The Five Bells and Bladebone by Martha Grimes
I suppose there was no reason to read The Five Bells, except that it was there. I’ve read one other by her about this group of characters and it was much the same. The overall tone isn’t bad, though a little unhurried, but the characters seem to know each other better than I know them. It’s a series.
The main character, a Richard Jury, is inexplicably loved by everyone. People, men and women, look for him to come. I don’t understand why this is. He seems like an ordinary sort of guy to me. Doesn’t do any particularly brilliant police work, doesn’t harm anyone, doesn’t make up to anyone, just quietly does his business in a polite, if uninteresting, fashion. It would be nice to believe that a man like that would be universally admired to the point of doting, but experience tells me this isn’t so.