The Hound of Justice

In the pseudonymous O’Dell’s debut, A Study in Honor, which reimagined Holmes and Watson as gay African-American women living in a near-future U.S. riven by a second civil war sparked by right-wing racists, surgeon Janet Watson lost an arm. In this superb sequel, Watson, now employed by Georgetown University Hospital, is working hard to master a prosthetic replacement so that she can operate again. The inauguration of the new president, who campaigned on a promise to negotiate a peace treaty with the secessionists, is disrupted by a terror attack by the Brotherhood of Redemption. Watson is on hand to treat the wounded, and her enigmatic roommate, FBI agent Sara Holmes, is tasked with investigating how the Brotherhood managed to evade stringent security procedures and smuggle explosives into Washington, D.C. Eventually, Watson assumes an active role in Holmes’s inquiry, which requires a perilous crossing into enemy terrain. O’Dell movingly portrays a proud woman struggling to regain her professional skills in a country still plagued by racism. Readers will hope this inventive series has a long run. [em]Agent: Lane Heymont, Tobias Literary. (July) [/em]