BOOK REVIEW - Fog and Fury

FOG AND FURY

Rachel Howzell Hall

Thomas & Mercer, 374pp.

Fog and Fury is the first in a new series for New York Times bestselling author Hall. Best known for her Lou Norton series, the prolific Hall has written another dozen other novels besides those. I met Rachel at a writers’ conference a few years back, where she was the keynote speaker and spoke about diversity in crime fiction and setting her beloved South-L.A. as a backdrop for her novels.

Fog and Fury follows her new protagonist, retired LAPD cop Sonny Rush, as she flees L.A. and a host of personal problems for what she thinks will be the peace and calm of a coastal hamlet in northern California. With a job offer from her private investigator uncle, she takes her slipping into dementia mother to Haven, heaven without the extra ‘e’ as the town’s boosters like to brag. But Haven is not what it seems. It’s foggy here on multiple levels. Tasked with finding a lost dog for her first assignment, Sonny gradually meets the cast of characters who populate the town. Most of them have something to hide and lie from their first hello.

To complicate matters further, Sonny’s new boyfriend, whom she met in L.A. but lives in Haven is married with a teenage daughter. Oh, and he’s also the biggest mover and shaker in this little burg and has his fingers in every pie. Then there’s the matter of the dead high school star running back that nobody wants to talk about, issues with her mother, and more trouble from L.A. that seems to have tracked her up here in her new home. It’s all a tangle and things that don’t seem connected, somehow are, as Sonny bounces from one crisis to another.

The characters are well-drawn and interesting, and the coastal setting is vividly described, but the plot seems to be going nowhere, and then suddenly it’s over. Plus, there’s a little loose end dangling at the end to tease the next book. Nevertheless, I enjoyed it as I’ve enjoyed her other books. The little intrigues keep you glued in enough that you don’t mind that solving the mystery is secondary.