THE BURGLAR

4 stars out of 5

I really enjoyed this book, but I admit it's a rather strange one. The title "burglar" is Elle, who has been on her own almost since she can remember - surviving by becoming adept at the ins and outs of theft (more to the point, how to get in and get out without getting caught). By now, she's got it down to a science; her powers of observation and tricks of the trade at times nearly obliterating the line of credibility. And then, she enters a house looking for goodies, finds three murder victims in an upstairs bedroom, and life as she knows it goes belly up.

The strange part, I guess, comes because the entire book is done in a matter-of-fact, narration style with very little dialogue. It's certainly not uninteresting - in fact, it's quite easy to read and entertaining enough that I was reluctant to put it down. But neither can I call it thrilling; most of the way through, it felt more like I was reading an instruction sheet on how to commit burglary than a murder mystery. Not a bad thing, mind you - as I said, I quite enjoyed the reading experience and thank the publisher, via NetGalley, for the opportunity to read and review an advance copy. But on the other hand, at no time did I get close to the edge of my seat.

Elle's discovery of those aforementioned bodies was accompanied by discovery that the murders (and a few more tawdry moments involving the two woman and a man) were caught on a camcorder. Always striving to stay ahead of whatever game with which she's not already well acquainted, she quickly surmises that what's on the tape might be valuable to the police. So, she steals the camera and makes copies of what's on it - minus, of course, any hint that she was ever involved (or so she thinks) - and re-burglarizes the place to return the camera for the police to find. If nothing else, she's a burglar with a conscience; she's never stolen more than she needs nor harmed anyone and insists that she never will.

That assumption is challenged, though, when Elle learns that not only do some very nasty characters know she was there, they're intent on tracking her down and, most likely, subjecting her to the same fate as the victims she found. That notion really hits home when someone she cares for is put down for the count (keep in mind that she's a loner who doesn't care for much of anybody, so this is a major milestone). 

So it is that she decides to investigate on her own in hopes of finding out who committed the murders that got the whole ball rolling and, more important, why. That not only puts her in an unfamiliar world of shady fine art deals, upper-crust snobs with whom her only connection is the goodies she's stolen from people like them in the past and those who will stop at nothing - including killing her - to make sure their own illicit plans don't go awry. In the end, perhaps the real question is, who's the better burglar? Read and find out!

The Burglar by Thomas Perry (Mysterious Press, January 2019); 304 pp.