The most decorated homicide detective in NYPD history, Dave Gurney is
still trying to adjust to his life of quasi-retirement in upstate New York when a young woman
who is producing a documentary on a notorious murder spree seeks his counsel. Soon after,
Gurney begins feeling threatened: a razor-sharp hunting arrow lands in his yard, and he
narrowly escapes serious injury in a booby-trapped basement. As things grow more bizarre,
he finds himself immersed the case of The Good Shepherd, which ten years before involved
a series of roadside shootings and a rage-against-the-rich manifesto. The killings ceased, and
a cult of analysis grew up around the case with a consensus opinion that no one would
dream of challenging — no one, that is, but Dave Gurney.
Mocked even by some colleagues, Dave realizes that the killer is too clever to be found. The
only gambit that may make sense is also the most dangerous – to make himself a target.
To survive, Gurney must rely on three allies: his wife Madeleine, impressively intuitive and a
beacon of light in the gathering darkness; his de-facto investigative “partner” Jack Hardwick,
always ready to spit in authorityʼs face but wily when it counts; and his son Kyle, who has
come back into Gurneyʼs life with surprising force, love and loyalty.
Displaying all the hallmarks for which the Dave Gurney series is lauded — well-etched
characters, deft black humor, and ingenious deduction that ends in a climactic showdown –
Let the Devil Sleep is something more: a reminder of the power of self-belief in a world that
contains too little of it