Kate Flora’s Portland, Maine, homicide detective Joe Burgess perseveres in his investigations despite his personal demons and he never quits until the guilty party is brought to justice.
Flora’s latest book, The Angel of Knowlton Park, received a starred review in Booklist, which said “Flora excels at portraying the police as real people with strengths and weaknesses who unite to bring some measure of justice to the dead and living alike. Flora's thought-provoking second police procedural marks her as one of the best in the genre.”
Burgess abandons his summer vacation plans when the body of Timothy Watts, an eight-year-old boy from an abusive family, is found wrapped in a blue blanket in a Portland park.
Although everyone in the neighborhood loved Timmy, people are unwilling to talk. Even Iris, Timmy's deaf sister, isn’t talking and soon disappears.
Burgess first appeared in Playing God, set in a wintry Portland. An oncologist who had a habit of picking up prostitutes is found dead in his car. It appears that his family and his colleagues knew about his sordid predilection, and yet – surprise, surprise – no one wants to talk to the police.
This book was called “a triumph in the police procedural genre.”
Flora is also the author of Thea Kozak series and a true-crime writer. Her Finding Amy: A True Story of Murder in Maine, co-written with a career police officer, was nominated for an Edgar Award in 2007.
Professional detectives – not to mention male detectives – are rare in crime fiction in the “The Pine Tree State”.
Linda Greenlaw’s new mystery series features Jane Bunker, a former Miami homicide detective who has given up the big city for Green Haven, Maine.
But the state is more commonly thought of as the home of several popular female amateur sleuths including J.S. Borthwick’s Sarah Deane, Kaitlyn Dunnett’s Liss MacCrimmon, Sarah Graves’ Jacobia Tiptree, Karen MacInerney’s Natalie Barnes, Leslie Meier’s Lucy Stone, and Lea Wait’s Maggie Summer.
Not to mention Jessica Fletcher!
If true crime stories and/or the paranormal interest you, I found an interesting website that covers paranormal investigations into Maine’s most intriguing crimes, which include a decapitation and dismemberment with a hammer and a triple homicide barn burning.
For “cold case” fans, there is also an interesting page about Albert DeSalvo, who went to grade school in Searsport, Maine. On March 18, 1965, at the height of the Boston Strangler Murders, a chambermaid for the famous Bangor House was brutally raped and strangled to death with her nylons. A description of a man seen in the area, about 5’10 with brown eyes and short brown hair, fit DeSalvo to a tee. Bangor Detectives informed the Bangor Daily that a hundred witnesses were questioned, but they did not have enough evidence to proceed.
