Bob Moyer loves to visit New Orleans, whether in person or through the novels he reads. Here he takes a look at the second in a quirky new New Orleans-set mystery series by Margot Douaihy.

Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer

BLESSED WATER. By Margot Douaihy. Zando. 288 pages. $27.95

Fire first, then water.

In her first book, the tattooed, gold-toothed, lesbian ex-punk rocker now known as Sister Holiday was embroiled in a series of deadly fires at the Sisters of the Sublime Blood convent in New Orleans. All the clues pointed to her, a recent novitiate. The daughter of a cop, she set off to solve the mystery, with the help of fire department Lieutenant Magnolia Rivaux, and no help from police detectives Decker and Rogan. Sister Holiday proved a delightfully tortured soul, and a determined detective, in an auspicious debut.

In her second adventure, the good Sister and New Orleans are pummeled by torrential rain. She is now an apprentice in retired Rivaux’s Redemption Detective Agency. When she arrives at what was supposed to be a meeting with a client down by the river, she instead finds the convent priest floating in the water. A short time thereafter, someone delivers a Polaroid addressed to her, a picture of the other convent priest tied and taped in an unknown location. She now has two cases to solve, and of course receives no help from her nemeses Decker and Rogan.

The ensuing narrative features some vivid imagery, much of it documenting in detail the novitiate nun’s struggle with her demons. The author has an apt sense of internal dialogue, and gives us insight to this square peg in a Catholic hole. She also gets the power of New Orleans storms, the way water changes force and changes lives, in this case tragically taking some of Holiday’s friends. It’s a shame that in all this good writing something is missing: the mystery.

Entire chapters go by without more than tangential reference to the death and abduction supposedly at the core of the story. Great detail is given to what happens inside Sister Holiday’s head as well as to her conflict with the Church. She (and the reader) are further distracted by the introduction of her brother, just released from the Army. Their past and present drama gets more print than the recent dilemma of the disappeared priest, or so it seems. When the search finally kicks in, very far into the book, the finale feels rushed and difficult to believe.

In spite of the book’s shortcomings, the Margot Douaihy has provided a decent read that leaves us wanting more.