Missing Ruth Rendell? In "The Shadows," Alex North attempts to pick up the late crime writer's mantle with a mystery that follows the Rendell playbook: Two brisk narratives alternate, wrapping around each other and gathering tension as they reveal themselves to be part of the same story.
Paul Adams returns to his English hometown for the first time in years, haltingly offering details of a crime that involved him and his middle school friends. Meanwhile, Amanda Beck investigates the murder of a man whose body was surrounded by hundreds of bloody handprints. The pseudonymous North falters in the closing chapters but his (or her?) book is a creepy pleasure, propelled by real-word threats such as incels and the violence of social media.
