A Deadly Little List is the first novel by Kay Stewart and Chris Bullock. Appropriately, the two authors have given readers two protagonists. Arthur Fairweather works as a freelance drama critic for Victoria’s daily newspaper. Constable Danutia Dranchuk (and only the authors can explain why, with all the fictional names in the world at their disposal, they chose this mouthful of a moniker) has been with the RCMP’s homicide division for only two months.

Dranchuk receives the call to investigate a death in an abandoned cabin on Salt Spring Island. The head of the local detachment calls it suicide, but the attending doctor suspects murder. Dranchuk must decide who is right, and proceed with an investigation if it is murder. Meanwhile, Fairweather has been cajoled by his ex-wife Thea to review a production of The Mikado, by the Vesuvius Light Opera Company of Salt Spring Island, at the theatre she owns. He’s unenthusiastic until he meets Lavender, one of the young female cast members. Thea has also convinced him to come over to Salt Spring to cover the arts festival she’s managing there. When he hears about the supposed suicide, he sees a freelance writing opportunity for himself. The book alternates between Dranchuk’s and Arthur’s points of view and their respective investigations. The two don’t truly come together until the ultimate showdown with the killer.

The cast of characters is rather large, including the entire cast of The Mikado, many of their friends and family, and the local RCMP officers, but Stewart and Bullock define them all very well. The pace of the story and the investigation moves along steadily, picking up in intensity when there is a second murder. The descriptions of Salt Spring Island ring true. Some of the other descriptions aren’t quite so smooth: “Moonlight shone, too, on Lavender, creating patches of shadow under her breasts.” Fortunately, this sort of writing is the exception and not the rule in an accomplished first effort.