Fire Feud

 Fire Feud is the second novel by Thomas Roehlk, but now that I’ve enjoyed that murder mystery published in 2025, I’m going to find his first novel, Red Deuce which was published in 2024.

 This story involves two construction companies that have been rivals for more than 100 years, and under suspect circumstances, one of them has consistently underbid and won the major construction projects while the other has played second fiddle to those biggest deals. The founders of the companies, both immigrants from different companies, had learned to hate each other while they were helping to dig the Erie Canal. At the conclusion of that project, they went separate ways although both continued to work mostly on canal projects until they both ended up founding construction companies in Chicago. It was during a current major dig in Chicago that a body was discovered, hidden in the pilings of a bridge abutment. It turned out to be a man who had been the founder of one of those companies.

 

Patrick Carney was thought to have perished in the 1871 fire that devastated the city, The Great Chicago Fire, but his body was never recovered. By legend, it had been Mrs. O’Leary’s cow that knocked over a lantern which set the city on fire. Roehlk wrote that it now looked as if the fire had not killed him, but that he was murdered, and his body had been purposefully hidden. Meanwhile, more murders happened involving the two families who had been feuding with each other since the two companies had been founded Frank Wagner was the founder of the company that had been significantly more successful than the other. Could he have been involved in the 1871 disappearance of Mr. Carney?

 

Meanwhile, an important subplot was developing. The term Red Deuce was a reference to identical twin redheaded sisters. One of them was an attorney who worked for the more successful company and the other was a forensic pathologist employed by the FBI. They lived together in Chicago and were sometimes involved in the same cases, and both were very eligible women in their 30s.

 

Good plot, good characters. I recommend this one highly. I thought the book should have been dedicated to Mrs. O’Leary since it absolved her of having caused the fire that killed hundreds of people and destroyed most of Chicago.