Murder Inside The Beltway
Margaret Truman
Ballantine, Jun 22 2010, $7.99
ISBN: 9780345498892
In Washington DC high priced escort Rosalie Curzon is murdered in her exclusive Adams-Morgan apartment. The culprit viciously battered the call girl who apparently did not go quietly into the night as the murder scene implies she fought for her life. WPD homicide detective Walter Hatcher leads the investigation; assisted by rookies, Matt Jackson and Mary Hall
The cops find video equipment hidden on a bookcase that leads the trio to believe Ms. Curzon taped her sexual encounters. The case has national implications as President Pyle runs for reelection against Robert Colgate; the married challenger is rumored to have illicit affairs and may have been a client of the dead Ms. Curzon. All the president’s men and women want the tape released without White House implication. The investigation takes a seemingly odd spin when a kidnapping occurs that should have no link to the case but does.
The latest Capital Crimes police procedural is an enjoyable investigative whodunit that provides insight into presidential campaigns in which surrogates follow the election end justifies the anything dirty goes means. The three DC detectives are stereotyped as Hatcher is sexist-racist who scorns both rookies for being a biracial male and by being a female. Jackson must have come from a Utopian commune as he is stunned that some of the force is on the dole. Finally Hall and Jackson are secretly having a tryst. In spite of the personality isms of the lead threesome, the case with its ties to election campaigns make for a solid entry by a terrific mystery maestro who passed away in 2008. As her children state in their dedication to their late mom Ms. Truman “… she liked nothing better than …, murdering people in Washington, D.C., one at a time”.
Harriet Klausner
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