Killing Critics -- Carol O'Connell
They just keep getting better and better. The critics of the title are art critics, which allows for a lot of jabs at the art industry--and to a lot of the people involved, it IS an industry.
Book number three in the Mallory series starts with a murder on the first page--and then it's discovered on the second:
Long after all the pretty shoe had departed for the evening, a pair of black shoes approached the body. These shoes extended out from the blue cuffs of the gallery rent-a-cop's uniform.
"Christ," said the owner of the black shoes.
In this one word, he gave away his lack of sophistication and education, his utter ignorance of the fine arts, for he had instantly realized that this was a dead body lying in a red spread fan of blood--and not a piece of performance art.
Even my bloodthirsty sister should be satisfied with that.
It isn't really the murders of the critics that matter so much to Mallory; it's the ten-year-old unsolved horrific double homicide that may be related to them. No one, including her superior officer's superior (superior in rank ONLY) wants her to re-open the investigation. This being Mallory we're talking about, (and a case that her foster father had worked on) obviously she doesn't listen. And Riker and Charles Butler are along for the ride.
We get even more information about Mallory's background and I fully admit to falling in love with Charles Butler. I also admit to crying at the end.
And I think that about halfway through the book, she proves that she still has a soul.