Another Alex Delaware novel from Jonathan Kellerman, another enjoyable reading experience. The series is long established now, and few surprises are to be expected, except perhaps in terms of whodunnit. But the virtues of the books are consistent. Good main characters, interesting, layered secondary characters. And a studied avoidance of cheap shots at almost anybody, including conservative Christians.

In Guilt, Alex and his gay cop friend, Milo Sturgis, are called to a house where a tree has been uprooted in a storm. Under its roots was found a metal box, and in the box the carefully wrapped skeleton of a baby. A newspaper in the box identifies the burial as from 1951.

Then, in a nearby park, another, newer baby skeleton is found, as well as the body of a young woman, a girl from Oregon who worked as a nanny. Suspicion soon points to an A-list celebrity couple raising their brood of adopted children in seclusion on a heavily guarded estate. It’s easy to imagine what might have happened.

But it’s not as simple as that.

The great joy of a Kellerman novel, novels written by a psychologist about a psychologist, is how the characters reveal themselves, in a sort of psychic undressing. A shallow expectant mother is revealed to be so frightened about the future that she’s having trouble coping. A celebrity turns out to be entirely different than one would expect – or is it all just an act at the end? Nothing interests me like complex human personalities, and that’s where Kellerman excels.

There are some Christian fundamentalists in this one, and Kellerman treats them with his customary decency. An Oregon evangelical pastor who wouldn’t impose his “personal” views about homosexuality on his parishioners seems a bit of a stretch, but it’s a generous stretch by Kellerman’s lights, so I take it in the spirit intended.

Recommended, with the usual caveats.