Sarah's List

June 1, 2020
A Tucson cop catches a very strange case. Sarah Burke and a new detective whose last name, Boganicevic, has been shortened to Bogey are sent to the scene of a murder at a high-end senior living home. A van used to transport residents crashed after the driver was chased down and shot dead by several men who've vanished despite being closely followed by the police. The discovery in the van of the driver's bloodstained jacket with $8,400 inside makes Sarah wonder why a low-paid man would have a bundle of cash. The victim was not DeShawn Williams, the usual driver, who was in an accident the night before. The staff's decidedly mixed reactions to the replacement driver suggest that one man may have been mistaken for the other. Sarah and Jason Peete visit DeShawn in the hospital just in time to catch two men trying to remove him. Jason tasers one, but when the other tries to knife first Jason and then herself, Sarah's forced to kill him, an incident that puts her on leave. Her housemates--her boyfriend, her depressed mother, and her drug-addicted sister's very bright daughter--all attempt to help her deal with the trauma of killing someone. But even as Sarah, who's known for her comprehensive lists, finds answers and crosses them off, more questions keep popping up. A surprise ending and plenty of quirky characters add depth to this procedural.

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June 15, 2020
Gunn’s workmanlike seventh Sarah Burke mystery (after 2016’s Denny’s Law) takes the Tucson, Ariz., homicide detective and her temporary new partner, Zivko “Bogey” Boganicevic, to Fairweather Farms, an upscale senior living facility. Earlier in the day, the facility’s van plowed into the garage, riddled with bullets and pursued by thugs wielding military-grade rifles who later escaped, leaving the van’s driver, Enrique Lopez, dead. By all accounts, Enrique was well liked for the kindness and consideration he showed his elderly charges. Why kill him in such a spectacular way, and what are members of the Fairweather staff hiding? An attack on the van’s usual driver while he’s in the hospital recovering from a car accident he had the night before Enrique’s murder raises the ante. Bogey plays a key role in the surprising denouement. Sarah’s evolving relationships with her housemates—her depressed mother, intelligent adolescent niece, and patient lover—provide relief from the violence. Fans of no frills police procedurals will be satisfied.