As the third book in Christopher Fowler’s ongoing Bryant & May detective series, THE WATER ROOM is such an exceedingly well-done mystery that I’m now anxious to read all the others.

The elderly, bickering, longtime partners Arthur Bryant and John May head up London’s Peculiar Crimes Unit, which takes on only the strangest cases around. This time, the unusual matter at hand is an old woman found drowned in her inexplicably dry basement. It seems to be an isolated incident until someone else on the same street dies in an equally bizarre manner. This revelation forces the duo to step up its investigation, all the while persuing a wayward professor in the underground sewer tunnels on a seemingly different case.

Imagine if the gang at CSI were replaced by cranky, anti-social old men, yet the strikingly odd cases remained the same, and you’ve got a pretty good idea what to expect from THE WATER ROOM. The characters are a big part of what I liked so much about the book; both leads are distinctive and good-humored, and each member of their support team – bumbling in his or her own way – stands out as well and serves an actual purpose (as do the many suspects). But no matter how strong the players are, a mystery just isn’t a mystery without the mystery, and this is one I couldn’t figure out for the life of me. And no wonder; it’s so complex, it takes Bryant about a dozen pages to explain it all.

In THE WATER ROOM (and, I suppose, FULL DARK HOUSE and SEVENTY-SEVEN CLOCKS which precede it), Fowler has crafted a thoroughly winning novel, both clever and charming. He’s made me an instant fan of a unique detective twosome I didn’t expect to warm up to. At a time when it seems the mystery shelves are overpopulated with entries from the feline-and-felony school, it’s refreshing to find a whodunit that follows the old-school formula in entirely original ways.

Next up for the Peculiar Crimes Unit is this summer’s TEN SECOND STAIRCASE, a preview of which is included in this paperback edition. –Rod Lott

Buy it at Amazon.