Book Review: Deadly Undertakings by Gregg Luke

****--4 Stars
288 pages
Publication Date: August 2012

From Amazon: Being an assistant to the state medical examiner in Salt Lake City might sound like a dead-end job, but Rebekah Smith loves the mystery and challenge of determining the cause of death in the bodies delivered to their morgue. Tutored by her friend and boss, Dr. Sandeep Mahesh, she gains understanding not only for her job but also for how to mask her own troubled past. While analyzing the corpse of a one-hundred-year-old woman, Rebekah discovers some disturbing elements: not only was the deceased woman a healthy centenarian, but she was also embalmed before anyone discovered she’d passed away. When two identical cases surface, Rebekah enlists the help of her boyfriend, special investigations officer Josh Logan. Together they uncover shocking truths about the bizarre deaths, which eventually lead them to a nightmarish revelation they weren’t prepared for. Yet unknowingly, the more they reveal, the closer they come to being the killer’s next guinea pigs.

My Review:  I love a good mystery/suspense story and this one was great!! It was so creepy, but not over the top. I thought things flowed well and tied together. The reasoning behind the whole storyline was very fascinating and...twisted...but it worked very well.

Rebekah is so independent and strong and I kept thinking that I'm glad there are people out there who don't mind doing autopsies because I sure couldn't stomach it!! She seemed to me to be the type of woman who doesn't really need a man in her life, yet when it really came down to it, she did. I don't think she realized the full extent of her feelings until she was put in a life or death situation. One little pet peeve about her: she was constantly calling her boyfriend, Josh, "Clouseau" (like the detective from the Pink Panther), but he didn't like it. He would tell her he didn't like it, yet she still did it anyway. She often treated him like he was kind of stupid.

Josh, the detective boyfriend, was great, yet sometimes rushed into things without thinking it through first. He was also quite reserved in his feelings, which in understandable, since his first wife died while they were still newlyweds. Everyone kept wondering what he was waiting for, even he thought that, yet he held back. But he was great towards the end!!

The villain was perfectly creepy and insane!!

I think this is Gregg Luke's best novel to date!!

Content: some violence, but nothing graphic.

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