Shadow Hill

May 1, 2021
Who killed the oil company executive? And why is everyone so anxious to cover it up? When wealthy retired oil executive Morris Cutter and his wife, Julia, are found shot dead in their home, their distraught son, Eric, hires investigator Geneva Chase to determine whether his father really killed his mother before turning the gun on himself, as the police have determined. Both Eric and his wife, Olivia, are adamant that Morris is innocent. After years as a reporter, Geneva now freelances as a researcher for Nathaniel Rubin at Lodestar Analytics. After accompanying her to her meeting with the Cutters at their luxurious Connecticut home, Nathaniel suggests that this was a double murder. Cutter's company, Continental Petroleum & Gas, doesn't want the case reopened. Their lawyer is charismatic Frank Mancini, who, although married, is unfortunately also Geneva's former lover. At CP&G headquarters in Manhattan, Geneva meets a stable of likely suspects, all of whom were afraid of their late boss. Kies follows a traditional path of multiple interviews peppered with Geneva's everyday problems; his crisp character portraits keep it all interesting. Suspicion falls on other family members not as loyal as Eric and Olivia. The more dirt Geneva uncovers, the more suspects want to open up, making the case both more complex and more dangerous for her even as she struggles to be a good parent to Caroline, the daughter of her late fiance, who chafes at the restrictions of adolescence. The tale deftly drops in the details of Geneva's colorful past and current challenges without slowing down the plot. Kies' fourth is sleek and engaging. If you miss Kinsey Millhone, you might give Geneva a whirl.

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May 24, 2021
In Kies’s memorable fourth mystery featuring PI and occasional freelance journalist Geneva Chase (after 2019’s Graveyard Bay), Eric Cutter hires Geneva to open a fresh investigation into the shooting deaths of his parents, Julia and Morris Cutter, a retired CEO of CP&G, an oil company. The couple were found dead in their upscale Sheffield, Conn., home in what the police ruled a murder-suicide. Morris was about to present a report subsidized by CP&G to Congress with the purpose of stalling legislation on climate change to allow the company time to roll out an international publicity campaign to sway the public to their view and increase their corporate earnings. Morris’s death delayed the report, but the pressure mounts for Geneva to quickly wrap up the investigation. The stakes rise as the report’s lead researcher disappears, as does Morris’s estranged climatologist daughter, and Geneva unearths secrets both spouses kept from each other and rumors of embezzlement. Complex characters and brisk plotting make this a winner. Readers will look forward to Geneva’s further adventures. Agent: Kimberley Cameron, Kimberley Cameron Assoc.

August 20, 2021
Morris Cutter, founder of a petroleum company that spews money and pollution with alarming speed, has killed his wife and himself. So say the cops, and they're not interested in the son's insistence that it just isn't so. His answer: call Geneva Chase, who makes her fifth appearance in author Kies' rambunctious series. Our boozy reporter now is a dried-out PI. Geneva uncovers fraud, graft and infidelity, which are stock items in these family narratives. Somehow they're not as unsettling as her interviews with the oil company's stooges in Congress, who don't doubt that climate change is real and sending the country into ""full self-destruct mode."" They don't care: they've got theirs. Her poking reaches a climax in a long, vivid battle during a night-time snowstorm, and on the way she displays good detective chops, spotting what doesn't belong: the climate-change screed by the dead man's side. There are signs raunchy Geneva lives, as when she scowls at a glass of vodka-less club soda and daydreams a built man in boxer shorts: ""smokin' hot.

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