The Deadhouse
Linda Fairstein
Reviewed by Donna Pierce
Listening time: 6 hours
Retail: $26
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
The only clue assistant district attorney Alexandra Cooper has is a scrap of paper in a dead woman’s hand with the words “The Deadhouse” and a series of numbers scribbled on it. The murder victim is Lola Dakota, a professor at a local university who had suffered at the hands of her abusive husband.
The Deadhouse is the fourth novel in a series that centers on Cooper and her favorite homicide cop, Mike Chapman. In this book, Cooper has become involved with Jake, a television news correspondent, but the romance becomes shaky.
Although her husband had abused her for years, Lola refused to have him prosecuted on domestic abuse charges. Lola and “Ivan the Terrible” had an on-and-off relationship for years, and in recent months reconciled for a brief period of time. After Lola left him again, he began stalking her and hired men to kill her. The “hired killers,” actually undercover cops, teamed with Lola and set up a fake shooting, videotaping it for authorities. When Lola’s body is later found crushed in an elevator shaft, Ivan has an alibi because he’s in jail for her attempted murder. But this time Lola’s death is real; she can’t sit up and smile for the cameras.
The book is full of interesting university characters who are connected to Lola, all with reasons to want her dead. The professors teach at King’s College, a small experimental university in New York. Another interesting aspect to the story is the in-house feuding that goes on among the faculty. To add to the mystery, Charlotte Voight, a King’s College student, had disappeared in the months prior to Lola’s death.
During the investigation, Cooper and Chapman find out that Lola and her academic colleagues had researched and started an archeological dig at an abandoned 19th century hospital on New York’s Roosevelt Island, an imposing, gothic hulk where more than a century ago smallpox patients were sent to die. It’s rumored that diamonds were buried on the island, and many believe they are still there.
