BEGINNING A WONDERFUL SERIES

The Ritual Bath by Faye Kellerman

Every so often, I am fortunate enough to stumble upon a series at its beginning. And since books in a series rarely improve as the series wears on, the first book is very often the best. It is there where the characters are still fresh and the author shows a high amount of creativity and originality.

The Characters

The Ritual Bath is the beginning of Faye Kellerman's Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus mysteries. It is also one of the best in a series that stays good for many, many books. Peter Decker is the detective that every mystery novel requires. He's a detective in the Los Angeles Police Department Foothills Division. He works juvenile and sex crimes with his partner, Marge Dunn.

Rina Lazarus is a young widow and mother. She's an Orthodox Jewish woman who lives in a yeshiva. In this novel, she works as a teacher and an attendant at the mikvah.

Faye Kellerman lets us into Peter Decker's head quite frequently, she is more stingy with her glimpses into Rina's perspective.

Emphasis of the Series

Overall, the series tells the story of Peter and Rina's love affair. It is an affair that is forbidden as Peter is a goy and Rina is a religious Jew. Throughout each novel, we learn more about Orthodox Judaism as Peter is exposed to Rina's religion and must make decisions about how much he will accept and what will be alien to him.

Technically, their relationship is background to the main plot, but it is certainly the more interesting of the two. I'm fascinated by this couple that explores the importance of religion and its practice in their lives. Kellerman is also generous with the details about Judaism and I put each book down feeling I've learned something more about her religion.

In sharp contrast to religion and spirituality are the "mysteries" of each novel. Do not think that just because the book explores deeply religious lifestyles that it will be a gentle read. Faye Kellerman's criminals and cops use raw, gritty language, and the violence of rape, sex crimes, and abuse is in no way glossed over.

This Book

This book begins with Rina in the mikvah. The mikvah is where ritual baths are taken. A ritual bath is necessary for spiritual cleansing after Jewish women have had their periods and before they can resume sexual relations with their husbands. Rina is the attendant and is cleaning up after the last woman leaves for the night. She investigates when she hears screams and finds the last woman who left has been brutally assaulted. Peter responds to the call and the rest of the book is spent investigating the crime and having the two protagonists get to know each other.

There is no deeper meaning in this book. It is not great literature. It does just what it says it does. It's a mystery involving a rape case and a story of how one woman lives as a religious Orthodox Jew.

The Ritual Bath does deal with prejudice and racism. The Jews of the yeshiva have been subjected to vandalism and hate crimes and they must deal with more violence as the book progresses. But it is not just the story of hate against the Jews. In a more subtle way, Kellerman also shows the prejudice that Jews have against Gentiles and the stereotypes that keep them from seeing the person beyond the label.

One of the biggest complaints I have about this book is that the portrayals of insane characters seem a little one-dimensional and lack credibility. Insanity is something that completely consumes some of her characters to the point where they are either completely coherent or completely incoherent. The switch between the two can be awfully abrupt and I had trouble believing it. She handles mental illness extremely poorly for a woman who is married to a psychologist she could have easily consulted--or at least gotten a referral to another expert.

--B. Redman