The Poet, from Connelly's harrowing mystery of the same name, has returned. Yes, the same serial killer who preyed upon homicide cops. The one who would leave behind poetry at the scenes of his gruesome crimes. In the previous book The Poet, FBI agent Rachel Walling shot him, but the authorities were never able to recover his body. She has long had a feeling that this particular loose end would resurface in her life.

But she's no longer the same person. Disgraced and exiled to the South Dakota branch office, she is no longer a rising star with the FBI. When her superiors reluctantly summon her, she realizes that they had no choice. The Poet actually sent them a package at FBI Headquarters in Quantico, Virginia. The package was addressed to Rachel. It contained a global positioning system (GPS) reader with only one point in its record: an isolated spot in the Mojave Desert at the California-Nevada border. Obviously the Poet is back and playing games with Rachel.

Rachel travels by plane to Nevada. Meanwhile the Poet himself, who has reconfigured his face with surgery, follows her, gloating at his perceived omniscience.

When she arrives at the remote crime scene, she sees that the FBI has set up an elaborate camp complete with a small population of experts to unearth the bodies of several male victims. The agent in charge of the case is an obnoxious man who takes an instant dislike to Rachel. Assisting him is a woman agent whom Rachel once mentored, and who now regards Rachel with suspicion. Worst of all, Rachel has been relegated to the lowly status of "observer" only.

At least she's fully aware of the facts of the case. Almost everyone else is being kept in the dark by the top agent who doesn't want the true identity of the serial killer known. (You'll need to read The Poet to understand why.) This infuriates Rachel.

But Rachel's third-person narrative is not the main story in The Narrows. That belongs to Harry Bosch, the Los Angeles homicide detective in Connelly's long-running series. He's more likable than Rachel (and way more likable than McEvoy from The Poet who doesn't reappear in this book), and he holds center-stage with his no-nonsense first-person viewpoint. Back in The Poet, Bosch also became involved in the case, and now he gets reeled in again through complicated circumstances.

Bosch's former partner in homicide, Terry McCaleb retired some years back to run a boat charter business. Now his widow Graciela shows up and asks Bosch to look into McCaleb's death. Apparently McCaleb, who had a heart-problem, perished at sea because someone tampered with his medication. Even though Bosch is also retired from the LAPD, Graciela hopes he will look into her husband's suspicious death for old time's sake.

This sends Bosch hunting for clues that draw him to Las Vegas NV (where his troubled ex-wife is raising their daughter whom he adores). Eventually he runs across the FBI's case and realizes immediately that the Poet is back. He and Rachel Walling both resent the way the FBI is handling the case while shutting them out, so they start their own renegade investigation.

The Narrows is not as exceptional as The Poet, but it's a good sequel. You can find The Narrows on Amazon through this link: The Narrows (Harry Bosch)