Broken Fields

Rendon’s fourth outing for Ojibwe sleuth Cash Blackbear (after Sinister Graves) combines a shocking whodunit with an insightful exploration of guilt. In the previous book, Cash killed a man in self-defense. At the outset of this one, she remains unsettled by the tragedy, viewing it as a referendum on the survival instincts she cultivated during her tumultuous childhood in foster care. In the months since the incident, Cash has been hired by Minnesota farmer Bud Borgerud to help tend his land. One afternoon, she finds Borgerud dead on the farmhouse floor, his body riddled with gunshot wounds. The rest of the property is empty, save for Shawnee, the daughter of Nils and Arlis Petterson, who were renting the farmhouse from Boregerud. Shawnee is shaken and unable—or unwilling—to say what she knows about Borgerud’s death, so Cash sets out to solve the murder and locate the young girl’s parents before she’s sent into foster care. The investigation points Cash toward Borgerud’s wife, though she lacks solid proof—and then more bodies start piling up. Rendon excels at balancing plot and character, taking time to probe Cash’s psychology while orchestrating a deliciously complicated mystery for her to solve. Readers will be rapt. Agent: Jacqui Lipton, Tobias Literary. (Mar.)