A STRANGE DESIRE
K Mitchell
Published by Constable
ISBN 0 340 61340 811 0
(Published in US by St Martin's Press as ROOTS OF EVIL)

Review by Jean Currie

(This is the third of Kay Mitchell's Chief Inspector Morrissey mysteries, the two earlier ones, A LIVELY FORM OF DEATH and IN STONY PLACES were published in UK by Barrie & Jenkins.)

Just like nearly everyone else, Chief Inspector Morrissey, believes that when a young husband drives off the side of a bridge, it is an accident, but the widow won't accept the Coroner's verdict. When an attempt is made to silence her, Morrissey realises her worries are due to more than grief. He and Sergeant Barrett begin to investigate and they uncover corruption, intrigue, murder and much more.

Kay Mitchell has the knack of sketching a character or a scene in little more than a paragraph, which means there's not a wasted word as the story leaps from bodies hauled out of the river to arson in a derelict area to fraud in high places.

On the very last page of the book a woman of the streets brought into the police station to be booked for plying her trade slots the missing piece of the jig-saw into place - neat.