I appreciated how she focused on educating her readers about very relevant issues. There is never a moment where it seems as if the more serious moments are being taken too lightly. She carefully injects the humor into the story, giving the darker aspects of the plot the gravity that they deserve.

Kelly Oliver takes some incredibly difficult topics and tackles them in a mature and respectful way. Existentialism, murder, date-rape drugs supplied by members of the Russian mafia, and even the disappearance of famous works of art tie these two lives together in intriguing and unexpected ways. Dmitry Durchenkov, the university’s janitor, finds that the past he fled his homeland of Russia to escape is finally catching up with him, and at the worst possible time. Jessica James, hailing from Montana, is pursuing her PhD in philosophy at Northwestern University when her advisor, Professor Wolfgang Schumtzig is found murdered in his Philosophy Department office. Throughout the duration of the narrative, we follow the lives of two characters. I ended up getting completely swept up in the suspense and wit of this novel. Though some parts fell a bit flat or lacked believability, it turned out to be a very enjoyable read as a whole.

However, Kelly Oliver’s clever writing managed to erase all of my hesitations. Despite my love of the mystery genre, I was a bit unsure whether or not this particular combination of themes would really be my type of story. Wolf is pitched as being a crime novel that tackles some important issues using a good dose of intelligence, humor, and feminism-and it certainly lives up to these claims.

Kelly oliver wolf