cover image An Iron Fist, Two Harbors

An Iron Fist, Two Harbors

Dennis Herschbach. North Star, $14.95 trade paper (290p) ISBN 978-1-68201-020-4

In Herschbach’s middling fifth Two Harbors mystery (after 2015’s Preying in Two Harbors), 21-year-old Maren VanGotten, one of the twin stepdaughters of Deidre Johnson, the former Lake County, Minn., sheriff, goes missing. A call from Maren’s live-in boyfriend, Dave Mason, is the first indication that something’s wrong. Deidre’s successor as sheriff, Jeff DeAngelo, focuses on a number of suspects, including a known sex offender and an unidentified serial killer. The authorities follow various clues but get nowhere. Jeff tells Deidre that he doubts Dave, once his prime suspect, had anything to do with Maren’s disappearance, which has a devastating impact on Maren’s father, Ben; Deidre; and Ben and Deidre’s eight-year-old twin boys, Jack and Steve. Deidre finds her beliefs tested as well as her deductive skills, as she conducts her own investigation. Unfortunately, despite the high stakes, the plot never generates any real tension. (May)