Gideon

 

On Treason: A Citizen's Guide to the Law

 

Tie Die by Max Tomlinson

Late 70’s San Francisco. Two disconnected events from the late 60’s. 1. Colleen Hayes discovers that her husband has been abusing their daughter. In a fit a rage, Collen drives a shiv into his neck, and she gets 10y courtesy of the State of Colorado. Pamela, the daughter, hates mom and eventually finds her way to a commune in rural northern California. 2. Steve Cook was a Brit rock singer on the way up. The Lost Chords' first album just knocked The Stones off the top spot. The boys are up and coming rock gods. All the booze and birds they can handle. Cook wakes up one morning after a mega concert with a dead minor in his bed. He’s barely out of his teens and runs off leaving his band mates behind without a word. Ends up in Brazil. Bye Bye rock god. Meets Lynda. A wannabe music producer. Convinces him to come to SF so she can resurrect his career. They marry. Have a daughter, Melinda, now 11. Steve and Lynda are divorced. 

Colleen has been out on parole and lives in San Francisco. Being a convicted felon kind of limits one’s career options. She’s worked security and now is working as an unlicensed PI. Gets a call about a kidnapped girl. Told to meet the dad at a bar where the dad works with some band and discovers . . . son of a bitch . . . the lead singer, the dad, her client, is THE Steve Cook, whom she had a crush on when The Lost Chords were an item.

He’s renovating a row house. When she interviews him about Melanie, Lynda comes in unannounced and uninvited. Real piece of work is she. There’s a ransom demand and instructions for the delivery. Colleen will make the trade per the kidnapper’s instructions. The swap goes bad. The bag man ends up under a bus, the money gone in a handoff, and no Melanie. Almost as bad, Steve got the money from a loan shark with a short fuse.

As Colleen and Steve go back over what happened, Colleen starts to think that the kidnap was a sham. The main target is not money, but Steve’s catalogue of songs he wrote for The Lost Chords. Hollywood wants one in particular for a movie. The rights fees for that song and the catalogue could bring in millions. Colleen starts tracking Lynda and eventually finds Melanie safe down by the coast, placated with a new horse. She shows photos to Steve and, for the most part, the case is done.

Problem is, I’m only 50% through the book. Lots more to come.

Like a 2^nd kidnapping of Melanie . . . Lynda’s dad (a film and music producer) . . . a titled music promoter in London . . . his old band mates . . . more ransom demands (for real this time) . . . Cook being arrested . . . a shootout in the Mojave.

Tie Die is a welcome glimpse back to the shift from the mod to the disco culture of that era, an era I lived through. It’s the 2^nd in a planned Colleen Hayes series. Most ‘noir’ mysteries have a hard boiled (male) detective and a femme fatale. Those roles are reversed with Colleen and Cook. Tomlinson presents Colleen as a seriously flawed heroine who sees this case as a parallel to her own relationship (or lack thereof) with her own daughter. Maybe solving one will help repair the other? Guessing that’s that’ll be his next book. Tie Dye is a very good noir mystery whose pace really picks up in the 2^nd half of the book. I think I may just try to find the first (Vanishing in the Heights) so I have the full backstory prior to what I suspect will be the all out hunt for her daughter.

The book is published by Oceanview. The only publisher I’ve ever pointed out in the past is Emily Bestler Books. I’ve had very good luck with Oceanview so it’s time I gave them some props, too. 

Published June 2020.

ECD

Fatal Intent

Serpentine by Jonathan Kellerman

Detective Milo Sturgis is pressured into taking a thirty six year old cold case after the victim’s wealthy daughter pulls some strings with a L.A. politician.  Milo immediately includes psychologist Alex Delaware in their dive into the past.  The duo, Milo and Alex are best friends and enjoy a very high solve rate.  The victim, Dorothy Svoboda died with a bullet in her head and was burned to a crisp in a borrowed Cadillac along treacherously curvy Mulholland Drive.  Thirty six years and three homicide detectives later, her murder is still unsolved.  Intuition and investigative probing soon reveal that someone still alive today wants the murder to remain unsolved.  Many of Dorothy’s known associates both dead and alive led unscrupulous lives and several could easily have had motive to wish her dead.  This is a formidable challenge even for Milo and Alex.

 A thirty six year old crime in the thirty sixed Jonathan Kellerman novel featuring his two favorite protagonists… probably coincidental.  But after so many books these characters have taken on such a familiarity both with themselves and with the reader that only the tiniest bit of character development is necessary.  Makes for a fast paced linear plot…just the way I like it.

 Thanks to Netgalley for the early read.

West Coast Don: I found this one in the Libby App and downloaded the audiobook. Like Midwest Dave, I'm a fan of Jonathan Kellerman, and I enjoy the way he writes about the friendship and crime solving skills of Alex and Milo. My favorite part of this book was the short take given on Alex treating an 18-m0nth-old girl who had been in a car accident and was clearly emotionally traumatized. Otherwise, I thought this was not one of Kellerman's best novels. It was a bit too long and convoluted for my tastes. Still his character development, as always is excellent. I thought there was a lot of unnecessary filler in the writing.

 

The President's Dossier by James Scott

It’s no wonder that Max Geller is pissed off and swilling mid priced scotch in the mid afternoon in a mid level DC bar.

He was a career field agent for the CIA. Russia was his specialty. Fluent. Familiar with Russian business and politics. Transferred back to the mother ship in Langley. He had an almost live-in girlfriend Vanessa. People wanted his counsel. Life was pretty good.

Then Vanessa gets posted to Australia. But soon comes Claudia. DC lawyer sort of on loan to the CIA. She and Max hit it off. But in an exchange of emails on the Company server, Max says some derogatory things about President Walldrum. Max should know that no conversation on a CIA email server is private or protected. Max’s boss learns about the email and summarily fires Max. Goodbye CIA. Hello afternoon scotch.Yeah, Max is pissed off. And everyone around him has to endure his attitude.

Into the bar saunters Bowen. A fixer of sorts. People want things done, he finds the right talent to do the job. A client wants the file on the President. The file, dossier if you prefer, was prepared by an outgoing MI6 agent. When a new President is coming in, most countries prepare their own dossier for info on how to deal with a new administration. The Brit’s file is pretty salacious. Lots of Russia connections. Like, photos and hooker diaries of a younger version of the president way back when in a hotel while doing business in Russia. Statements from the Russian underground saying that Walldrum was told by Kremlin reps those pics will stay hidden if Walldrum permits the Russians to launder money through his hotel construction business. Bowen’s client doesn’t just want the file. He wants its contents verified at the source. And the client is willing to pay handsomely - $10 million.

Geller will have to go to London to track down the file (to which Bowen inserts Jill Rucker to work with Geller, who ain’t happy about a partner or minder or babysitter – you choose), then Russia to talk to the sources, then Panama to see how construction laundering works, to DC to set up an exchange of information for cash, to Geneva for the actual exchange. Having once had a career in Europe, Max has friends at most every stop. Along the way, he gets the help he needs and maybe a bad guy or three meet their maker. As the story develops, poor Max becomes a target of the CIA, MI6 and the Kremlin.

The question here isn’t so much whether Max find the dossier. He will. We all know that. The real question is who profits by having possession of the dossier. And that’s the slippery slope we have to navigate. And I’ll have to say, when all is revealed, I didn’t see it coming. The last 25+ pages of the book is almost as surprising as the last 2 minutes of The Usual Suspects.

Scott's other titles are historical thrillers and he has lived all over the world. Also a vet of the 101^st Airborne, was on the Army Staff, and is a graduate of the General Staff College and the National Defense University. Write about what you know? I think this guy knows it. An early 2020 release, this book was honored at the best thriller/adventure book of 2020 by AmericaBookFest.com. Fast paced, loaded with twists, double and triple crosses and other similar pastimes. Once you’ve started reading, don’t’ pick it up to read a few pages before nodding off to sleep. Not gonna happen. Those few pages will easily turn into 2+ hours of lost sleep. 

East Coast Don