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Dianne Emley Cut to the Quick: A Novel
Ballantine Books 2009 034548620X / 9780345486202 Mass Market Paperback New
034548620X 034548620X From the Publisher The crime scene was like something out of a horror movie. Billboard tycoon Oliver Mercer has been brutally slain in his home in the Pasadena hills, joined in death by his long-legged trophy girlfriend?both of their bodies displayed in a chilling tableau. The murder scene reawakens terrible memories for homicide detective Nan Vining, who survived her own harrowing attack a year earlier. While tracking the taunting gameplayer her daughter Emily dubbed T. B. Mann?The Bad Man?she is now working the Mercer case alongside her ex-flame Jim Kissick, stirring up conflicted feelings in her. From the ritzy estates of L.A.'s Lamborghini-driving set to a rocky desert outpost where rattlesnakes whisper murder, Nan will risk both her badge and her heart on a case that cuts close to the bone. Publishers Weekly Emley's compelling follow-up to 2006's The First Cutfinds homicide detective Nan Vining faced with a grisly double homicide in a Pasadena mansion. Physically but not psychologically healed from the vicious knife attack in The First Cut, Vining questions Mark Scoville, the homeowner's business partner, who's cooperative at first. But when he suddenly clams up and asks for a lawyer, Vining's suspicions deepen. Discovering recent calls between Scoville and ex-con Jack Jenkins, Vining wonders if Jenkins misinterpreted Scoville's sour comments about his partner as an invitation to a classic criss-cross murder scheme. Complicating matters, a mute vagrant is arrested carrying disturbing drawings hinting at Vining's previous attack, as well as pointing to other victims. As she struggles to piece together the Scoville case, Vining also steps up her obsessive, private search for her assailant, whom she now fears is a serial killer. The tease of this ongoing subplot is underdeveloped, though Emley skillfully juggles several other plot lines. Readers will look forward to seeing more of this edgy, unpredictable heroine. (Jan.)Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information Kirkus Reviews Pasadena homicide detective Nan Vining wrestles with a violent double murder while she's still struggling to exorcise the horrors of her own brush with death. Millionaire playboy Oliver Mercer has become the target of the ultimate home invasion. Somebody knocked on his front door, entered and killed him, dismembered him with a chainsaw-and then, for good measure, murdered his girlfriend, art-museum administrator Lauren Richards, when she turned up, and arranged the two corpses with ritualistic precision. Pasadena's finest suspect is Mark Scoville, Mercer's business partner, whose wife, glamourpuss newscaster Dena Hale, is her own biggest story. Nan in particular is sure that shifty-eyed Scoville knows more than he's telling. From the opening scene, however, Emley has made it clear that Mercer was killed by a stranger, a man dressed as a woman, though it's not clear whether he's a transvestite, a transsexual or just a guy in a really unconvincing disguise. Unfortunately, Emley, whose eye for the visceral effects of violence is as unsparing as Patricia Cornwell's, has also picked up Cornwell's fondness for subordinating the not-very-interesting homicide du jour to the ongoing saga of her menaced heroine. Two years after a savage knife attack left her clinically dead for two minutes (First Cut, 2006), Nan encounters Nitro, a crafty/crazy street person whose drawings of women in extremis include one that bears an uncanny resemblance to Nan, and another that's got to be Johnna Alwin, the Tucson police detective whose murder has never been solved. Does that mean that Nitro is really T.B. Mann, Nan's nightmarish assailant? The smart money won't expect any answers to what the author obviouslyintends as a long-running set of riddles. Scary killers and solid procedural work, as long as you don't mind a modicum of mystery and many more questions than answers. Agent: Robin Rue/Writers House LLC Synopsis The crime scene was like something out of a horror movie. Billboard tycoon Oliver Mercer has been brutally slain in his home in
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Dianne Emley The First Cut: A Novel
Ballantine Books 2008 0345486188 / 9780345486189 Mass Market Paperback New
0345486188 0345486188 From the Publisher For two minutes she was dead. The assailant was vicious, the attack brutal?and it left her lifeless . . . until her pulse fluttered and she jolted awake. Now, a year later, detective Nan Vining is still questioning her strength, her safety, even her sanity: Can she ever again be the cop?and mother?she was before? And will her attacker someday return to finish the job, before she can track him down herself? Shaky but determined, Vining rejoins the Pasadena PD, only to confront a murder case that strikes close to home: A slain policewoman has been discovered beneath the Colorado Street Bridge, her body bruised, her throat slit. Even as Vining struggles to recover her standing within the department, she can't help but feel profoundly drawn to the murdered officer, Frankie Lynde?and she is deeply troubled by the baffling otherworldly visions that haunt her waking hours. Are these mere fever dreams? Or could they be, as Vining's daughter insists, messages from beyond the grave? Digging deeper into Lynde's past, Vining discovers clues that set her on the twisted trail of a killer as ruthless as he is depraved?a predator whose methods and madness recall those of her own attacker. Amid a rising tide of danger, she pushes herself to bold new limits, desperate to avenge the murder of a fellow police officer . . . and to reclaim the life she lost a year ago. Packed with suspense and action, this pulse-pounding novel will hold you breathless from the first cut to the last. Publishers Weekly A year after surviving a brutal attack, Pasadena, Calif., police officer Nan Vining returns to duty in Emley's sizzling debut, a hard-edged police procedural with a psychic twist. Nan, a 34-year-old single mom who still bears emotional and skin-deep scars, has her mettle tested by her first case back. The gory corpse of young, blonde LAPD vice cop Frankie Lynde, who got "too close to her work," murmurs a cryptic message to Nan at the crime scene. Nan's ability to hear the dead may be connected to her near-death experience or may be a symptom of post-traumatic stress, but it does help crack Frankie's case and eerily provides a clue about Nan's unknown attacker, whom she and her 14-year-old daughter, Emily, dubbed T.B. Mann or "The Bad Man." Readers will cheer as the fast-paced, high-stakes investigation empowers Nan to triumph over a repugnant criminal and her fears. (Sept.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information. Library Journal This gripping debut page-turner examines the shadier side of humanity while providing readers with a first-rate story. However, it is not for those with delicate sensibilities. Detective Nan Vining returns to her desk at the Pasadena Police Department, one year after having barely survived a brutal attack. She is assigned to investigate the vicious rape-murder of LAPD vice cop Frankie Lynde, who worked as an undercover prostitute. Lacking substantial clues, the police turn to the public for help. While they encounter numerous dead ends, Vining, who has experienced visions since the attack, follows otherworldly clues and her keen sense of insight to find the path of a brutal psychopath. Emley introduces two plotlines here, only one of which is satisfactorily concluded. Though Emley states that she will resolve the identity of Nan's attacker in further books, the reader is nonetheless left disappointed. Despite this flaw, the title is recommended for all suspense collections. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 5/15/06.].-Nanci Milone Hill, Nevins Memorial Lib., Metheun, MA Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information. Kirkus Reviews Pasadena police detective back on the job after a traumatic attack investigates the brutal sex murder of another female officer. Chastened by a gruesome knife assault that left her clinically dead for more than two minutes, Detective Nan Vining returns to work after a year's absence feeling emotionally shaky. Her attacker still at large, the no-nonsense single mom of a teenaged daughter struggles with panic attacks and a deep fear of entering str
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