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[bookcover:In the Clearing|26214866]
In the Clearing by Robert Dugoni
Tracy Crosswhite series Book #3
4 ★'s
From The Book:
Detective Tracy Crosswhite has a skill, and a soft spot, for tackling unsolved crimes. Having lost her own sister to murder at a young age, Tracy has dedicated her career to bringing justice and closure to the families and friends of victims of crime.
So when Jenny, a former police academy classmate and protégé, asks Tracy to help solve a cold case that involves the suspicious suicide of a Native American high school girl forty years earlier, Tracy agrees. Following up on evidence Jenny’s detective father collected when he was the investigating deputy, Tracy probes one small town’s memory and finds dark, well-concealed secrets hidden within the community’s fabric. Can Tracy uphold the promise she’s made to the dead girl’s family and deliver the truth of what happened to their daughter? Or will she become the next victim?
My Thoughts:
Most of the book deals with a forty year old cold case involving the apparent suicide of Kimi Kanasket, a Native American teenager in Klickitat County, Washington. The former sheriff who is now deceased...was just a young deputy when he answered the call that Kami hadn't come home from her waitress job. He began to keep a file on the case as he couldn't get the investigating detectives to listen to him that there was something very wrong. He had taken dozens of pictures of the crime scene that showed that there had been several people and a truck in the clearing the night that she was supposed to have jumped into the river and drowned... that said it had not happened this way. Forty years later we find his daughter is now sheriff and she has found her father's file. Since it's a small town and may be considered a conflict of interest she asks Tracy Crosswhite...A Seattle detective to work on the case in her spare time.
What actually happened and who the killer is is fairly obvious early on but the way that Tracy follows the evidence that is brought to light by technology that wasn't available forty years ago is amazing as well as fascinating. Knowing how Tracy Crosswhite works the crime scene and how she digs deep for all the unknowns is what I love about her character. Overall this is a great series and well worth the time to meet Tracy and her friends.
