Unholy City: A Clare Codella Mystery

The bludgeoning murder of senior church warden Philip Grave, found in the garden of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, propels Smith’s carefully plotted third Claire Codella mystery (after 2016’s Forgotten City). When NYPD detectives Codella and Brian Haggerty arrive at the scene, just about everyone they talk to appears to be hiding something. The stakes rise with the subsequent discovery of the body of vestry secretary Emily Flounders in her car on the church grounds. The case soon spirals into a whirlwind of salacious secrets, and Codella and Haggerty are in the eye of the hurricane. Smith bolsters her seemingly straightforward procedural with well-developed characters: Codella is still recovering from a bout with cancer, and the case threatens her delicate relationship with Haggerty, with whom she’s romantically involved. In addition, Smith sensitively portrays the plight of an intersex doctor, who was born “biologically male but with anatomy that would never look male.” Readers will want to see more of the capable Codella. [em]Agent: Kathy Green, Kathryn Green Literary Agency. (Nov.) [/em]