Emotionally damaged characters who deal with their problems through their compelling need to help others punctuate the impressive Desolation Canyon, the second novel by P.J. Tracy featuring Los Angeles Police detective Margaret Nolan and army veteran Sam Easton.
Margaret struggles to manage her guilt following a shooting in the line of duty, as well as her grief over the death of her brother, Max, a soldier killed in Afghanistan. Margaret's heartbreak is exacerbated by her mother's mourning, so deeply felt that she has distanced herself from her daughter and the rest of her family. Sam, whose scars include irreparable disfigurement to half his face, works through his PTSD by jogging in Desolation Canyon near Death Valley. Margaret and Sam intersect again when he tries to help Marielle, a young woman who has escaped the Children of the Desert compound with her daughter. Though the remote Children of the Desert bills itself as a spiritual retreat, it is a criminal enterprise run by the deceptively charming Father Paul. He is desperate to retrieve his wife, Marielle, and their daughter, whom he considers "stolen property."
As Margaret and Sam deal with their own troubles, the suspense builds in a novel that becomes both a psychological thriller and a gripping police procedural. Margaret and her fellow detectives investigate a body found at the Hotel Bel-Air, the murder of a divorced couple, the decades-old kidnapping of a child and the machinations of a former KGB boss.
Desolation Canyon's riveting, complex plot illustrates the wide-ranging talents of Tracy (Deep into the Dark), who--with her late mother, P.J. Lambrecht--wrote 10 lighter, award-winning novels in the Monkeewrench series. --Oline H. Cogdill, freelance reviewer