Sacro e profano

Set in Salt Lake City, this is the first mystery in a new series featuring private detective Moroni Traveler Jr. As a non-LDS (Latter Day Saint), Moroni finds it both a blessing and a curse to be named for the angel that graces the top of the temple looming over Brigham Young's city. During a spring blizzard, a distressed young woman named Penny Snow retains Moroni to find her mother, whom she fears is dead. Moroni can't believe his luck when his boyhood friend Willis Tanner also solicits his services on the same day. But there's a catch: Willis is acting for the church and wants Moro ni to keep an eye on Penny, whose father John Varney is on the Mormon Council of Seventy. Moroni is soon on the trail of murderer "blood atonement" as an LDS would put it and heresy that leads to a violently satisfying conclusion.