Undercurrent: A DI Andy Horton Mystery

In British author Rowson’s sturdy ninth police procedural featuring Det. Insp. Andy Horton (after 2012’s Death Lies Beneath), Horton investigates the death of naval historian Douglas Spaulding, whose broken body was found at the bottom of a dry dock at the Portsmouth dockyards. Spaulding, who had given a public lecture earlier in the evening, evidently fell from a great height. Horton and Sgt. Cantelli, his competent sidekick, are mystified when their irascible superiors dismiss the case as a suicide. They’re further perplexed when their bosses claim that a marine archeologist, whose body turns up on a private yacht, died of natural causes. A third fatality, the bludgeoning of the last person to see Spaulding alive, is dismissed as a random mugging. Horton suspects a conspiracy, and though warned off the cases, surreptitiously pries on his own. Rowson successfully pilots the complex storyline, filled with wild speculations and a slew of suspects, to a fitting conclusion. (June)