I'm really liking Zoe Boehm more and more for each new book I read in this series. Her job sounds a little boring - as a PI, she "finds people" - but along the way, she does a lot more. She's smart and resourceful, single-minded and brave. It's always nice to read about heroes that aren't overly macho and unrealistic.

This one was pretty complex and surprising. There was a lot going on, but a lot of it was not what it seemed. I'm pretty sure this could be read without reading the earlier books in the series, but it helps if you read them. ( )

Never can tell where Herron is going. Love the sarcastic humour. ( )

Mick Herron's 'Why We Die', the 3rd in his Oxford Investigations series, is a clever mystery that leads us down a path that has a bit of an abrupt departure at the end. Walking, running, and driving that path isn't a bunch of laughs to begin with, as it's lined with various criminals, sociopaths, a physical freak, murderers, and simpletons, but the journey is worthwhile for the reader.

The series stars the indefatigable Zoe Boehm, private investigator of a certain age, who just won't give up once she latches onto something. In 'Why We Die', she's hired by a dodgy pawn shop owner to find out who robbed him. Although the police are likewise investigating the robbery, he couldn't necessarily divulge to them all that was stolen from him because, well, most of it was stolen property he was fencing. That's why he needs Zoe. Zoe needs him because she has a big tax bill to settle up on and needs a payday. Oh yeah, and during the robbery a bystander was shot....with a crossbow. That's important in the action that follows.

Coincidentally, at about the same time a young man who intends to commit suicide due to the depression he's felt after his wife died in an accident sits in a bar getting hammered. He's approached by a beautiful young lady who appears to have been battered by someone, they enjoy a bit of a chat, and he continues his drinking while wondering who could've abused her. He returns home, drinks himself into a stupor, and forgets to off himself.

In relatively short order, with the help of a freakishly-built young lady who's 'on the inside', Zoe determine who did the robbery, but complications arise. The leader of the 'gang' dies after being stabbed by his abused wife, he was the financial guy for the group and had hidden all the loot, and lots of players are trying to locate the spoils. The abused wife has been arrested but is getting the 'abused wife' treatment from the police and the press, but the rest of the gang, including the psycho leader who is a cross-bow aficionado, thinks she knows where the loot is stashed. In the meantime, our erstwhile suicidal guy, not the sharpest tool in the shed, begins his quest to locate the abused young lady who he'd conversed with at the bar. I won't go any farther on the plot.....

I've grown to really enjoy the Zoe Boehm character through the course of this series. She's smart, glib, fearless often to the point of recklessness, physical, a bit older than you'd think.... in short, a complex personality that's been expertly developed by the author. Herron's a tremendous writer, particularly with dialogue and understated Brit humor, and he creates plots that'll keep moving forward with a lot of quirks thrown in for good measure. His Slough House series is great and these Oxford mysteries are excellent as well. Both series are character-driven and totally enjoyable. ( )

I am always intrigued by the manner in which we discover authors who go on to join the ranks of our favourites. Earlier this year I chanced upon Mick Herron’s marvellous series of espionage thrillers featuring the glorious Jackson Lamb, who leads the troop of ‘Slow Horses’, intelligence officers who have been condemned to serving out the remainder of their careers with MI5 at Slough House. Several years before embarking on that series, Herron wrote another featuring Zoe Boehm, a down at heel private investigator from Oxford.

I feel a certain sense of relief because if I had read the Zoe Boehm novels when they were first published, I might not have bothered the Jackson Lamb books, and would have missed out on a rare treat. That is not to say that this was a bad book. Herron always constructs his plots well, and there is something appealing about Zoe Boehm’s jaded perspective on life. In this story, Zoe is commissioned to investigate an armed robbery on a local jeweller’s shop. The police are, of course, already investigating the case, but the jeweller expects little success from them. He also indicates to Zoe that the items stolen already had a questionable provenance. His shop was a staging post for local criminals fencing off stolen property, and he needs either to recover the stolen items as soon as possible or face the wrath of the organised criminals who had left them there.

Zoe pursues her investigation assiduously, despite various tribulations including the theft and burning out of her car, and unwelcome run-ins with a former policeman whom she had crossed in a previous novel. The plot moves forward swiftly, and Herron builds up the intensity adeptly. All in all, I am struggling to work out why I can’t get more enthusiastic about the book – all the various components of a good and entertaining novel were there, but somehow I never quite managed to engage with it. Perhaps I had simply read too many books by Mick Herron within too short a space of time. ( )

Couldn't get into this at all, pity as the dialogue was quite witty but I couldn't get a grip of who or what the characters were. ( )