Review of "City of the Dead: An Alex Delaware Mystery" by Jonathan Kellerman

In this 37th book in the 'Alex Delaware' series, the psychologist helps LAPD detective Milo Sturgis investigate a tricky case. The book can be read as a standalone, but familiarity with the characters is a plus.

*****

A moving van has almost reached its destination in an upscale Los Angeles neighborhood near UCLA when it hits a young man who seems to appear out of nowhere.



The victim is dead....and naked.



When the police arrive a crotchety old man who lives on the block suggests the deceased came from a house down the street, that 'gets a lot of visitors.'



The cops approach the house in question, see some drops of blood, and enter to find the dead body of homeowner Cordelia Gannett.

LAPD homicide detective Lt. Milo Sturgis gets the case, and as always in unusual situations.....



......calls his friend Dr. Alex Delaware, a psychologist who consults for the Los Angeles Police Department.



It turns out Dr. Delaware is acquainted with deceased Cordelia Gannett, a beautiful blonde with a checkered past. When Alex was doing a child-custody evaluation for the court a couple of years ago, Cordelia Gannett showed up to testify for the husband, claiming to be a child psychologist.



Cordelia, who barely finished high school, was exposed as a fraud and charged with misrepresentation. Afterwards, Cordelia reinvented herself as a sort of life coach, a profession that doesn't require a license or credentials.

Milo and Alex conclude that the dead man was Cordelia's houseguest, and he may have killed her, panicked, and ran into the street. On the other hand, someone else may have killed them both and thrown the nude man into the moving van to confuse the authorities.

The naked victim can't be identified because his wallet is gone, his face is crushed, and his fingerprints aren't in the system. Thus an early order of business is to find out his name. The investigators also learn that a lawyer loosely connected to Cordelia was murdered, and things get even murkier.



Milo and Alex spend a lot of time driving around Los Angeles to interview people, including Cordelia's mother, stepfather, half-brother, clients, and acquaintances. When the naked corpse is identified, Milo and Alex speak to the people who knew him as well. It turns out both Cordelia and the naked man had difficult childhoods and broke away from their families to better themselves as adults.



Meanwhile, Alex is also working on a child custody evaluation for a divorcing couple. Alex meets with the parents separately, and learns the mother wants to take the couple's daughter to Kentucky, where her rich horse-breeding family lives.....



.....and the father opposes the plan.



The manipulations of both parents, and the shenanigans of a snooty devious lawyer, add interest (and a touch of fun) to the story.

As always in this series, Alex hobnobs with his girlfriend Robin and their cute French bulldog Blanche;



and Milo eats enormous amounts of food, including a monumental burrito and a huge steak.



I like police procedurals and I enjoyed the book. My major quibble is that the solution to the murders doesn't come from clues accumulated by the investigators but is more of a deus ex machina. Armchair detectives would have to be clairvoyant to suss out the killer, and I felt a bit cheated.

Still, I'd recommend the book to fans of the series.

Thanks to Netgalley, Jonathan Kellerman, and Ballantine Books for a copy of the book.

Rating: 3 stars