The Skin Beneath.

Darleen R. Golke is a high-school teacher and librarian in Winnipeg.

For five years Sam O’Connor has mourned her sister, Chloe, believing she died of an overdose, but a postcard arrives alleging “your sister died investigating a political conspiracy. Coincidence? How often do women kill themselves with a gun?” Shocked, Sam resolves to investigate, heads to Montreal, secures a job at Le Lapin Blanc where Chloe worked, and meets Chloe’s former Hell’s Angel boyfriend, her exotic dancer roommate, and fellow conspiracy devotees as she begins piecing together disparate bits of information. From Montreal to Detroit, back to Toronto, on to New York, and back to Montreal, Sam doggedly pursues her quest for the truth following even the most tenuous of leads.

In Detroit, conspiracy buffs show Sam a paper co-authored by Chloe, “The Ecdysis Conspiracy,” involving Raelian strippers, Hells Angels and Grey Wolves, and chemical weapons in Iraq. The trail eventually steers Sam to the New York City hotel where Chloe died and to a former CIA operative whose paranoia causes him to suspect her motives and who tries to kill her. Sam concludes Chloe committed suicide, “mad at everyone” except Sam—her former boyfriend, her roommate, her parents, and her friends. Sadly, “the way she staged her death was the last word.” In 10 skilfully inserted flashback chapters, Holtz reveals how Sam’s relationship with her older sister compels her to investigate in order to understand both of their lives.

The Skin Beneath, marketed as a “lesbian mystery,” combines mystery with other genres to produce a remarkably literate first novel that received the 2008 Alice B. Lavender Certificate for best first novel and that was named a finalist in Quebec’s McAuslan First Book Prize. Describing herself as a “yuffie” (young urban failure), the protagonist sports “a lot of ink on her arms” and body, dresses androgynously, and is quite comfortable with her sexual choices. Sam’s present becomes entangled with Chloe’s past as she starts a relationship only to have past events threaten to destroy her new-found happiness. In this multi-layered novel replete with quirky characters, conspiracy theories, and a well-paced plot, Holtz sustains the skin motif throughout as she looks “beneath the skin” at society and its facades, its obsession with appearances. Wonderful descriptions of urban landscapes in Montreal, Detroit, and New York combine with a journey of self-discovery to produce an entertaining and absorbing debut novel.

Recommended.