Customer Reviews

Dead Beat (A Kate Brannigan Mystery)

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Like other readers, I picked up _Dead Beat_ as a result of enjoying both _The Mermaids Singing_ and _Wire in the Blood_, the Tony Hill novels.

It's worth noting that this book was written long before the other two, and is in fact the first book in the Kate Brannigan series (written in 1992). It may even have been her first published book.

Kate Brannigan agrees to search for a missing songwriter as a favor to a fading rock star who wants to revitalize his career. She finds her, but the consequence of the discovery is murder...

_Dead Beat_ is an inconsistent novel-- with a lot of the brilliant flashes that will show up later in McDermid's writing, but also with a lot of strange and stiff formula writing and some fairly strained plot devices. The role of the police is unbelievable, to say the least, and Brannigan herself acts in some fairly odd and unmotivated ways. It's still worth a read because it sets the basis of the character, who I'm willing to bet gets better in later books.

This year Spinsters Ink began reprinting the Kate Brannigan mystery series by the award-winning Val McDermid, who is also the author of the lesbian mystery series featuring Lindsay Gordon. In this first book, Kate is hired by a famous musician to find his long-lost lyricist Moira. She succeeds in tracking Moira to her girlfriend's house, and thinks all ends happily ever after with the reunion, until Moira is murdered in the musician's house. Now Kate is pulled into the murder investigation, and finds more suspects and motives than she anticipated, all the while dealing with her job as a private investigator and with a distracting boyfriend. "Dead Beat" is a marvelous introduction to the series and showcases McDermid's talents as a mystery writer. Now let's all thank Spinsters Ink for bringing Brannigan back.

Dead Beat by Val McDermid St. Martins Press, New York 1992

I read with a great deal of pleasure two books by Val McDermid featuring Dr. Tony Hill and wanted to see how I would like her series with Lady PI Kate Brannigan. In this book, Kate is put on the trail of a missing lyricist and bed partner of a rising rock star. The missing Moira has been through a really tough time venturing into heroin addiction and prostitution and has finally ended up with her lesbian Social Worker. When Kate finds her, she agrees to come back and join the rock star in writing songs but not in bed. However, she is soon found dead with a full caste of likely suspects. Kate very cleverly finds the murderer amidst the hangers-on in the rock star's mansion and flushes him out in a clever maneuver.

This book is perhaps not quite as graphic in its descriptions of crime scenes as the other two books, but Kate is a very exciting, thoroughly modern young woman with a quick wit and Thai boxing experience. I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

Val McDermid writes really well, though she's constrained here by the standard female PI formula. Kate Brannigan is smart and sassy, can't cook, does martial arts, understands computers, and all that required stuff. In fact, Kate's just a little bit too modern-girl to be true - she lets her boyfriend move next door, but to keep her own space, won't give him her key... that kind of thing, I am also so over the whole Rock Star lifestyle behind the scenes stuff, and end was very Agatha Christie - Kate revealing the killer's identity to the suspects assembled in the living room. But if you like female PI stories and want a change from VI Warshawski, then you could do a lot worse. And if you're into serial murder books, The Mermaids Singing, by the same author, is about the best one I've ever read.