What secrets lie deep beneath the surface?A deafening explosion rocks a historic Oklahoma City hotel, sending archaeologist Faye Longchamp-Mantooth crashing to the marble floor of the lobby. She’s unhurt but shaken—after all, any time something blows up in Oklahoma City, the first word on everyone’s lips is the same: bomb.Faye is in town for a conference celebrating indigenous arts, but is soon … celebrating indigenous arts, but is soon distracted by the aftermath of the explosion, which cracks open the old hotel’s floor to reveal subterranean chambers that had housed Chinese immigrants a century before. Faye is fascinated by the tunnels, which are a time capsule back to the early 20th century—but when the bodies of three children are discovered deep beneath the city, her sense of discovery turns to one of dread…
more
Great series, the characters are so lovable and the description of archeology is well done. Each book teaches about a lost culture.
Love all of this author’s books.
Catacombs is a complex, compelling story that weaves the past and the present together into a taut mystery. The twelfth entry in a popular and award-winning series featuring archaeologist Faye Longchamp-Mantooth and her husband Joe Mantooth, this one is set in Oklahoma City. Faye and Joe are joined by Cully Mantooth, a famous though aging actor and distant cousin who plays a pivotal role in the developing story.
Faye and Joe, normally Florida residents, are in Oklahoma City when the story starts for a conference celebrating indigenous arts, where Joe and Cully are featured presenters. Cully, who is returning home after decades away, also brings Faye a hand-made flute and promises to teach her how to play. Cully is also guarding a painful secret from his youthful days in Oklahoma.
While Cully and Faye are in the lobby of a historic hotel, a bomb goes off, bruising and stunning Cully and Faye, but miraculous killing only the bomber.
Minutes before the explosion, the bomber had been exploring catacombs hidden beneath the hotel. The author explains in notes at the end of the book that the catacombs are real, and housed Chinese residents early in the 1900s. Though the book is fiction, it incorporates a good deal of actual history about the catacombs.
In short order, the FBI arrives and Faye, who has consulted for the agency before, is hired as an archaeologist consultant due to the role of the catacombs in the bombing. She is whisked away by the FBI through sewer tunnels to view the room in the catacombs where the bomber went moments before the bomb in his backpack exploded. In that room, three bodies of small children are wrapped and laid to rest. Around the room, colorful paintings, ripe with symbols and displaying faces of women and one man, fill the walls.
Ultimately Faye, Joe, and the FBI combine their skills in a suspenseful, well-paced race to discover the truth behind the bombing and the bodies of the children. Along the way, Cully confronts the secrets of his own past and Faye is endangered by a white-supremacist protest gathering. An expert on the catacombs disappears, raising fears of her death or kidnapping. Faye struggles with whether she can trust Cully, even as Cully makes trusting him hard to do. The climax is exactly the kind of edge-of-your-seat dramatic confrontation with a unique twist that author Mary Anna Evans does so well in her Faye Longchamp series.
As with the prior books in the series, Catacombs shines with rich details, well-paced action, compelling characters, and a complex, dynamic plot. Passages read with the sensitivity of a poet’s writing, yet the suspense is never lost.
This is #12 in the Faye Longchamp mystery series, but it works as a standalone. This is my first venture into the books, and I was not confused by character relationships or any references to past events.
What I enjoyed:
1. The story reveals timely cultural issues.
I had expected a straight-forward amateur detective-type mystery. While I got that (and it’s a doozy), I also got a thoughtful, moving look at prejudices in our society. Even better? These arise naturally from the story circumstances. This isn’t a book about an issue but a story that reveals an issue. There’s a difference.
Evans writes with compassion, even as she describes the horrible ways that prejudices filter down through the years. Cully (an old movie star returning to Oklahoma) and Sly (Faye’s father-in-law) both attended Indian schools. The under-funded schools lacked even basic items that make up “back-to-school” lists each year in the United States: pencils, paper, books. There was abuse at some schools. All of this is a true and shameful part of U.S. history. Both characters left without diplomas and had to build lives for themselves without it.
The catacombs of the title are the underground dwellings of a Chinese community in the early 20th century. These creative people dug through the walls of their below-ground basement apartments and created a multi-leveled living area beneath Oklahoma City. As strange as it sounds, this actually happened! Fascinating. Horrible, too. They weren’t paid adequate wages and landlords refused to rent decent apartments to them. Why? Their ethnicity.
And then there’s protest against the academic conference on Indigenous Art. It’s disappointing but not surprising that certain types of people would protest this exploration of a culture that is not “theirs”.
There’s a running theme about the idea of “invisible people.” Faye observes that the hotel maids are invisible to most. Those with power might not see them as people or consider their needs. But Faye does.
2. Faye Longchamp-Mantooth is unique.
She’s observant and astute, two qualities that I imagine archeologists need in abundance! (The tidbits of professional knowledge are fascinating.)
While she’s definitely a strong woman and a feminist, she is considerate and understanding of different codes of honor. For example, both she and Cully are somewhat hurt in the bombing. Medics attend Faye first and she wants to protest. Cully is an old man! Examine him first! But she knows that his chivalrous nature and generational ideas would never allow him to be treated before a woman. So instead of protesting, she respects that by remaining silent. (And Cully does a jig to demonstrate his “healthy” state.)
3. Faye and Joe’s relationship is realistic and beautiful.
Evans gives us a realistic marital relationship here. Joe and Faye know each other, deeply care about each other, and feel secure enough in that love to argue together. (A healthy relationship doesn’t mean a conflict-free one!) They support each other’s work. She sees even more potential greatness lying inside him and is determined to make her husband shine. It’s beautiful.
And more . . .
There’s much more that I could rave about. The plot is great. The writing is terrific. All in all, it’s a well-crafted story. Evans writes with compassion and understanding, and this is a wonderful book.
Thanks again to Netgalley and Poisoned Pen Press for a copy of Catacombs in exchange for an honest review. It was a pleasure to read this book.