Subject: Review: News From the Edge by Mark Sumner

From: [email-masked] (Tallibeth)
Date: 07 Jul 1997 19:17:25 GMT

News from the Edge: The Monster of Minnesota
		by Mark Sumner
	Review Copyright 1997 Tallibeth

Mystery readers may not wander back to the science fiction shelves very
often, but now they have a very good reason -- finding this book.

This book straddles the line between a mystery and a science fiction
novel, and does a good job of keeping one foot in each camp.  You can even
see this on the cover, as the book has a quote mentioning the Cat Who
books.  On the one hand, this is a very traditional cozy mystery, complete
with a plucky female detective, plenty of bodies on the ground, and clues
everywhere.  But it's also a SF novel, with some strange events going on
around and under a little fishing lake and some nice science behind the
solution.

Savvy McKinnon is a young journalist who ends up working at a tabloid
paper.  She hates her work, and is looking for a way out when a call comes
in about some deaths worth investigating.  She slips away from her desk
and heads up to Minnesota, hoping to find something that will get her a
better job.  Instead she finds a story so weird that even her tabloid
might have a hard time printing it.

Sumner keeps the book moving quickly, and it's full of snappy, funny
dialog.  Savvy McKinnon turns out to be a great character, very much in
the tradition of cozy mystery.  There's also a very colorful supporting
cast, from a precocious kid, to a crusty fisherman, to a English professor
with a love for lake monsters.  They all play their part in solving the
mystery, and the interaction of the characters is very snazzy.

There's an environmental message at the core of the mystery, but don't go
into this book thinking you're going to get any great understanding of the
human condition.  The tabloid look of the cover perfectly captures the
book -- pure fun.  A great read at pool side, or for a summer evening.

I first ran into Mark Sumner's books by reading one of his young adult
thrillers.  Then I read his other books including DEVIL'S TOWER, which
also spreads itself across two genres (fantasy and western).  I've loved
all these books for different reasons.

Mystery readers: force yourself to take a trip to the SF shelves.  If
you've like the Cat Who books, or other cozy series, you'll love this
book.