Religions and personalities collide, mix, and meld in this vibrant multicultural, multinational mystery by author Henry G. Brinton, set in the engaging town of Occoquan, Virginia.
Harley Camden never heard of Occoquan before he is assigned there by his bishop. She insists on a change of venue for him because both his sermons and his management of church affairs have lost their flavor – understandably – after his wife and daughter were killed in Brussels, by Islamic terrorists who used nail bombs to make their horrifying statement.
Camden realizes that he needs the change, and soon finds that, despite his inner pain, Occoquan has many charms, and many charming residents who go out of their way to make him feel at home.
Tim, who lays claim to no religion, introduces him to the remarkable history of the region, staunchly abolitionist during the Civil War. Tim also tells him about the Bayatis, an Iraqi family who operate the local bakery. Not long after Camden’s arrival, the complacent riverside town is rocked by sudden tragedy when Norah, the baker’s daughter, is murdered; the presumption made by law enforcement is that her father Muhammad is guilty of a ritualistic killing because Norah had consorted with a man, thus dishonoring her family.
To preach the Christian gospel, find forgiveness in his enraged anti-Islamic mind, and to find a way to bring together the many strands of spirituality in the town – Christian, Jewish, Muslim – will be a task that Camden never expected to take on.
Tormented by strange, seemingly prophetic dreams, and guided to meet a Coptic Christian couple and a Jewish woman about whom he receives psychic “messages,” Camden will also befriend the Bayatis and begin, almost without meaning to, to investigate Norah’s murder. In doing so he will uncover obscure but meaningful lore with a bearing on the town’s dilemma, providing regenerative fodder for his emotive sermons. In seeking Norah’s actual killer, he will also imperil himself, and ultimately uncover a terrifying danger hovering over Occoquan.
Brinton knows whereof he writes, as a Presbyterian minister and well-known journalist whose articles often encompass the themes of multiculturalism, religious understanding, and tolerance.
Examining as he does the thorny religious and political issues gripping the nation and our world today, Brinton makes Camden a spokesperson for those crucial themes. Mining materials from the history of the Galilean city of Sepphoris as the “city of peace” brings his story into broader focus, while the real-life town of Occoquan is almost a character in the book’s plot, so deeply does Brinton delve into its unique and admirable qualities.
The first in a series of Harley Camden sagas, City of Peace is a tale of disruption and chaos – followed by reconciliation and interfaith resolve – that will fascinate readers of intelligent mystery fiction and make them seek more offerings from this talented wordsmith.
City of Peace by Henry G. Brinton won 1st Place in the 2019 CIBA Mystery & Mayhem awards for Cozy & Not-So-Cozy Mysteries.
