Three Strikes, You're Dead

February 12, 2018
Hartwell’s uninspired third mystery featuring Bellingham, Wash., PI Eddie Shoes (after Two Heads Are Deader than One) takes Eddie and her mother, Chava, a casino security employee, to the Wenatchee Valley Hot Springs Resort and Spa in the Cascade Mountains for a getaway weekend. During a hike, Eddie encounters a badly injured man at a campsite. Moments later, a wildfire sweeps toward them. As they flee the flames, the man begs her to find his missing daughter. The man collapses and dies. Before she can check his pockets for identification, Eddie loses consciousness. When she wakes up in the hospital, her father, Eduardo, “mastermind of criminal enterprises and cleaner for the mob,” is at her bedside. After Eddie is discharged from the hospital, she seeks to find out what happened to the dead man and locate his daughter. Chava and Eduardo assist in an investigation that leads the three to a mysterious compound and a deadly confrontation with an unlikely killer. Hartwell’s appealing portrait of rural Washington compensates only in part for the rickety plot.