Val McDermid: Dead Beat

Val McDermid

Dead Beat

Out of print

Christina says:

The Manchester based detective agency Mortensen and Brannigan Investigations usually deals with white-collar-crime. But when rock star Jett asks Kate Brannigan to find his former girl friend Moira she accepts the job to cultivate a possible business relationship. She is successful and Moira goes back to Jett to help with his career again, but soon she is found beaten to death in Jett’s studio. Kate doesn’t deal with murder any more than she usually takes on missing person cases, but she feels responsible for what happened to Moira and starts investigating her murder. There are suspects galore. Neither Jett’s manager nor his new girl friend nor his overbearing secretary where happy about Moira’s return, and the same is true for Moira’s lesbian lover.

The first book by Val McDermid I ever read was THE MERMAIDS SINGING, her first Tony Hill mystery. In spite of the high gore factor I couldn’t put it down, except when I was forced to take in food. McDermid’s stand alone A PLACE OF EXECUTION which I read next was a very different kind of book but no less captivating. Therefore my expectations were rather high when I picked up DEAD BEAT, the first book of her older Kate Brannigan series, and I was promptly disappointed. Kate is a likable detective and her case is interesting enough, but the feeling of "Wow! This is a very special book!" was missing when I put it down. DEAD BEAT is more like the well-done and well-liked books by McDermid’s American colleagues like Marcia Muller and Sara Paretsky. I enjoyed reading the first Kate Brannigan and will look for more. It just didn’t stay with me like the others did.

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Christina Gross

Last changes: 02-09-03