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| Author Bill Loehfelm |
Maureen Coughlin returns as the heroine of the newest Bill Loehfelm novel, The Devil in Her Way.
Maureen made her first appearance in Mr. Loehfelm’s last novel, The Devil She Knows, as a late twenties
bartender on Staten Island . She was tired,
older than her age, with no plans to move forward. When she saw something she shouldn't have, she became embroiled in a power struggle amongst powerful
people. She learned the hard way that she could only count on herself.
At the end of The
Devil She Knows, Maureen had a new outlook on life, made some new and
healthy friends, decided to take control of her life. She had been selected to
be in the next class of the New
York City Police Academy
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| Win a 1st Edition of The Devil in Her Way! ** Click Here! ** |
Before I even started the book, I was worried about
explaining the change of location from New York
to New Orleans .
But Mr. Loehfelm handled it simply and believably: Maureen’s class at the NYPD Academy
Mr. Loehfelm did a great job balancing Maureen’s past,
present, and future. For the first time in her life she felt she had a
mission with the NOPD, a future, preferably as a homicide detective. But she wasn't ready for it, and her ambition, which could get her there if she could slow down enough to learn, could
be her undoing. And Maureen is well aware of it. Referring to the Joan of Arc
statue in the French Market:
Joan manned her post at the front
of the cavalry charge while holding high a weapon, a bannered lance. Maureen
loved the warrior part of the story. The young martyr part she tried not to
think about.
In another portion of the book, Mr. Loehfelm let the reader
know that Maureen hadn’t forgotten her past, and that she didn’t want to return
to it:
Dealing with tourists would be too
much like waiting tables again. She wanted to be done with supposed grown-ups
who refused to listen, refused to follow, to even read directions and simple
instructions—people who refused to fend for themselves while in public.
Another pleasant surprise from the story is how well Mr.
Loehfelm was able to write Marueen as a rookie policeman. She was everything a
rookie police officer should be, and everything that annoys the more seasoned
officers. Eager, headstrong, overconfident, bold; but also green, in a hurry, putting her own goals before what is most
important.
In addition to the great character development and story, a love of New Orleans
is apparent. Without ignoring the obvious and complex problems in New Orleans, Mr. Loehfelm's New Orleans a desirable place to visit. The food, unique and historic neighborhoods, culture, and pride all outshine the crime, post-Katrina chaos, corruption, destruction, and hopelessness that are there, too. Mr. Leohfelm does the city just as much justice as the wonderfully descriptive James Lee Burke.
If The Devil She Knows
was about breaking away from life’s circumstances that held Maureen back, then The Devil in Her Way is about Maureen
plowing through life’s new challenges without looking back, despite sometimes still being haunted by the devils of her past. I
enjoyed it, and look forward to more of Maureen Coughlin.
The Thirty Year Itch is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
