A Studied Death

Peter Martin is a senior projects editor at the University of Ottawa
Press.

Rosie Cairns, who teaches at Trillium University, is the faculty advisor
to an unhappy young woman who is stabbed to death on the campus. The
police and Rosie’s husband tell her to stay clear of the
investigation, but an abused baby, two dysfunctional families, a case of
incest, and a couple of other seemingly unrelated murders intrude and
Professor Cairns, not unwillingly, finds herself in the thick of things.

The novel’s plot is nothing to write home about. Readers don’t get
that “Of course!” feeling when the killer’s identity is revealed.
And a couple of promising storylines—radical feminism on campus and
the repugnant incest revelation—are introduced and abandoned. But A
Studied Death is better than most of its American and English
female-campus-sleuth counterparts (this has become a distinct subgenre).

Struthers, a poet of distinction, has a keen ear for dialogue. Her
characters, though sketchy, are realistic. And she has interesting
things to say and says them well: “... the debate over political
correctness and free speech, a debate guaranteed to prod all the sacred
cows into a stampede.”

An enjoyable, rewarding, and unmistakably Canadian book.