Bone Canyon, Lee Goldberg

Lee Goldberg began his book-author career with a number of tie-in novels for the television series he helped produce, such as Diagnosis Murder. Eventually he created novels unrelated to his broadcast work and has several series written and co-authored. In 2019, he opened the career of Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department homicide detective Eve Ronin, a woman who capitalized on her viral video arrest of an action star to leverage herself into plainclothes assignments.

As Bone Canyon, Eve's second novel opens, she is about ready to come back to work after the injuries she suffered in Lost Hills. The devastating wildfires that made for the climax of that novel have left a lot of unpleasant surprises for investigators as bodies dumped long ago are discovered in their aftermath. One such set of skeletal remains is assigned to Eve and her partner Duncan Pavone and as they try to learn to whom they belong, the answers open up a past with secrets many people would like left alone. And they would like it strongly enough to put Eve and Duncan directly in danger themselves.

On paper Eve and Duncan seem straight out of central casting: The brave, intelligent but inexperienced rookie and the jaded veteran hanging on as he counts the days until his retirement. And the main features of the narrative follow a TV-pat sequence and fall into place a little too easily. Based on that alone, Bone Canyon would be a bit above average but nothing special. It's better than that, though, because Goldberg has created some fascinating characters with real depth. Eve's fellow detectives resent her for leveraging her fame to get a detective slot ahead of people with more seniority -- and she freely admits she did it. But her reason was not personal fame or notoriety (even though no one believes her) but to give her the chance to solve murders and speak for those who can no longer speak for themselves. This driven character puts her at odds with her department hierarchy, as might be expected. But Goldberg also shows how it sometimes keeps her from making the progress with her case that she wants to make.

A third Eve Ronin book is planned for later this year and Goldberg may have hit on the alchemy that makes for a long-running series. If the stories he tells lose some of their TV sheen and gain some of his lead character's grittiness he might be able to aim for Connelly or Parker status, but even if they don't they're very likely to continue to be at least interesting and entertaining reads.