Aubrey Nye Hamilton Reviews: Runner by Tracy Clark

Tracy Clark’s fourth book about Chicago private investigator Cassandra Raines is a fine mystery and a devastating take-down of the nation’s foster care system.

In Runner (Kensington, 2021) recovering addict Leesa Evans asks for Cass Raines’ help in finding her daughter Ramona. Evans lost custody of Ramona during the worst of her struggles with her addiction but she’s clean now and working hard to save enough money to make a home for her daughter. Ramona has been in foster care for five years, moved from family to family, regardless of how well she is doing in any one place. Evans has filed a missing persons report with the Chicago police but feels that her race and social status are keeping the police from taking her seriously. (The Washington Post reported on May 23, 2022, Health and Human Services Inspector General findings that foster children are typically missing more than a month before they are found. In a grim coda, the Post goes on to state that thousands of foster children are never found at all.)

The police think Ramona ran away. Raines is overwhelmed with the idea that anyone should be outside during a brutal Chicago winter. As she talks to the police, case workers, foster families, anyone who might help find the girl, she reminds them to look out their window and remember how cold it is. In a wonderfully done sequence Raines hitches a ride with her nun friend Barbara who distributes supplies to street people at night, hoping to find someone who has seen Ramona or knows where she might be. She jumps from the bus to chase a potential informant, frightening her friend and the elderly nun driving the bus. When she returns, the wrath of the tiny bus driver intimidates Raines far more than anyone else she’s encountered so far.

Strong writing and a concise straightforward narrative made this book a read-all-at-once title. Readers don’t need to start with the earlier books, this one stands well enough on its own to be read out of order. Highly recommended.

Starred review from Publishers Weekly. Winner of the 2022 Sue Grafton Memorial Award. Shortlisted for Anthony Award for Best Novel.

 

·         Publisher: ‎ Kensington (June 29, 2021)

·         Language: ‎ English

·         Hardcover: ‎ 304 pages

·         ISBN-10: ‎ 1496732014

·         ISBN-13: ‎ 978-1496732019

 

Aubrey Nye Hamilton ©2022

Aubrey Hamilton is a former librarian who works on Federal It projects by day and reads mysteries at night.