I give pretty high marks to author B. V. Lawson for her Scott Drayco series, about a private eye who was once a concert pianist and an FBI agent, who also has synesthesia, the condition where people see colors in sounds. Lawson does a pretty good male character, and her stories are colorful and intriguing.

The third Scott Drayco book is Dies Irae. Unlike the first two books in the series, this one is not staged in the town of Cape Unity, on the eastern shore of Chesapeake Bay, but in Scott’s home of Washington D.C. This time he is reunited with his old FBI partner, “Sarg” Sargosian. Scott took the fall for a mistake Sarg made on the job, resulting in his own dismissal from the Bureau. It saved Sarg’s career but ruined their friendship. Only now Sarg wants Scott’s help. A student at a prestigious local college, a musical prodigy who also had synesthesia, has been murdered. She’d received a mysterious, coded note beforehand. Sarg has reason to fear that his own daughter, a fellow student, might be the next victim.

There is a possible voodoo angle in the plot, and the story delves into religious questions. The author’s attitude seems to be pretty broadminded, except that Christian evangelicals consistently look bad.

As in the previous book, the author misuses the phrase “to beg the question.” And this time out, she adds the odd quotation, “et two, Brute.”

The Scott Drayco books aren’t bad, but I’m finding them philosophically uncongenial. I can’t deny, however, that the stories are pretty well done.