Mike Knowles’s third novel, In Plain Sight, begins with anti-hero Wilson in a hospital bed, having been run over by a drunk driver. Wilson’s a grinder – a mob enforcer: cold, calculating, and ruthless, reminiscent (in attitude, if not occupation) of Richard Stark’s Parker.

Hamilton cop Huata Morrison suspects that Wilson’s mob ties run deep and wants to use him to bust up the local underworld. Morrison won’t admit to himself that he and his partner are dirty cops, but by manipulating Wilson he proves he is willing to bend the rules to achieve his own ends. Knowles is adept at teasing out the irony between Morrison’s belief that he’s on the side of the angels and the reality of his less than savoury actions.

For his part, Wilson is happy to play the corrupt cops and violent mobsters against one another while he settles old scores. However, when a Russian mobster with a grudge kills a nurse in Wilson’s room, Morrison is forced to reconsider his uneasy partnership with the enforcer.

Knowles’s prose is appropriately terse and utilitarian, enhancing the grinder’s menace. Wilson is a bad guy you can root for, because the other bad guys – not to mention the cops – are so much worse. The plot does nothing innovative, but it doesn’t need to. Wilson’s raw brutality draws readers in, and the book’s frenetic pace is enough to keep them hooked until the bloody climax.

Unlike In Plain Sight, Dead Politician Society doesn’t hinge on the strength of a single character. Politics, obviously, is at the heart of Robin Spano’s fast-paced, readable debut.

The mayor of Toronto has been poisoned in the middle of a speech. Someone named “Utopia Girl” claims responsibility in an obituary that outlines the mayor’s failures. Suspicion quickly falls on University of Toronto political science professor Dr. Matthew Easton and the students of a class he teaches called “Political Utopia for the Real World.” Easton, a vehement opponent of the mayor’s policies, hand picks his students: is he teaching them to kill?

Rookie cop Clare Vengel has no understanding of politics, but she leaps at the chance to go undercover in Easton’s class, even though her boss makes it clear that failure could mean the end of her career.

Spano spins an intriguing web. Her characters are sketched in quickly; for instance, the reader knows almost all she needs to about Easton in his first appearance, when he thinks, “the only thing missing from his cheap, metal bookcase was a book with his name on the cover.”

Dead Politician Society is a page-turner, even if few of Spano’s characters are particularly likeable. Despite being dubbed a “Clare Vengel Undercover Novel,” the putative lead often seems like an ancillary element in her own story. Vengel’s investigations are not vital to the revelation of the guilty parties, who show themselves by way of their own hubristic actions. Notwithstanding this minor flaw, Spano has created an enjoyable read, which bodes well for future entries.