Author Grant McKenzie should get more recognition than he currently does. He has written a couple of mystery series --- one under his own name, the other under a pseudonym --- and more recently has published a number of stand-alone titles, as well as some short stories for eReaders. THE BUTCHER’S SON, McKenzie’s latest work, feels like the opening salvo of a new series, featuring a compassionate and tenderhearted protagonist towing a boatload of tragedy that, in turn, occasionally manifests an explosive and rough edge.

"[T]he mystery at the heart of the book is an intriguing one, full of many twists and turns that keep readers not so much guessing as reacting."

Ian Quinn is a licensed Child Protection Officer who runs a private agency in Portland, Oregon, which assists family courts in divorce and abuse cases involving minor children. He does not come to this vocation by accident, given that his older sister went missing when they were both still young. His father left him and his mother a short time afterward, and both absences have left a permanent mark on him. Even worse, his only daughter was killed, which ended his marriage. As THE BUTCHER’S SON opens, Ian is coming off of a particularly tough case when he receives an unexpected call from an attorney. It develops that Ian’s father, who has been missing for decades, has recently died, leaving Ian as his sole beneficiary. The estate is an enigma, to say the least, consisting of a key, a short two-sentence letter from his father, and the deed to the long-abandoned butcher shop that Ian’s taciturn grandfather owned and ran.

Ian does a bit of investigative work and finds out that his father was brutally murdered in Boston by an unknown assailant for reasons yet to be determined. The shop, where Ian spent a good deal of his boyhood, is in an area that gentrification has bypassed, to say the least, and is only a shadow of what it used to be when he was a child. As he explores the rooms of the shop, memories come back to him, and those few people still left in the neighborhood from his childhood fill in some blanks that he didn’t know existed. It’s when Ian begins to thoroughly explore the shop, however, that he slowly discovers his grandfather’s secrets and gains new insights into his family.

At the same time, Ian finds himself in terrible danger posed by an elderly but still threatening crime figure who issues him an enigmatic command, which he has almost no hope of fulfilling, to his peril. He discovers in time that the answer lies not only in the shop, but also within the neighborhood. Both give up their secrets slowly, even as he learns that his grandfather was a man whose complexity was hidden behind the stern countenance that he presented to Ian and most of the world. Even bigger surprises await Ian, including one that will change his life permanently, if he can live long enough to fully experience it.

THE BUTCHER’S SON is violent at times, closer to some of the darker edges of British crime fiction than we normally get from North American authors. While those with easily offended sensibilities regarding such matters might be better off looking elsewhere, the mystery at the heart of the book is an intriguing one, full of many twists and turns that keep readers not so much guessing as reacting. McKenzie introduces a number of interesting characters in addition to Ian here, and it would be a shame to have them consigned to a stand-alone work when they all seem to have more stories, and problems, to explore. Hopefully we’ll see more of them and, most of all, more of McKenzie.