Book info

• Title Goldilocks
• Author Ed McBain
• Year 1976
• Genre Mystery

Jamie Purchase enters his home late one night to find the bloodless bodies of his wife and two daughters. It was no secret Jamie’s ex, Betty, hated the new wife—Goldilocks, she’d called her, and the name stuck. But could Betty hate Jamie’s new family enough to slaughter them? Lawyer Matthew Hope can believe it. He’s seen his fair share of heartache and deception, but he knows better than most that Goldilocks only wanders in when you’ve left the door wide open. And when that happens, everyone’s to blame. Now Hope must immerse himself in a family drama too close to home in order to find a cold-blooded killer.

Thoughts

I was a big fan of McBain’s cop series but read a few too many of them so that they grew a little stale. It was really nice and refreshing to read his writing in a different format, this time a lawyer helping to investigate the murder of a mother and two kids. A brutal crime, and not many suspects, but even fewer once someone confesses to the crime.

As with much of McBain’s work, it has snappy dialogue that draws you right in. I always wonder how it can be interesting to read police interrogations, going over and over the same information time and again, but somehow it still is!

Interesting book, fascinating crime, and a good whodunit twist that, for once, doesn’t come totally out of left-field but is still something of a surprise.

Rating: 4 / 5