Frigor Mortis

Andrew Broom #3

by Ralph McInerny

In a small Minnesota town, Roy Hunt and Stella Arthur shove her rich husband George through a hole in an icebound lake. Leaving him to drown, the killers wait for the body to surface in the spring and prove Stella's widowhood, so they can wed and live on George's money. Meantime, Stella sells the victim's extensive library to Steve Nicodemus, a used book dealer, thus entangling him as well as others in the case, which is magnified by a second murder.

Genres: Mystery

303 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1989

About the author

Ralph Matthew McInerny was an American Catholic religious scholar and fiction writer, including mysteries and science fiction. Some of his fiction has appeared under the pseudonyms of Harry Austin, Matthew FitzRalph, Ernan Mackey, Edward Mackin, and Monica Quill. As a mystery writer he is best known as the creator of Father Dowling. He was Professor of Philosophy, Director of the Jacques Maritain Center, and Michael P. Grace Professor of Medieval Studies at the University of Notre Dame until his retirement in June 2009. He died of esophageal cancer on January 29, 2010.

Reviews

[Nolan · Rating 1 out of 5]

Normally, I eagerly snatch anything Ralph M. McInerny writes with relish and joy in my heart. While I initially thought this was part of the Father Dowling series, I learned rapidly that it is not, and I learned equally quickly that it was a dreadful book lacking in the author’s usual joie de vivre and compelling writing style. Normally, you always learn something from a McInerny book—something about Catholicism or even the Chicago Cubs. This book only served as a sad reminder that not all books by the same author are equal. At one point, McInerny describes a Mexican-American housemaid as “weighing 90 pounds soaking wet from her swim across the Rio Grande.” Seriously? This from a professor of philosophy at Notre Dame? Ok. The whole book is a lot like that—lots of really late-70s dated commentary that doesn’t hold up well even for someone who is clueless like me and pays little attention to that kind of thing normally.

The only person worse off for cracking this book is poor George Arthur, and he’s fictional. He’s the guy whose wife arranges to kill. The wife’s lover convinces poor George to go ice fishing with him in a small Minnesota community. Poor George has never ice fished, so he doesn’t know that you cut only a relatively small hole in that ice down which you thread your line. The hole that his wife’s lover carved was large enough for the lover to push George down. The body wasn’t found for months.

Stella Arthur never loved her husband. She married the guy because he breezed into town with money and rescued Stella from financial ruin upon her father’s death. Dear old Dad died being hugely over extended.

Sadly for Stella, once George’s body is found and she and the lover are free to diddle one another less secretly, she learns that George’s safety deposit box doesn’t contain the thousands of dollars she thought he had in there. Life goes from bad to worse for Stella when someone strangles her.

[Elwood · Rating 2 out of 5]

Detective story. Don't bother reading.

[Margaret Mary · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun story, local setting, some good moral issues as various characters wrestled with their consciences. There was an unexpected twist at the end.

[Emily Ballard · Rating 1 out of 5]

so far fun mystery read about a wife that pushes her husband through the ice when he's ice fishing......