Barbara Lloyd McMichael

“Bet Your Bones” — Jeanne Matthews
Poisoned Pen Press — 320 pages — $24.95

Dinah Pelerin, a 30-something student of anthropology and a sleuth-by-happenstance, returns this summer in “Bet Your Bones.” This sequel by Renton mystery writer Jeanne Matthews follows on the heels (or should I say calcaneus?) of “Bones of Contention,” which came out last year.

 

Matthews has a knack for constructing plots that are a veritable snake pit of untrue lovers, unethical business dealings and murderous motives.

 

Growing up in Georgia, Dinah and Claude Ann had been best friends, although their friendship soured somewhat when Dinah discouraged Claude Ann from marrying her first love.

 

Claudy married someone else on the rebound and started a family right away, while Dinah moved on to pursue her studies.

 

A decade later, Claude Ann is freshly divorced, living in Hawaii, and set to marry Xander Garst, a volcanologist turned real estate tycoon.

 

Wrapping up her field work in Mindanao, Dinah makes a convenient stopover in Hawaii to serve as maid of honor at the wedding.

 

But when she meets the groom for the first time, she once again harbors doubts about Claude Ann’s choice in men. Xander is a couple of decades older than Claude Ann and his grown children seem to have plenty of troublesome baggage of their own. Daughter Lyssa is married to a race car driver with a penchant for gambling and fast women. Son Jon followed in his dad’s footsteps as a volcanologist but lives with terrible scars as a result of getting too immersed in his work.

 

Furthermore, Xander and his partners are enmeshed in a controversial deal involving land that may be the burial site of an ancestral Hawaiian king. This has prompted native Hawaiians to stage vociferous protests.

 

Dinah is made uneasier still as the Big Island experiences a flurry of seismic events and an increase in volcanic activity.

 

When the bride is attacked and a member of the wedding party is shoved into a molten lava flow, Dinah resolves to uncover whatever the dangerous secrets are that jeopardize her childhood friend’s second chance at happiness.

 

For those who think of Hawaii as leis and luaus, author Matthews will broaden your outlook with hefty servings of modern-day conflicts as well as some fairly brutal ancient mythology.

 

The author certainly is competent at weaving an intriguing whodunit, laced with plenty of red herrings, but she has not managed to overcome the chief problem I discerned in her earlier effort: as a lead character, Dinah Pelerin is a cipher. She doesn’t have a sense of humor, she doesn’t exhibit much compassion — she just doesn’t seem likeable.

 

Moreover, she is not a credible Gen-Xer. She spouts expressions (“for crying out loud,” “for heaven’s sakes,”) that are positively archaic to that generation and she moves through the world in a way that just doesn’t sync up with the way 30-somethings today act.

 

I’d like to see Matthews write a mystery that features a more mature female lead — perhaps then she’ll really hit her stride.

 

The Bookmonger is Barbara Lloyd McMichael, who writes this weekly column focusing on the books, authors and publishers of the Pacific Northwest. Contact her at bkmonger@nwlink.com.