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HOMICIDE MY OWN
By Anne Argula
Police procedural, paranormal mystery
March 2005
Pleasure Boat Studio
ISBN: 1-929355-21-1

Quinn is a regular cop who puts up with the men in her department, a non-existent love life and hot flashes that could ignite the rain forest. Her partner, Odd, is a quiet young man who doesn't seek out trouble.

But that's exactly what they get when they are sent from one end of Washington state to the other to pick up a prisoner, a much-older man who has run off with a teenage girl, on an island David Lynch would love in Anne Argula's Homicide My Own, an Edgar nominee for Best Original Mystery Paperback.

When Quinn and Odd reach the island, there is a delay and they have to stay overnight. Odd is strangely drawn to a decades-old double murder of two teen lovers. Soon, it appears he has a connection to the case no one would have ever guessed.

As Odd tries to solve what has become a very personal murder, the action is at times sweet, at times wacky, always propelling forward. It's Cinderella Liberty meets Twin Peaks, and with good reason. Anne Argula is the pen name of screenwriter Darryl Poniscan, who wrote the screenplays for Cinderella Liberty, The Last Detail and Taps.

Whatever name the author takes, however, what counts is that the narration by Quinn rings true and makes what could have been completely ridiculous instead entertaining. Just sit back and see what happens.

Although it is not highly relevant to the story, Quinn and Odd are Spokane cops. Anyone wanting to know what a city that thinks it's a town was like in the 1970s will find some clues in this book.

 -- Reviewed by Lynne Perednia

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