At this point, my ongoing reviews of P. F. Ford’s Dave Slater novels are more in the line of reading reports than reviews. You already know what I think of them – not top-level literature, but amusing entertainment.

In The Secret of Wild Boar Woods, Detective Sergeant Dave Slater is landed with a new partner – a cute little female detective. To make it even more precious, her last name is Darling (and yes, comic hay is made out of that). They are called to investigate the disappearance of a young girl, last scene waiting for her mother outside her school. When the missing person case becomes murder, they’re faced with a confusing tangle of intertwining relationships, familial and sexual, among the girl’s family and their friends. Meanwhile Dave patiently attempts to teach his green and volatile new partner how to act like a grown-up cop.

As always, the story was entertaining. As always, I’m a little annoyed by the author’s treatment of his characters. He changes his mind about them between stories, so that someone we’ve been taught to like in the last book because a bad’un in the present book. That, in my opinion, is not playing entirely fair with readers who faithfully follow the series.

Still, The Secret of Wild Boar Woods was pretty good reading, and it’s not expensive in Kindle. Recommended, with cautions for adult themes.