Exile trust

Booklist Review: Frank Cole, a resident of Exile, Florida, ekes out a living as a free-lance fact checker for insurance companies and local law enforcement. When the town’s bank discovers irregularities in its safe-deposit boxes, Exile chief of police Denny Dannon recommends Frank as the guy to track down the boxes’ owners, living and deceased. One box in particular proves vexing. It belonged to a recently deceased woman, but its contents were removed by a man impersonating her long-dead husband. The ensuing investigation takes Frank back 20 years to a long-dormant land deal and then circles back to the present to involve the town’s leading land developer. The third Cole mystery advances the protagonist’s character credibly, setting the table for more cases, and is populated with an intriguing cast of small-town eccentrics as well as buried motives and simmering feuds. Another very good mystery that somehow manages to mix effectively elements of both the village cozy and the hard-boiled thriller. --Wes Lukowsky