"Plate Glass serial killer" --well written as always in that series ( )

In this Gregor Demarkian mystey, Haddam presents a mystery from multiple points of view. This mystery is never dull and Haddam includes multiple well developed characters. Gregor is hired by the police as a consultant to help them solve a series of serials murders. Gregor uncovers a lot including the fact that the detectives in charge of the case hate each other, don’t work together at all, and both have spent less effort on solving the case than on trying to confuse the evidence and prevent the other from solving the case. Are the murders the work of a serial killer or something else. Gregor untangles the mess. Simultaneously, his life is a mess—Bennis turns up after a year and Gregor needs to work through his relationship and feelings for her. ( )

No. 22 in the Gregor Demarkian series.

Haddam, who varies her plots by exploring new themes, for the first time takes on that of the serial killer. Given that it took her 22 books to get there, it’s surprising, since that was Demarkian’s specialty in the FBI. Nevertheless—she made it with this latest.

Her last book being such a disappointment, I was more or less steeled for a repeat performance in this book. But it does appear that if Haddam stays off of her main agenda—politics—she does a very good to excellent job of using her themes to expand and texture her plots, which are very formulaic.

Clearly Haddam has researched serial killers. As the plot unfolds, through a very clever major twist and several minor ones, we learn a great deal about serial killers that adds greatly to the interest in the story.

She also has several subplots, as usual. Gay men have appeared repeatedly in her books; she treats them sensitively but realistically. It does look like Chickie George, a gay man who first appeared in True Believers, is to be a repeat minor character; he played a major role in Hardscrabble Road and appears again in Glass Houses in a more supporting one.

However, Haddam in this book goes beyond just sympathetic (in general) portrayals; she looks at the different attitudes towards homosexuality and, quite frankly, gives one of the best arguments supporting the Catholic church’s stand that it is “objectively disordered” that I have read, including anything put out by the Church itself. However, she does also show the other side. She does this through several very sympathetically-drawn characters, basically taking no sides formally. Given her other books, though, it’s pretty clear what she feels personally. Still, this is particularly well done, given the genre.

She also takes on the subject of pedophilia, and while the character is too one-dimensional, considering again that the book is a mystery novel, NOT a work solely devoted to exploring the subject, she does a very good job. But again, the character is too one-dimensional and meets too stereotypical an end to be really believable. It is to Haddam’s credit, however, that she continues to pursue these social topics.

As fans of the series know, in the last few books, Haddam introduced a major crisis between Demarkian and Bennis Hannaford. In this one, she resolves the crisis, but getting there is a real strain on credulity.

Still, Glass Houses returns to a better standard of writing. The resolution of the mystery is well done with a nice twist. More than most writers in the genre, Haddam incorporates various, sometimes disparate topics into her plots and for the most part, carries them off very well within the confines of the genre and book length. She continues to do so in Glass Houses. Highly recommended. ( )