X by Sue Grafton

 I'm nearing the end of my second time through this series, and it makes me sad that I'm almost done! I'm sure I read it when it came out in 2015, and I bought a copy for Melissa, who read it too. I saw her copy when we were in Rapid City last Christmas, and I was tempted to borrow it. But I didn't want to be tempted to read it out of order, so I ordered a cheap used copy from Amazon and thoroughly enjoyed it.

I finished this afternoon, a beautiful spring day in St. George, in the sunshine. I remember it as being kind of a dark story, but it didn't strike me that way this time through. And why didn't I write about it on this blog when I first read it? I was at least partially retired, but I must have just spaced it out. Now I'm more disciplined and careful--I don't allow myself to start my next book until I've recorded the one I just finished. I notice that with my aging brain, I have to be much more methodical about how I operate, or else things just fall through my sieve.

This story had three different threads, and lots of interesting characters. Happily, I was able to track them all. Maybe the warmer weather is helping me think and remember things better??? At any rate, all three stories were interesting. At one point, I thought they might intersect, but they did not. 

The first thread focuses on a rich couple's acrimonious separation and divorce, and centers on the theft of a Turner painting. Of course that intrigued me because he's one of my favorite artists. The second thread involved a psychopath killer whose wife left some mementos for their daughter, and Kinsey has to follow cryptic clues to trace his crimes. And the third one is Henry's new neighbors who turn out to be squatters and criminals. They are elderly and devious. This story comes unraveled when Henry discovers they have diverted his water source when he is desperately trying to conserve water because of the drought. The California weather and landscapes always figure in Grafton's stories, and being a native Californian, that always interests me. 

I'm ambivalent about beginning Y because it is Grafton's last book in the series. She died before she got to Z. I am so curious about how she might have tied up some of Kinsey's story's loose ends. Would her boyfriend Dietz come back to stay? Would she find peace with her family? Maybe some of these will be hinted at in Y is for Yesterday. I can't imagine writing so well when one is suffering from cancer and treatment. Wow.