The Harvey Girl

A strong-willed woman detective faces danger in the 19th-century American West in this promising if underheated series launch from Stabenow (A Taint in the Blood). The action opens in 1890 with a brutal murder during a robbery on a train of supplies bound for a Harvey House—a chain of Southwestern restaurants and hotels—in the New Mexico Territory. It’s the latest in a string of similar crimes, and Pinkerton agent Clare Wright, who’s made her name pulling off tricky undercover missions, is assigned to find out who’s behind the killings. To do so, she poses as a hostess at a Harvey House in the rough mining town of Montaña Roya. The hours are grueling and surveillance is tight, but Clare manages to find evidence of her employers’ shady finances before another murder rattles Montaña Roya, making her eager to identify the culprit before her cover is blown. Though things get off to a slow start, Stabenow builds sufficient suspense by the novel’s midpoint, and the thrill of watching Clare flourish in this hypermasculine, rough-and-tumble environment helps paper over some of the pacing issues. Appearances from real-life figures including Mark Twain and journalist Bat Masterson are a cherry on top. By the time everything comes together, readers will be well primed for the sequel. (Feb.)