William X. Kienzle (1928–2001)

Death Wears a Red Hat is the second book in the Father Koesler Mystery series. The first Koesler mystery, The Rosary Murders, was the first adult thriller novel I ever read. I thorougly enjoyed it....but being 14 at the time, I moved on to other books and never read the rest of the Koesler books. Given the fact that the librarian called my dad before allowing me to check out the book, it could have been that the library didn't have the rest of the series. Or maybe I was embarrassed to take another Catholic theme murder novel up to the desk to check it out from my former catechism teacher. lol. Whatever the reason.....I never read any more books by William Kienzle. 30 years later I am rectifying the situation, and coming back to see what trouble Father Koesler got himself into after that first book. I knew from the creepy cover to this second novel that I was in for something truly gruesome and exciting!

I was not disappointed (until the last few pages....but I will discuss that a little later).

The basics: During an adult confirmation ceremony at a Detroit cathedral, pandemonium breaks out when a child notices that the red cardinal hat suspended from the cathedral's ceiling has an actual human head in it. Police are baffled as to why someone stuffed local gangster Rough Rudy Ruggiero's severed head into the huge red religious symbol. That's just the start....more heads of local thugs show up in various churches across the city. The severed heads all bear grimaces of extreme horror and are perched on top beheaded statues of saints. The saints are chosen according to the sins of the murdered victims. Father Koesler is called on to help with the investigation and to provide information on the saints and various aspects of Catholicism as Detroit Police struggle to find clues and identify the serial killer.

The mystery is quite interesting in this second Father Koesler mystery. It has a little bit of everything in it......gruesome severed heads, Catholic mysticism, patron saints and even Voodoo.

I was loving this book clear up until the very end..... The ending fell flat for me. Father Koesler discovers the identity of the murderer, but doesn't disclose it to the police. He says that it is something deemed a "Professional secret'' that he can't divulge. Really?? A priest knows the identity of a killer who murdered six people in a really horrible way, displaying the heads in churches.......and he doesn't tell the police? He allows them to close the case as unsolved? No matter how terrible the victims were....there is no excuse for that. But.....a church that covered up sexual abuse of children and other horrible crimes by its own clergy....I guess I can see the reality of a priest not revealing the identity of a murderer. My rating of this book chunks down a star because of the ending. Great mystery. Crappy ending.

There are 24 books in the Father Koesler series, written from 1978-2002. William Kienzle was able to incorporate the ins and outs of Catholic life, politics and the priesthood into his stories because he actually was a priest for 20 years before leaving the church.

I will definitely continue reading this series.....but I really did find the ending of this book to be an incredible let down. Bleck.


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The Rosary Murders was one of the first real adult suspense thrillers I ever read. In fact, as a teenager, when I brought it to the check-out counter at my small hometown library, the librarian called my father to get permission to check it out to me. Still makes me laugh to this day. My dad's response to the librarian? He'd rather I read murder mysteries than bodice ripper romance novels with half naked people on the front. I found that funny because the book cover has a dead woman in a bathtub.....it doesn't show anything vital, but the naked is implied. I guess dead naked people are acceptable, while half naked women contemplating sex with rogues is less so. :)

But I digress......I remember that I thoroughly enjoyed the novel. And the movie with Donald Sutherland (even though it made significant changes). But for whatever reason, I never returned to read more of the Father Koesler series. I was a teenager....who knows what I was thinking. :) There are several series that I started when I was younger and never finished....I've decided to backtrack and read them! The Father Koesler series is one....and the Dana Fuller Ross Wagons West! series is another. Just to mention two.....there are more, but I will never get to the review for The Rosary Murders if I keep rambling.

Back on task.....

The basics: Father Bob Koesler is a priest in Detroit. A killer is targeting priests and nuns in the city. Killing them brutally....then draping a black rosary around each one's hand before leaving the scene. Koesler works with the police to try and catch the murderer. They struggle to investigate as more killings occur. The case heats up when one victim lives long enough to scrawl a clue in her own blood, and then Father Koesler has a frightening run-in with the killer inside the confessional. Koesler cannot reveal what the killer said to him in the confessional. He struggles to aid the investigation without breaking the seal of confession. It all builds to an exciting conclusion!

Although it can't be much of a surprise that a story centered around murders of Catholic priests and nuns would contain a lot of details about the Catholic church, for non-Catholics some of the details and situations in this book might be a bit confusing, or at times, even boring. There are many details about church politics, conflicts over Vatican II changes, Catholic practices and the duties of priests and nuns. I grew up Catholic so I didn't find it tedious. Others might though. I rewatched the movie starring Donald Sutherland as Father Koesler after I finished the book. The movie made a lot of changes to the story, but some were obviously made to keep the focus on the murder mystery, rather than Catholicism. As usual though some changes between the book and film versions seemed arbitrary and ridiculous. For instance one murdered nun in the book is middle-aged and a religious coordinator for a church in Dearborn, but in the movie she is young and beautiful, preparing to renounce her vows to get married. I guess they wanted to add a little extra drama? *eyeroll*

Kienzle wrote so well about the Catholic church, its inner issues, politics and drama because he was a priest from 1954-1974.He left the priesthood over doctrinal differences.

I'm so glad I re-read this novel. This time I didn't have to get parental permission. ha ha. I'm going to read more of this series (there are 24 Father Koesler books). I'm interested to see how Koesler's character develops throughout the series.





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