Mx3 Review: T is for Trespass by Sue Grafton |

Paperback:416 pages
Publisher:Berkley Trade (April 3, 2012)
ISBN-10: 0425245632
Source: Publisher

In Grafton’s 20th crime novel featuring Kinsey Millhone, private investigator is tasked with investigating an automobile accident when her elderly neighbor Gus, suffers a fall requiring hospital attention. Gus has never been the easiest person to get along with; he was known to report everyone and everything he deemed to be going wrong in the neighborhood. Despite this, Kinsey still feels a need to assist her ailing neighbor.

When he’s released from the hospital, it’s apparent that Gus requires assistance in his day to day living. Kinsey tracks down his niece, who isn’t exactly excited about leaving her live to deal with her uncle. She begins interviewing home care nurses to deal with her uncle, not an easy task. Several of the nurses fail to stay an entire day, unable to deal with Gus’ behavior. But then she meets Solana Rojas and believes her to be a perfect fit. Aware of Kinsey’s occupation, she asks Kinsey to run a background check on this woman.

From page one, the reader is aware this woman is a sick, twisted psychopath, living the life and the identity of a woman she used to work with. She’s pretty slick, however, and is able to evade any suspicion when the background check is run. She quickly assumes the role of Gus’ home care nurse and his niece heads back home to New York.

It doesn’t take long before Kinsey gets suspicious. While she was never really that close with Gus, she is concerned about his well-being and begins to notice quite a few startling changes taking place. First, his home was a horrible mess prior to his injury. Mouse droppings on the floor, rooms filled to the brim with old newspapers and other trash. Yet it doesn’t take long for Solana to take control. She rents a dumpster and begins to rid Gus’ home of all the trash that has been piling up for years.

On the surface, this appears to be an improvement, but when Kinsey learns that Gus’ mental capacities are waning she’s immediatly concerned. Gus, despite his personality issues, was a pretty sharp guy. Upon a visit to Gus’ home she notices a check register for his bank accounts. The balance is dwindling…quickly. It becomes her mission to find out who this Solana Rojas really is before Gus’ life begins to dwindle as quickly as his bank accounts.

It’s been several years since I’ve read any of Grafton’s alphabet series books, but it didn’t take long for me to get immersed in Kinsey’s life again. Grafton’s books are set in the 80s, so it was interesting to see how much life and society has changed since then. No cell phones, no computer databases. It was almost refreshing to see a tech-free life again.

The strength in these books are the rich characters. One can’t help but love Henry, Kinsey’s sweet neighbor. He’s Kinsey’s backbone and, oftentimes, her conscience. I appreciate how this book dealt with elder abuse, individuals taking advantage of the elderly for the sake of financial gain. Gus was a pretty mean guy at times but he certainly didn’t deserve the treatment he received.

T Is for Trespass is a stunning, captivating book. I’m truly glad this was the book that reunited me with Kinsey Millhone. It reminded me what I was missing; I can’t wait to dive back into this series!

I’m excited to be participating in this tour, sponsored by Penguin books. Yes, because it reunited me with a pretty wonderful series but also because I have a special treat for you, my readers. Each blog participating in this tour is able to present its readers with an excert of V Is for Vengeance , the latest book in this series, scheduled for release November 14th. Follow the blog tour to get a exclusive access glance inside the new book! Without further ado…an exclusive look inside V Is for Vengeance :

Nearby customers seemed unaware of the drama being played out, but I was transﬁxed. The shoplifter’s gaze ﬂicked from the loss- prevention ofﬁcer to the escalators. A direct path would have forced her to walk right past him. I thought a move was ill advised and, apparently, she did too. Better to keep her distance and hope the threat evaporated of its own accord. In most stores, policy dictates that no one make contact with a customer under surveillance as long as she is still on the premises and has the opportunity to pay. For the moment, the woman was safe, though her agitation surfaced in a series of random gestures. She looked at her watch. She glanced toward the ladies’ room. She picked up a half-slip, studied it brieﬂy, and then replaced it. The items she’d stolen must have felt radioactive, but she didn’t dare return them lest she call attention to herself.

The prospect of being apprehended must have obliterated the alternatives she’d planned if the caper turned sour. Her best course of action would have been to adjourn to the ladies’ room and toss the stolen merchandise in the trash. Failing that, she could have abandoned her shopping bag and headed for the elevators in hopes of stepping into the next available car. Without the pilfered items in her possession, she’d be home free. Until she left the store without paying, no crime had been committed. Perhaps with something of the sort in mind, she removed herself from Mr. Koslo’s line of sight and ambled into the women’s plus-size department, where she looked right at home.

Koslo moved away from the counter without visual reference to the woman. I watched as he circled behind her in a wide arc, herding her from the rear. Claudia moved directly to the escalator and went down, probably to intercept the woman if she tried leaving by that means.

The shoplifter’s gaze darted from one area to the next as she considered viable escape routes. Her only choices were the elevators, the escalators, or the ﬁre stairs. With Koslo ten yards behind her, the elevators and the ﬁre stairs must have seemed too far away to chance. From her current location, the aisle widened to form a generous apron of pale marble that led to the escalators, tantalizingly close. She strolled out of the plus-size department and crossed the open ﬂoor at a leisurely pace. Behind her, Koslo adjusted his speed to correspond with hers.

On the far side of the escalators, I saw the younger woman in the dark blue dress appear at the mouth of the short corridor leading to the ladies’ room. She halted abruptly, and as the shoplifter reached the top of the escalator a look ﬂashed between them. If I’d entertained doubts about their being in cahoots, I was convinced of it now. Maybe they were sisters or mother and daughter on a regular late-afternoon outing, ripping off retail goods. In that brief freeze-frame, I took a mental inventory of the younger woman. She was fair, forty by my guess, with untidy, shoulder-length blond hair and little or no makeup. She turned on her heel and returned to the ladies’ room while the older woman moved on to the escalator; Koslo seven steps behind her. The two of them sank from view, ﬁrst the woman’s head disappearing and then his.

I crossed to the balustrade and peered down, watching them glide slowly from the third ﬂoor to the second. The woman must have realized she was boxed in because the knuckles of her right hand were white where she clutched the rail. The sluggish speed of the moving staircase must have sent her heart into overdrive. The ﬁght-or-ﬂight instinct is almost irresistible and I marveled at her self-control. Her partner would be of no help to her now. If the younger woman intervened, she risked being caught in the same net.

Claudia was waiting on the second ﬂoor at the foot of the moving stairs. The shoplifter kept her attention ﬁxed straight ahead, perhaps thinking if she couldn’t see her two trackers, they couldn’t see her. Once on the second ﬂoor, she took a hard turn and stepped onto the next down escalator. Claudia stepped on after she did, so that now there were two store employees in that slow-motion foot chase. The fact that the shoplifter was aware of them took away their home court advantage. By this time, however, the game was in progress and there was no way to abandon the pursuit. I could see a thin pie-shaped portion of the ﬁrst-ﬂoor shoe department, which I knew was only a short stretch away from the automatic doors that opened onto the mall. I left the three of them to their own devices. By then, the older woman was no concern of mine. I was interested in her companion.

I crossed to the short corridor that led to the ladies’ lounge and pushed open the door. I was hoping she was still there, but she might well have slipped past me while I was watching her friend. To my right, an anteroom had been set aside for mothers with babies, affording them privacy to nurse, change stinky diapers, or collapse on a well-upholstered couch. That area was empty. Across from it, there was a room where sinks lined the two opposite mirrored walls, with the usual paper towel dispensers, hand blowers, and plastic-lined waste bins. An Asian woman foamed her hands with soap and rinsed them under running water, but she seemed to be the only customer present. I heard a toilet ﬂush, and a moment later the younger woman opened the door to the second stall. She now sported a red beret and wore a white linen jacket over her navy blue dress. She still carried the shopping bag and her big leather purse. The only oddity I noted was a short horizontal scar between her lower lip and her chin, the sort of mark left when your teeth are driven through your lower lip on impact. The scar was old, with only a white line remaining to suggest a tumble from a swing or a fall against the corner of a coffee table, some childhood misfortune she’d carried with her since. She averted her face as she brushed by me. If she recognized me from the lingerie department, she gave no sign.

I kept my expression blank and headed for the stall she’d just vacated. It took me half a second to peer into the wall-mounted receptacle meant for used sanitary supplies. Six price tags had been clipped from articles of clothing and tossed into the bin. I listened to the sound of her retreating footsteps. The outer door closed. I scurried after her and opened the door a crack. I didn’t see her, but I knew she couldn’t have gone far. I proceeded to the mouth of the corridor and peered to my right. She stood in front of the bank of elevators, pushing the down button. Her head came up, as mine did, at the sound of a persistent high-pitched whoop from the ground ﬂoor. The older woman must have breached the transmitter-receiver system at the exit doors, where electronic surveillance tags had activated the alarm. Once she stepped outside, it would at least allow the loss-prevention ofﬁcer to stop her and ask her to return.

Following is a list of the other blogs participating in this tour. Be sure to check them all out, the publisher is offering three sets of Q, R, S, T, U (paperback) and the brand new V to three different people who comment on every single blog throughout the tour (US/Canada only)

Tuesday, Sept. 27: Q IS FOR QUARRY http://lesasbookcritiques.blogspot.com/
Thursday, Sept. 29: Q IS FOR QUARRY http://www.jensbookthoughts.com/
Tuesday, Oct. 4: R IS FOR RICOCHET http://www.elizabethawhite.com/
Thursday, Oct. 6: R IS FOR RICOCHET http://www.linussblanket.com/
Tuesday, Oct. 11: S IS FOR SILENCE http://www.devourerofbooks.com/
Thursday, Oct. 13: S IS FOR SILENCE http://www.kittlingbooks.com/
Tuesday, Oct. 18: T IS FOR TRESPASS http://bermudaonion.net/
Thursday, Oct. 20: T IS FOR TRESPASS http://www.jennsbookshelves.com/
Tuesday, Oct. 25: U IS FOR UNDERTOW http://popculturenerd.com/
Thursday, Oct. 27: U IS FOR UNDERTOW http://www.bookingmama.net/