Silence the Dead

The opening of this solid whodunit, based on a real-life murder case, is certainly an attention getter. When the authorities exhume the corpse of Betty Jo Dean, who was shot to death in Grand Point, Ill., decades earlier at the age of 17, they see that she was buried only in her underwear. Grand Point’s mayor, Mac Bassett, who “had imagined all sorts of horrors,” insists that the fleshless, loose skull in the coffin is not Betty Jo’s. Flash back to 1982: on the last night of her life, Betty Jo hooks up with a new beau. The following day, after Betty Jo has gone missing and the beau is found dead, Chicago reporter Jonah Ridl arrives in Grand Point to investigate, only to learn that local law enforcement is concealing the truth. In the present, Bassett discovers that the cover-up is still active—and deadly. The ending is a bit of a letdown, but Fredrickson (The Dead Caller from Chicago and three other Dek Elstrom mysteries) does a decent job of portraying smalltown despair. Agent: John Silbersack, Trident Media Group. (Jan.)