John Harvey's books featuring Charlie Resnick and his crew continue to get better and better.

I find it interesting through nine novels featuring these characters how Harvey leaves some threads unfinished and sometimes strangely not mentioned as often as one would think. One favorable aspect of this, though, is to suggest in his novels, as in real life, that some offenses simply are never solved.

Harvey also has an excellent practice of weaving his novels of characters that while touching each other, are not always integral to the main story. I assume it is a way to bring further life to his stories.

And like Jo Nesbo, his characters also continue to carry their scars and experiences throughout, unlike other novelists who create characters that can never be touched or damaged by their fictional exploits.

Lastly, it's going to be interesting to see how he wraps all these characters up with his final book supposedly dealing with Charlie Resnick.

It has been very interesting following one of his characters and the development of this character - but no further will be mentioned to avoid spoilers. ( )

It’s a good thing that I am a committed fan of the Charlie Resnick series by John Harvey as the 9th book, Still Water was not exactly a page turner. Instead this book updated the reader on the members of Charlie’s Squad and, indeed, on Charlie himself. There was a certain amount of carry-over from the previous book as to the status of Mark Devine and Lynn Kellogg has been promoted and accepted a position with the newly developed Serious Crime Unit. Also everyone had expected Charlie to apply to head up the new Serious Crime Unit, but after much pondering, he decided to pass on this for now, but then he felt that politics came into play when the new chief was announced. Meanwhile Charlie and his girlfriend Hannah are spending more and more time together even as Charlie questions some disturbing questions about love.

Of course there is some crime action as they investigate a case of art theft and eventually there is a murder to solve with the death of Hannah’s friend, Jane. Through the course of the investigation it is revealed that Jane suffered abuse at the hands of her husband so the team zeros on him, but does being a wife beater automatically make him a wife killer as well?

As always John Harvey provides an authentic touch of police detail along with his crime story but Still Water wasn’t his usual gripping story. The plot line was rather scattered and there were perhaps a few too many loose ends left dangling. Nevertheless, I will definitely be continuing on with this series as these books are usually exceptional, so will keep my fingers crossed for the next one. ( )

Harvey is excellent as always, Resnick is a great character, and Nottingham never seemed so interesting! ( )