Pitch Black

Susan Crandall

5/20/2008

Madison and her adopted teen aged son, Ethan, had left Philadelphia for a small Tennessee town. She has taken over as editor of the newspaper in Buckeye and they are the new outsiders in town. Ethan had had a rough childhood before she had taken him in, eventually adopting him. So far he has only made one friend at his high school. Everyone else looks at him suspiciously. She is regarding uneasily by the adults in the close knit town as well. The sheriff, Gabe Wyatt, is the exception. He finds himself drawn to Madison.

Ethan, his friend Jordan, and two other boys from their class have gone camping up the mountain with Jordan's stepfather, Steve McPherson. When the group is late on their return, Madison gets worried. She convinces Gabe to go up and find them. They meet the boys coming down the mountain. Steve McPherson was dead. There had been an accident at their campground.

After investigation Gabe realized McPherson didn't fall - he had been beaten to death with a rock. Jordan has gone into a catatonic state. Ethan had been further up the mountain. The other two boys had been at the camp site. No one of the group except Jordan and his stepfather had been at the spot where McPherson died.

Soon no one in Buckeye believes that Ethan is innocent. At the same time, Madison discovers there is a problem of steroid abuse among the high school football players. When one of them dies - one of the other two who had gone camping - steroids were in his body. She starts some exposes in the newspaper. But the small community refuses to believe it is happening in her town. That outsider must be trying to divert attention from her son.

Even Gabe has trouble proving Ethan innocent. He believes Madison in her beliefe in Ethan. Gabe knows Ethan is hiding something, but also believes the boy is innocent. The clues, though, keep pointing back to Ethan. If Gabe wants to get closer to Madison, he has to discover who killed McPherson. What he doesn't know that he has to move fast or she may be the next victim.

Susan Crandall has created an interesting family dynamic in Madison and Ethan. He had been living on the streets when she, single and a busy journalist, took him in as a foster child. They bonded to each other and she adopted him. The story starts in Tennessee, so we see their dynamic after it has been forged but is still new and at times, shaky.

The mystery in Pitch Black is fairly predictable. Crandall builds the romantic relationship nicely between Gabe and Madison, giving it realistic problems as he has to investigate her son. It builds to the expected face down and yet is resolved in a satisfactory manner.

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Notice: Sexual situations