At this point in time, one doesn’t go to Jonathan Kellerman’s Alex Delaware novels for novelty. A pile of them have been published over the years, and in a non-fictional world both the main characters would be long retired.

But there are other reading pleasures in the world than novelty. Psychologist Alex Delaware and his L.A. police lieutenant friend Milo Sturgis are old buddies to fans, and you don’t need a new experience every time you get together with old buddies. So we have City of the Dead, the latest in the series.

This time out, Milo asks Alex to accompany him to view a body in an exclusive neighborhood. A naked man has been hit by a moving van. The cop on the scene notices a blood trail leading to a nearby house. Inside he found a woman murdered. When Alex views that corpse, he realizes he knows her.

She is a sometime model, now an “internet influencer.” She poses as a psychological counselor, which is how Alex encountered her, pretending to a doctorate she doesn’t possess. She seems to have been a charlatan, but she didn’t deserve to have her throat cut.

A deep dive into her background, and that of the male victim, leads into sad stories of family dysfunction and personal “reinvention.” But it’s harder to find anyone who had reason or opportunity to kill them. The true solution will be far more bizarre than anyone imagined.

I found the plot of City of the Dead a bit disappointing, to be honest. The solution depended on a coincidence rather than detective work.

But it was an opportunity to spend time with a couple of my favorite literary characters. I’m not complaining.