He had me with the title, A Cold Case. I’m a sucker for cold cases. Peter Turnbull launches a new mystery series with this book. If future ones are as convoluted as this one, I’ll be waiting. I’ll also be rooting for the well-developed main character.

Maurice Mundy retired from Scotland Yard as a detective constable. He rubbed a few too many higher ups the wrong way with his methods, and his persistence. But, they did bring him back for the Cold Case Review Team. How much trouble could he get in, investigating a ten-year-old murder case when he’s not even allowed to interview suspects?

Mundy is teamed up with Tom Ingram. Ten years earlier, a young boy was found dead in a pond after he disappeared on the way home from a friend’s house. It’s a sad case. Oliver was the only child of older parents. Mundy and Ingram visit the boy’s mother, and then head to the house where Oliver had visited his friend. But, the friend’s father makes an odd comment about a woman who was killed the same night Oliver died. When Mundy and Ingram ask a few too many questions, they discover the local police have been investigating a string of murders that go back twenty-some years. And, those questions lead to Mundy’s first reprimand in his new job.

It’s a good thing Scotland Yard doesn’t know about Mundy’s inquiries about a case that’s even older, one that goes back to his early days as a police officer. Scotland Yard may have considered Maurice Mundy unsuitable for the job of detective, but he’s a methodical investigator who plugs away in the search for answers, and justice.

Maurice Mundy isn’t particularly appealing. He’s actually a lonely man, barely making it on his small pension. He has a surprising personal life. But, he’s conscientious and determined.  Readers who appreciate methodical police procedurals will find an absorbing story in Peter Turnbull’s introduction to Mundy, A Cold Case.

A Cold Case by Peter Turnbull. Severn House. 2016. ISBN 9780727886835 (hardcover), 186p.

*****
FTC Full Disclosure – Library book.