa. Hampering her efforts are her struggles with her boss, Lieutenant Bryant, who believes she’s incompetent, and her conflicted feelings toward her married cop partner, Dack Marshall. The suspense rises as the Fable Killer puts her in his crosshairs. Though some exchanges of dialogue help bring the story to life, readers will have trouble keeping track of the underdeveloped characters and knowing whom to care about. Awkward prose abounds (“It was a growing, adapting framework perhaps, but it was the atmosphere where she had cultivated the elementary ingredients”). Brisbane offers only a minor plot twist en route to the unsatisfying climax and resolution. [em](BookLife) [/em]