Wolf Point: An Ashe Cayne Novel

At the start of bestseller Smith’s entertaining sequel to 2020’s The Unspoken, the two grown children of late Chicago politician Walter Griffin, “one of the South Side’s biggest supporters,” ask PI Ashe Cayne, a wealthy, suave, athletic, well-read, and straight-shooting ex-cop who picks his own cases, to investigate the death of their father. Two years earlier, Griffin’s body was found on a deserted strip of land by the Chicago River. Griffin apparently shot himself, and the authorities so ruled, but his children are sure it’s a case of murder made to look like suicide. Despite suffering romantic angst from a lost love and an urge to work on lowering his golf handicap, Cayne dives into the case. Unraveling the complicated crime takes him all over Chicago and into many levels of the city’s social and political structure, though he discovers that the whole affair boils down to a few simple, universal motivations: “jealousy, hatred, money, and sex.” On the side, Cayne supervises a bit of vigilante justice. This is smart, smooth escapism. Readers will hope Cayne will be back soon. Agent: Mitch Hoffman, Aaron Priest Literary. (Oct.)