BONE WHITE irrefutably establishes why Wendy Corsi Staub continues to be a compelling reason for regular mandatory visits to your local drugstore and supermarket paperback displays. You don’t have to be familiar with BLOOD RED or BLUE MOON, the first two books in the Mundy’s Landing trilogy, to fully appreciate this concluding volume, though you will want to acquire those just to get a feel for how quietly twisted this particular piece of New England real estate truly is in the fictitious world that Staub has created.

Book Three takes place one year after Mundy’s Landing’s historic Sleeping Beauty Murders were solved, and things, at least on the surface, appear to be quiet. However, the newfound tranquility of the village is disturbed when Emerson Mundy arrives from California, bearing antique letters and seeking answers about her past. Her appearance coincides roughly with a pair of precipitous events.

"BONE WHITE is arguably Staub’s most ambitious novel to date. She is among the best at weaving the events of the distant past into the present."

One is initiated by Ora Abrams, the elderly curator of the Mundy’s Landing Historical Society. Ora has the skull of a young lady in her possession, bequeathed to her as part of a family legacy. In the deep twilight of her life, she is determined to find out once and for all if the woman died of natural causes or was murdered. The answer may be found through a combination of modern-day forensic science and a careful reading of the series of letters dating from the 17th through the 20th centuries that are interspersed throughout the narrative. These epistles, as well as the book’s very dramatic prologue, provide a graphic view into the founding of the town and the possibility that this tranquil tourist destination is built on dark and deadly soil.

The second event concerns Sullivan “Sully” Leary, the NYPD detective who left the force to take a similar position in Mundy’s Landing and who played an important role in solving the Sleeping Beauty Murders. Sully is adjusting to and indeed enjoying the relative quiet of Mundy’s Landing when she receives an unexpected visitor in the form of Stockton Barnes, her former NYPD partner. Barnes appears to be on the run from an unknown pursuer. Worse, he is concerned that Sully may be in danger as well.

Meanwhile, a man named Roy Nowak is approaching Mundy’s Landing, seemingly bent on a mission. He is Emerson’s fiancé, and has traveled from California in apparent pursuit of Emerson, who is unaware that he’s on his way. His arrival is marked by a very public death that might be suicide but could be murder. As Sully investigates, she determines that the death is linked to another that took place decades before and a continent away. A killer has come to Mundy’s Landing, and it’s not the one who Barnes is fleeing. Rather, this individual is hiding in plain sight and has a reason for being there, one that will put any number of people in danger.

BONE WHITE is arguably Staub’s most ambitious novel to date. She is among the best at weaving the events of the distant past into the present. Here, she exceeds her own standards, creating enough mysteries for three books and leading the reader down a carefully crafted path of twists and turns to a series of revelations that even her longtime fans won’t see coming. She also sets up her next trilogy, or at least appears to do so, which will give us something to look forward to, even if we have to wait a year or so before we get it. Our patience will be rewarded.