Getting Away with Murder

Trevor S. Raymond is a teacher and librarian with the Peel Board of Education and editor of Canadian Holmes.

Canada’s internationally popular Benny Cooperman, Howard Engel’s
softboiled private eye from Grantham (St. Catharines), Ontario, is back.
He still likes his chopped-egg sandwiches, visits his parents for a
weekly dinner, and solves murders that baffle the police. But after a
fine start—when Benny is rousted from bed by goons hired by an
infamous gangster who wants Benny’s help “or else”—the story
slows down. Two-thirds of the way through, Benny muses, “I’d talked
to a lot of people. In fact, this case was almost all talk.” Indeed.

As always, Engel’s writing is of a high quality, and his tale is told
with a minimum of violence and profanity, but readers who have followed
Benny since his delightful 1980 debut in The Suicide Murders may be
disappointed this time. Those new to the series should start with
Benny’s earlier adventures, which were graced with more wit and
sparkle.