RED, GREEN, OR MURDER

In Posadas County, N.M., everybody knows chile burritos can be killers.

True, the green-chile burrito from Posadas’s leading Mexican restaurant is somewhat less decisive than the red. But obviously it suffices, a certain retired law-enforcement officer thinks mordantly while staring down at the lifeless body of a longtime friend. It’s especially unfair that “he didn’t get to finish,” as former sheriff Bill Gastner says to undersheriff Estelle Reyes-Guzman, who’s already ordered George Payton’s kitchen enveloped in yellow crime-scene tape. No longer does she believe what the police were meant to believe: that old George, known to be suffering from numberless serious ailments, had succumbed to a massive heart attack triggered by a hot blast of famously lethal chile. Her sharp eyes have noticed enough out of kilter to suggest malice aforethought, and soon Bill too is persuaded. Who could have wanted irascible but likable George dead? Before Bill can give much thought to that question, he has another mystery to crack. Someone has punched the lights out of a young cowpuncher, stolen his truck and left him for dead. The two attacks make Bill and Estelle a clue-sifting team once again, leaving his retirement far behind.

Another highly entertaining entry (The Fourth Time is Murder, 2008, etc.) that shows those unruly New Mexicans doing what they do best. Long may they stay homicidal.