A Hunt in Winter: A Joe Swallow Mystery

Brady’s strong third whodunit set in Victorian Ireland (after 2016’s The Eloquence of the Dead) seamlessly integrates the political tensions of the day into the plot. When 18-year-old waitress Alice Flannery is bludgeoned to death in November 1888, Dubliners fear that the murder heralds a series of crimes similar to Jack the Ripper’s ongoing butcheries in London. That prospect increases the pressure on Det. Insp. Joe Swallow of the Dublin Metropolitan Police to catch the killer, which intensifies after a second attack. While developments in Swallow’s personal life, in particular his decision to marry the woman who’s carrying his child, distract him from his grim work, they are superseded by a professional request that highlights the tensions he experiences as a patriotic Irishman working for the English. Politicians bent on discrediting Charles Parnell’s advocacy for Irish independence have sent officers to search for evidence of adultery in the records Swallow’s unit maintains of Parnell’s movements while in their city. The resolution doesn’t match those of Brady’s earlier books, but the series’ historical backdrop should continue to prove a rich source for future entries. Agent: Daniel Bolger, New Island Books. (Oct.)