I’m a sucker for female private detective novels and I’ve got five of Tracy Monger’s Casey Jones novels, of which this is fifth (I’ve recently re-read 1 through 4). And yes, before you ask, our hero is aware of that TV series … and there’s a very brief reference to it in an earlier book.

Casey is a southern gal who works as a private detective carrying a fake licence as she has a criminal record, has a boyfriend who is paralyzed from the waist down (long story, see previous books) but still has sexy times with him, and others, and is surrounded by a collection of interesting characters who crop up through the books.

This one is about a series of rapes and murders set around Duke University and features a bigger and more diverse host of characters than normal but it romps along towards a suitably implausible outcome and was fun to read.