The Deep Dark Descending

July 17, 2017
In Edgar-finalist Eskens’s engrossing fourth Max Rupert mystery (after 2016’s The Heavens May Fall), the Minneapolis police detective has yet to recover from the death five years earlier of his wife, Jenni—struck by a hit-and-run driver, who was never identified, as she was leaving her administrative job at the Hennepin County Medical Center. Drinking too much and running afoul of his higher-ups, Rupert is close to losing his job, the only thing that gives his life meaning. Then D.A. Boady Sanden, a former friend, presents Rupert with evidence that Jenni’s death was no accident. When a case sends Rupert to Hennepin County Medical to interrogate a murder suspect, Rupert takes the opportunity to visit a coworker of Jenni’s, who sets him on a trail toward identifying his wife’s killer. In the end, Rupert must decide what he’s ready to do to obtain his goal: vengeance for Jenni. Eskens relies too heavily on coincidence, but a well-constructed plot and a sympathetic lead will keep readers turning the pages. Agent: Amy Cloughley, Kimberley Cameron Agency.

Starred review from August 1, 2017
Still grieving the wife who died four years ago, Detective Max Rupert (The Heavens May Fall, 2016, etc.) roars into action when evidence mounts that the hit-and-run that killed her was premeditated murder.Boady Sanden, the attorney who ended his unlikely friendship with Max by trashing him on the witness stand, doesn't want to make nice. He doesn't even want to talk. He just wants to drop off a file he's happened to come by that contains a voice recording of two men clearly planning Jenni Rupert's death. Max doesn't recognize either of the two voices. Apart from Detective Niki Vang, the partner he's never truly opened up to, he has no allies in Minneapolis Homicide. And he's already got his hands full with the bizarre case of an automotive fire that nearly killed Dennis Orton, the mayor's Deputy Chief of Staff, and would have killed his girlfriend, Pippi Stafford, if she hadn't already been dead in the back seat. No matter. Max takes on uncooperative witnesses, international sex traffickers, knee-deep corruption in his own department, and everyone else who stands between him and the truth. A series of increasingly nerve-wracking flash-forwards show Max, burning for condign revenge yet reluctant to strike the fatal blow, confronting the man he's become convinced ordered Jenni's murder miles from everywhere on the middle of a frozen lake in subzero January temperatures. Has Max indeed found the guilty party? Will he kill him? And if he does, what kind of peace (and possible sequels) can he expect? Eskens infuses the old this-time-it's-personal trope with raw urgency, righteous indignation, and enough scorching action to melt every trace of the Minnesota snow in his finest hour to date.

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October 1, 2017

Minnesota homicide detective Max Rupert has never recovered from the death of his wife, Jenni, initially believed to be the victim of a hit-and-run driver. Struggling with his own demons and alienating his coworkers, Max is in danger of losing the only thing that still matters to him--his job. But after discovering that his wife was murdered, Max is torn between his implacable desire for vengeance and his need to maintain his inherent decency and commitment to law enforcement. VERDICT Edgar Award winner Eskens's fourth mystery (after The Heavens May Fall)--and the third in which Max Rupert appears--takes the "will he or won't he" revenge theme and layers it with darkly convincing action and intricate plotting. Packed with heart-wrenching twists, this bleak book will haunt readers who favor an evocative and compelling sense of dread along with a dose of noir.--ACT

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 1, 2017
Minneapolis PD Detective Max Rupert is still haunted by the hit-and-run death of his wife, Jenni, four years earlier. Then he gets proof that she was murdered from the recording of a phone conversation between the killers, who describe Jenni as a hospital social worker who stumbled onto something she shouldn't have. One of the men is now dead, and the other's voice is familiar, but the person who ordered the hit remains shadowy. Called on the carpet earlier for looking into his wife's case, Rupert works carefully and tries to protect his partner, Niki Vang, who wants to help despite probable discipline from their suspicious boss. The narrative toggles between Rupert's investigation into Jenni's last day and his capture of a man on frozen Lake Superior in the bitter cold. The two plotlines converge in a final reckoning, as Rupert considers the consequences of revenge. Fine crime fiction that captures the chill of its setting as it explores issues of life and death.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

November 27, 2017
Eskens’s latest novel featuring detective Max Rupert begins with the Minneapolis homicide cop on a frozen lake in Superior National Forest, facing the killer of his pregnant wife. The big question: is he there as lawman or vigilante? Max continues to ask himself that for nearly the whole novel, which recounts his surprising discovery that his beloved wife Jenni’s death was not a hit-and-run accident but a planned assassination. What follows is his fury-driven solo struggle to find the killer. If Eskens’s tense, fast-paced thriller weren’t hard-boiled enough, actor Bray’s hoarse narration, simmering with anger, carries it to into truly suspenseful territory. His Rupert isn’t just a cop gone rogue, he’s almost uncontrollable. There aren’t many notable women in the novel other than Max’s very understanding partner and a pistol-toting Russian who provides assistance. Bray indicates a change in gender with a slight alteration in delivery (and in the latter case, accent) without slowing the novel’s pell-mell progress or softening its hard mood. It’s a lively performance by Bray, who manages to keep the energy up through to the very end. A Seventh Street paperback.