Dead in the Water.

Matt Hartman is a freelance editor and cataloguer, running Hartman Cataloguing, Editing and Indexing Services.

It’s hard to determine the audience Ottawa’s Bob Leroux had in mind for his second novel, Dead in the Water. The book is ostensibly a crime novel, dealing with smuggling in Ontario’s Glengarry County, which lies on the border with New York State on the St. Lawrence River. Leroux was born (1945) and raised in Glengarry, and he clearly knows it, and the Mohawk reserve that is part of the county, well. But the crime itself, involving illegal immigration, cigarette smuggling, a missing persons search, and some nefarious shenanigans on the border, is so badly portrayed that it is questionable whether an adult reader would stay focused for very long. Perhaps a younger reader could ignore the repetition and lack of characterization, but there is so much gratuitous obscenity thrown into the dialogue that even a young adult would find it distasteful.

Most of Leroux’s difficulties stem from his lack of skill portraying characters. They “grin,” they “laugh,” they “pretend to shield their eyes,” they scoff in disagreement” … all on the first few pages. The action revolves around “Big” Charlie Belisle, who was introduced in Mr. Leroux’s first novel, Murder in the Glen (2003). Charlie comes to the reader with some history: he killed or nearly killed a couple of men in the earlier book and has established himself as something of an avenging superman. His age is never supplied, but he has arthritis in both knees and uses a cane, though most often as a weapon. He has served as an MP in the American military, likely in Vietnam, so his credentials as a fighter are impeccable. But Leroux has made him a bully. He bullies his former wife, Harriet (whom he calls “Harry” throughout), as well as assorted bad guys. Doubtless, Leroux intended to make his hero more of a burly detective than a bully, but it is as a bully that he makes his way through the novel.