Raye Anderson

This is number 4 in the Roxanne Calloway series. I have to say that I didn't find it quite as good as the preceding three but I still love a book that is set right in my home province in a place that I know well.

It's a hot, dry summer in Manitoba. The level of Lake Winnipeg has gone down significantly and smoke from forest fires around the prairies is having a significant effect on air quality. Although the year isn't specified, from statements about people getting vaccinated against the COVID virus and small gatherings starting to take place, I assumed it was 2021. Anyone who could heads to cottage country and the tourism industry in Cullen Village (a thinly disguised Winnipeg Beach) is thankful. The 100 year old Borthwick cottage, Hazeldean, is now owned by the four Borthwick siblings: Fraser, Donna, Leslie and Jay. Their mother, Lois, is still alive but due to dementia lives in a personal care home in Fiskar Bay (which is Gimli in real life). Each sibling is entitled to a stay during the summer months at the cottage. Donna, a realtor in Winnipeg, arrives with gourmet foods and lots of liquor for her stay. She has dinner with her younger brother, Jay, who had been working to fix up the cottage and then he heads back to his wife and stepson in Winnipeg. Early the next morning, a neighbour out for a walk with her dog discovers her body hanging from the pier that juts out into the lake. Roxanne Calloway, head of the Fiskar Bay RCMP detachment, and other members of her team investigate the suspicious death but the coroner rules that it was a suicide. That ruling was called into question when Donna's daughter, Amelia, is found bludgeoned to death inside Hazeldean. Is someone out to get the Borthwick family? Izzy McBain, from the Major Crimes Unit but also a former resident of the area, is tasked to investigate. Roxanne was her mentor when she was a raw recruit but now Izzy is the same rank and a little touchy about Roxanne taking part in the investigation. But Roxanne is the person that the locals call with information and she just can't quite manage to stay uninvolved. Even if it means that her pregnancy might be in danger. There will be more victims before the case is finally solved and, as usual, it's not anyone that was under suspicion before.

There is a ring of truth to this book since there have been many disputes when family cottages devolve to the next generation. To the best of my knowledge, they usually get resolved without a resort to homicide.… (more)

This is #3 in the Roxanne Calloway Mystery series, a series that has a female RCMP officer as the protagonist and is set in Manitoba. That is enough to hook me into reading the books but, in addition, Raye Anderson crafts a decent mystery.

In this outing Roxanne Calloway is back in the fictional Fiskar Bay in Manitoba's Interlake area. She was traumatized in the last book when she was almost killed by a murderer in Winnipeg. So, she has taken the position as head of the Fiskar Bay Detachment which became vacant when the previous incumbent retired last fall. Sergeant Bill Gilchrist and his wife, Julie, had spent the winter as snowbirds in Arizona. When Bill Gilchrist's body is discovered in a ditch in early spring very few people knew he was even back. Roxanne won't be in charge of the investigation; someone for the Major Crimes Unit will be doing that but they will need Roxanne and her staff to help. That staff consists of Constables Ken Roach, Sam Mendes, Aimee Vermette, and Ravindar Anand, and civilian staffer Kathy Isfeld. Roach, Mendes and Isfeld had all worked for Gilchrist for many years but Vermette and Anand were relative newcomers. From the MCU, Izzy McBain (local to the area) and Dave Kovak take on the investigation. The first order of business for Roxanne is to find Bill's wife but she isn't at home and her daughter, Fern, doesn't know where she is. One of Julie's friends tells Roxanne that she needed a break from Bill and she went to a retreat at a nearby centre for two weeks. Since they are not supposed to have any contact with the outside world Julie would not have heard that Bill was dead. However, when Roxanne goes to the centre to tell Julie she is not there either. Does this mean she has also been killed or perhaps she was the killer? Before they can find Julie another RCMP officer is killed. Ken Roach was doing traffic control while sandbags were being placed to prevent parts of Cullen Village from flooding due to rising waters held back by ice still on the streams and lake. When he didn't arrive home after dark his wife called in and Roxanne went to his last known location. She found his body in the creek with the top half of his body stuck in a culvert. It looks like there is a cop serial killer on the loose. This brings a major response from the RCMP in terms of more Major Crimes Unit officers on the investigation. There are multiple suspects including a local guy put away for fraud by both Gilchrist and Roach and a new couple to the area who had a history with both of them when they were in a northern town. Another body is added to the count before the culprit is identified (by Sergeant Calloway, of course).

There seemed to be a few too many suspects in this case. I found it a little hard to keep track of who they all were and what their motives were. Then, in the end, it was someone I quite liked so that was a shock.… (more)

I love books set in Winnipeg because I can then visualize where the action is taking place. Raye Anderson called some places by slightly different names than they actually are but any Winnipegger worth their salt can probably figure them out. That said, I don't think you have to live in Winnipeg to enjoy this mystery but it does add to the enjoyment.

This is the second book in the Roxanne Calloway mystery series. The first one, And We Shall Have Snow, was set in the Interlake but RCMP Sargent Calloway has to investigate a murder in Winnipeg because the body was found outside of the city, making it an RCMP matter. The body was found in the trunk of a car in Lockport. The victim of a knife slash to the neck was the Artistic Director of Prairie Theatre Centre who had gone missing just after the dress rehearsal of the theatre's opening play. Gerald Blaise never missed an opening night so there was some concern. However, Blaise's wife, actress Annabel (Budgie) Torrance, who is performing in a play in Regina's Globe Theatre, said he has gone off before usually with a new romantic conquest when he is under stress. Gerald and Annabel have an open marriage with each free to see other people but they always come back to the marriage fold. This time, however, Gerald obviously isn't coming back. Roxanne Calloway has to figure out who in Gerald's life would have wanted him dead. He was generally well liked by his theatre compatriots. His wife, who might have had the motive to inherit his considerable wealth, seems to have a pretty ironclad alibi. Could it be a former lover or possibly even a current one? The RCMP can't even find where he was killed because there is no blood either at his condo or at the theatre. Some valuable paintings are missing from the condo so maybe robbery was a motive. Calloway is trying to sift through the possibilities when the body of a theatre professor (Thom Dyck) who was a close friend of the first victim is discovered in a city park. The two crimes are probably by the same perpetrator so the investigation now becomes a joint one with the city police. Detective Sargeant Cooper Jenkins tends to ruffle feathers wherever he goes but he does have good instincts. Calloway objects to him calling her Foxy Roxy but needs his insights and cooperation. It will take another murder and an attack on Calloway to unmask the killer. I have to say I certainly didn't have any inkling about the identity of the murderer. Good job Ms. Anderson.

Anyone who has attended a play at the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre is likely to recognize that it is the theatre called the Prairie Theatre Centre in this book. And there are lots of great theatre jargon and superstitions to delight theatre buffs. I understand the author is well acquainted with theatre; it shows.… (more)

I am pleased to have discovered this book by a local author which is set in the Interlake area of Manitoba. I hope the author has more planned in the series because I'd like to see more of Corporal Roxanne Calloway of the RCMP.

The action starts at a dump for a small town on the western shore of Lake Winnipeg. Cullen Village (possibly Matlock in disguise) has lots of residents in the summer as it is prime cottage country but in the deeps of a Canadian winter only a few people stay. Panda, an accountant, and her female partner, Annie, an artist, live outside of the village so they have to take their garbage to the dump. There are a few other people there including Archie, the dump manager. Archie starts to shove their garbage and the town's garbage collected that morning over the edge of the pile and then goes down to bottom to straighten up the pile. He sees a human limb protruding from a trash bag and calls the rest of them to come look. Panda gets on her phone to call the RCMP but before they get there the others break open another bag and out rolls a severed head. Everyone recognizes it as Stella Magnusson, a local entrepreneur who has developed a sizable music festival on her acreage. Corporal Roxanne Calloway is new to the Major Crimes Unit in Winnipeg but she is detailed to head up the local investigation out of the Fiskar Bay detachment. Constables Izzy McBain and Matt Stavros are assisting and since both of them know the people and area quite well they are useful to fill Roxanne in on local knowledge. Before they can really get started another body turns up under the ice of the lake. It's another local, a man who had a large workshop that may have been where Stella's body was cut up. He was dumped through the hole in his fishing shack out on the ice after he was killed. Although the methods of disposal are quite different it seems probable the murders are linked. Corporal Calloway and her team just have to figure out who had the motive and the opportunity for both.

Much like Louise Penny's Three Pines mysteries there is a lot of visiting back and forth between the locals and lots of good food is served. This is, after all, rural Manitoba; no-one would ever have visitors without offering something to eat. There is also a lot of discussion about the weather which is another preoccupation of Manitobans. For a debut novel I thought Raye Anderson did a great job.… (more)