"Soaks readers in its rural Northland setting" - review of BETTER LEFT DEAD

BETTER LEFT DEAD by Catherine Lea (Bateman, 2024)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

DI Nyree Bradshaw and her team have their work cut out for them once again. Local woman Lizzy Bean has been found dead, garrotted with a piece of wire. Lizzy's property, a 1970s beach house overlooking a pristine Northland bay, is overflowing with rubbish. Inside, the house is even worse.

As Nyree and her team delve into the case, clues begin to reveal an intricate web of connections involving a local crime syndicate, a kidnapped woman, and a group of ex-foster children haunted by the past.

Meanwhile, Nyree's own past is catching up with her. Forever racked by guilt that she has failed her son who is currently in prison for murder, Nyree might finally get a chance to redeem herself in his eyes . . . but it comes at a steep cost.

For This second instalment in experienced Kiwi crime and thriller author Catherine Lea’s police procedural series starring tough, middle-aged investigator DI Nyree Bradshaw of the Far North CIB shows a storyteller really hitting her stride. After several mystery and thrillers featuring northern hemisphere settings and heroes, including a trilogy starring US socialite-turned-sleuth Elizabeth McClaine, former tech businesswoman Lea ‘came home’ with DI Bradshaw in The Water’s Dead.

This time Bradshaw and her team are faced with the puzzling murder of local hoarder Lizzy Bean, who is brutally garrotted in her own home, that’s overflowing with junk of all kinds. Making for tricky forensics at the scene. A second murder further complicates matters. Does a list of names of former foster kids have anything to do with the killings? Or had some locals who’d had issues with Lizzy Bean and her lifestyle choices play a part? Meanwhile many of the police in the region are instead focused on the missing daughter of a local councillor, and Bradshaw must also deal with the fallout of some life-changing news dropped on her by son Tony, who is in prison for murder.

Lea does a great job soaking readers in the rural and smalltown Northland setting, including the poverty and problems – drugs, gangs, mental health, greed – lurking beneath the picturesque region’s tourist-enticing landscapes. Nyree Bradshaw is an intriguing series star, a little different to the norm even in a sea of police procedurals and smalltown noir that’s out there.

Overall, Better Left Dead is a very good, gritty read where Lea makes readers care about the people in the story – beyond the main characters, too - as much as finding the killer. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come for a heroine, wider cast, and setting that deserves an ongoing series.

[This review was first written for Deadly Pleasures magazine in the United States]

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.