A Line Intersected

A Line Intersected by David Grant Urban:

Michael Collwood was a young professional, an architect with a great firm in San Diego. He was in love with and married to a wonderful woman. On a warm night, they were enjoying an outing in downtown’s Gaslamp District when disaster struck. They were grabbed at gunpoint and pushed into a dark building where Michael was drugged and his wife was assaulted, raped, and murdered. When Michael unexpectedly recovered from a coma three months later, he learned that he was the prime suspect in his wife’s murder. He was fired from his job and lost his home when he could not pay the mortgage. After two more years of struggling, Michael decided it was time to end his life and he hiked into a remote canyon near Borrego Springs with enough pills and booze to do the job. When a small plane crashed near Michael’s remote campsite, that’s when things changed.

A Line Intersected is a well-told story with strong subplots. Michael thought an old homeless man might have witnessed their kidnapping and could support what no one else believed. The author took us on a deep dive into the homeless population of San Diego to find “Books” who had seen them being taken at gunpoint. In the search, one learns about the size of the homeless population, where and how they live, and the variety of people who have ended up on the streets. Urban humanized a part of our society that often seem to stay invisible. The story also takes the reader into city corruption, the movement of drugs across the border, the gangs that distribute this product, intrigues with law enforcement, friendship, and romance. And, you’ll get an excellent tour of the entire San Diego area.

Great plot, great character development, skilled writing – this book has all of that.

This book was given to me by an author, Aida Afaf (The Shadow of the Profit, previously reviewed in this blog), and she said David Grant Urban is in her writers group. This is his first book, and I’m ready to nominate this one for an Edgar Award. As for the homeless in San Diego, this blog continues to look for book donations (novels, not texts and encyclopedias) that are taken to the homeless via a charity known as “The Burrito Boyz.” When I hand out books, along with breakfast burritos, to the homeless, I’ve been amazed at the knowledge of contemporary authors by the people I’ve encountered, people who are always grateful for the food and books that we provide.