Review: Water Mark

Water Mark by J.M. Redmann

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



Book Info: Genre: Detective/Lesbian Noir Reading Level: Adult

Disclosure: I received a free copy of book 7 in this series in exchange for an honest review. I purchased the rest of the books in the series myself, so am under no particular obligation, but am happy to provide an honest review.

Synopsis: It’s just one more body in one more destroyed house. I n New Orleans, a few months after Katrina, there are thousands of destroyed houses and hundreds of body yet to be found. Can one more matter? It does to Micky Knight as she takes on the quixotic search to find out who the woman was and why she might have died there. But is Micky searching for justice or just doing anything to avoid confronting the ways Katrina destroyed everything that had tied her to New Orleans? In a city that doesn’t even have working stoplights, there seems little need for a private investigator. Her friends are all struggling with their own disrupted lives, lost jobs, destroyed homes. And the woman Micky thought she’d be with forever, Cordelia James, hasn’t returned.

Micky’s investigation leads to a tangle of greed and deceit that stretches back generations. Someone is using the destruction wrought by the flooding to finish what was started a hundred years ago. To stop them Micky will have to risk not just life and limb, but any chance to reconnect with Cordelia and rebuild the life she had before Katina. But if she doesn’t stop them, a young Midwestern teenager whose only crime was wanting to help the destroyed city, will be the next body left in an abandoned house.

My Thoughts: I think this must be the best one yet. Post-Katrina New Orleans is a dark and desolate place, and Micky is just trying to make it day to day with her anger and hurt and ennui. The book is difficult to read – Micky has retreated back to her own self and is avoiding her friends, avoiding life. Redmann portrays the angst and anger and depression in such a realistic way that it was difficult to read, but at the same time it was so unflinching that you had to keep going and live what these people had experienced. Highly recommended.



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