The Confessors’ Club

In Fredrickson’s complex fifth Dek Elstrom mystery (after 2013’s The Dead Caller from Chicago), somebody is murdering Chicago’s wealthiest movers and shakers in a manner that makes each death look like the result of either natural causes, suicide, or an accident. The police refuse to believe that this isn’t mere coincidence. When Wendell Phelps, the “head of Chicago’s largest electric company,” decides that he’s next on the list, he hires Elstrom to investigate. Elstrom fits the classic PI mold: a recently divorced recovering alcoholic with a weight problem, a shabby wardrobe, and a grubby residence. And it’s clear that the author is heavily under the influence of Raymond Chandler: “She took a slow look at the silver tape curling off the Jeep’s top and side curtains like a spinster’s hairdo gone wild in an electric storm, flicked the cigarette butt into the street and said she’d drive.” Fans of 1940s-era hard-boiled detective fiction will find a lot to like. [em]Agent: John Silbersack, Trident Media Group. (July) [/em]