Hellhound On My Trail by J.D. Rhoades

When you're good a finding people, trouble seems to follow. When you bring death, hell follows with

you.

Jack Keller was good at finding people, but tried to quit looking for bail jumpers in NC to rehabilitate himself in the desert outside of Phoenix. Found a dive bar he kinda liked and became a regular. One night he ingratiated himself to Julianne, the owner, by breaking up a particularly nasty bar fight. Some weeks later, he moved in with her in her trailer behind the bar. Life was looking pretty reasonable for Jack.

Senator Shea has recently died. Served in 'Nam, then did a career in public service all the way up to the Senate. Now his daughter, Kathryn, is looking to ride his legacy to her own place in DC. But she's worried something from her father's past might derail her ambitions. Puts her chief-of-staff, Cordell, on the task to make sure any evidence is squashed and any people with any knowledge are silenced, "by whatever means necessary." Cordell has used a former DEA sniper for some touchy work in the past and calls on Riddle again. One of the loose ends involves Keller's father.

Guy named Maddox shows up at the bar right about the same time as two of Riddle's thugs. Maddox wants to deliver a parcel to Keller from his father. The thugs think otherwise, but Keller manages to persuade them from venturing any further. One of the guys ambushed by Keller was the son of the head of a Mexican cartel.

Keller and his father, Trammel, are estranged to say the least. Jack never met him. Trammel was on leave from Ft. Bragg, impregnated Jack's mother, and was never heard from again. After his tour in 'Nam, he too went into government work doing wet work for various agencies. Trammel is dying of cancer and has sent Maddox with an enticement that might encourage Keller to meet him.

The parcel contains only a DVD. The gunner's video of a helicopter attack during Gulf War 1. Keller was a squad leader and a good one, up until his squad members were all killed in an explosion. Keller went off the rails and was eventually discharged for medical reasons. The DVD opens old wounds when he sees that his squad was killed by friendly fire.

At first Keller is reluctant to go meet his father. Dad had no time for him then, Keller has no time for him now. But Keller is curious. When he tries to board a flight back east, he is stopped and detained by TSA. About the same time, Riddle breaks into Julianne's bar looking for the parcel missed the first time. When Jack gets to go to the can, he tries to call and checkin in on Julianne, gets no response, freaks, steals a cargo van from in front of the terminal only to find his girl dead.  Needless to say, law enforcement is after Keller and Keller has a new target.

The chase is now on. He gets jailed, released, taken in by his lawyer and her wife, captured by the Cartel head, drives across country to SC, up to Bragg, and finally to the DC area where he meets his father, learns the real truth behind what Kathryn Shea is so scared of before finally coming face to face with the pilot who was pressured to pull the trigger that night in Iraq.

I think this is #5 in the Jack Keller series and everyone is better than the previous. For me, Rhoades is one of the very best at telling a complex story that is filled with sudden and exhaustive violence. Keller is who he is because of his father's rejection that changed the very nature of his being when his squad was destroyed. Yes, Keller has some serious issues, but not so serious that we aren't fully on his side no matter who is his foe is at any point in time.

Rhoades has cornered a unique dungeon in the mystery genre referred to as Redneck Noir. I've read some similar titles from lesser authors and can say without hesitation that Rhoades is the crown prince of redneck noir. No one else even comes close.

ECD

Ice Chest by J.D. Rhoades

When a book has been compared repeatedly to Ocean’s 11, the cast of characters might be warranted.

Paragon Security

‘Chunk’ McNeil: Former police detective. FSU DLine back in the day.

Zoe Piper: Half Chunk’s age, ginger-haired, punk cut, hacker, armed with what is destined to become the next great tool for personal protection.

The Enigma tour

Hermione Starr: Chaperone for the models in the tour. Low-mid 40s, but pretty hot. No one knows, but she’s a black belt and a pretty good shot with a pistol. And a penchant for playing a little fem-dom

Gareth Gane: promotions manager for Enigma and keeper of the Ice Chest.

Ricky Vandella: Irish comedian (on the C-list and falling) who is the MC for the ‘Birds of Paradise’ tour

Clarissa Cartwright: Enigma’s IT girl this year. She’ll be wearing the crown jewel of the Birds of Paradise tour making her the current face of Enigma. Was Mario’s girlfriend until she mistakenly received a photo of Mario having a happy ending to a meal while she’s out on this Enigma tour.

The Atlanta thieves

Uncle Rafe Valentine: Branson’s uncle. Dreams up the idea to steal the Ice Chest. Small time thief in Atlanta. Spent his days while incarcerated in prison libraries with his nose in Word Power books to improve his vocabulary

L.B. Gordon: Rafe’s thief partner. His mom was a bit of a literary nut and named her kids after great writers. L.B. stands for Lord Byron. He’s gone by L.B. his entire life. Can’t blame him.

Elihu and Japeth Lowman: Georgia twins who grew up in the Church of the First Fruits Unto God and To The Lamb, or COTFFUG&TTL for short. The high priest felt that he should be the only one to procreate with the female believers and castrated the men and all boys when they reached puberty. Both are built like linebackers. Being a eunuch means a kick in the crotch has no effect on them.

The New Jersey connection

Mario Allegretti: son of Silvio, NJ mob boss. Boyfriend—make that ex-boyfriend—of Clarissa if she has her way. But he did have a nice dinner that night.

Aldo “Moose” Cantone: Allegretti muscle sent to Atlanta to keep an eye on Clarissa for Mario who learns he has a thing for a fem-dom. Mistakenly sent the photo to all contacts in Mario's phone.

Paul Chirelli: a mob old-timer, as skilled with making a suggestion as he is with a firearm.

The Innocents caught up in the mess

Branson: Early 20s. and nephew of Uncle Rafe Valentine. Does bus boy and room service for the Imperial Hotel where the show will be held. Got his eye on Stephanie. Nice guy caught up in his uncle’s scheme. Tries to do the right thing and mostly fails.

Stephanie: Waitress at the Imperial Hotel. Sort of likes Branson because he is real. Solid. Lives with a  clown, literally.

The Ice Chest 

The object of everyone’s attention, the crown jewel of this year’s line of luxury lingerie. Enigma’s $5 million dollar, jewel encrusted bra.

Paragon Security (Chunk and Zoe in charge) has been hired to protect the Ice Chest (that’s what everyone on the tour calls the pricey bra). It’s a nightmare trying to balance exposure, publicity, travel and security. Too many people have access from the dozens of models, stylists, costumers, management, and hangers-on, most of whom have something dicey in their background check.

Advance publicity prompts Uncle Rafe and L.B. to work out a plan to steal the Ice Chest. They need an inside man, Rafe’s nephew Branson. Rafe and L.B. work out a plan, before grabbing the Lowman twins to help if and when muscle is needed.

On the big day, a diversion sends the show into chaos. As the models scramble for the exit, Clarissa and the Ice Chest get pulled out and stashed into a delivery van driven by the Lowman boys.

Local Atlanta detectives are less than useless. Chunk and Zoe figure they are soon to be out of a job, Hermoine, too, and figure it might help their causes if they can find Clarissa and the bra. Branson is having 2^nd, 3^rd, and 4^th thoughts about his role, Moose has lost sight of Clarissa so Mario and Paul fly in to take over, Rafe and L.B. set out to fence the stones and get rich, no one can find Clarissa or Branson forcing Mario and Paul to lean on Stephanie, but she knows nothing until they all find their way to an abandoned warehouse to settle scores and, just maybe, eliminate unnecessary witnesses, until Ricky Vandella arrives with delusions of saving everyone’s ass.

This is J.D. Rhoades first foray into comedic crime. The Shamus-nominated Rhoades is one of the early pioneers, I guess you could say, in one of my favorite genres: red-neck noir with his Jack Keller series (you really should read those. Each has been reviewed here at MRB). And Rhoades hit a hanging curve high over the far fence. This is a flat out riot. Loved it from the first chapter. Character development, imagination, dialogue, twists, you name it. A brisk 300-page book easily read in a day or two. I’ve no clue about how one would draft out the outline for comedic violence, but Rhoades surely seems to have the formula.

East Coast Don

p.s. Zoe’s soon-to-be hot item in personal protection? The Hello Kitty Taser. Where do I buy stock?

Broken Shield by J.D. Rhoades

In another time, Maddie Underhill would’ve been considered the retired schoolmarm. Right now, she and her grandson are cleaning up after a storm. A huge summer thunderstorm rolled through Gibson County, NC after ripping up Tennessee with a number of destructive tornadoes, especially around Chattanooga. While sweeping up, her grandson picks up what looks to be part of a photo and shows his grandmother. She studies it closely before running inside to call the sheriff. 

She gets Tim Buckthorn on the horn who, when he arrives agrees with Maddie’s discovery. It looks to be a girl who is bound to a chair, gagged, bruised with a disembodied hand holding the front page of a newspaper . . . 

POL. In cop-speak: proof of life. 

He quickly establishes that the newspaper was from the Atlanta Constitution, 2 days ago. Kidnappings get the FBI involved. The return call is from a Charlotte agent he dealt with in Breaking Cover Joe Wolf and his chip-on-her-shoulder partner Leila Dushane. 

First order of business: where. The storm obviously picked up debris and blew the pic to Maddie’s front yard. A number of bits of data fall into place suggesting the Chattanooga area. Tim’s brother-in-law is a local developer with his own plane. 

Turns out, the girl’s dad has gambling debts and is in deep with a group that broke away from the infamous Dixie Mafia headed by the aging Lamp Monroe, centered near Biloxi. To apply pressure, Lamp has his henchman Sean Donovan (a former IRA bomber) snatch the girl. He stashes the girl in the basement of a safe house owned by Lamp’s grandson/heir apparent. But the house was ground zero for a tornado that flattens the house sending debris across the storm’s path. 

Joe, Leila, and Tim track down the house and come on Sean and Lamps grandson trying to dig out the girl. The ensuing fight leaves Lamp with one less heir, Sean on the run, but the girl is safe. 

Lamp ain’t happy. No one messes with family, so he sends Sean out to clean up loose ends. And does so by leaving a trail of bodies as he heads to Pine Lake, NC to enact some Mississippi-style justice on Tim and his FBI partners. 

And . . . that’s, essentially, the preamble. Once Sean strikes Pine Lake, Tim decides to return the favor on Sean and Lamp. Tim’s reason for living was to protect his family and his town and he had failed to do so. The only way left is a showdown that may well end up being suicide by crook.

My library had notified me that a power rotation author’s newest (All the Old Knives by Olen Steinhauer) was in. The table by the door had a collection of NC authors, including this one, so I grabbed it. Rhoades is a lawyer in rural NC who writes in an obscure genre called Redneck Noir. I’ve read all his books, love this genre and wish he had more titles. How could you not like the “Redneck Noir” genre? He had sort of gone off the print grid for a while. His 3 most recent books had been e-books only. This print version looks to be self-published. Surprisingly, it’s not mentioned on his website, but is available on Amazon and is reviewed on Goodreads. 

I thoroughly enjoyed this and hope J.D. doesn’t stay so far under the radar. Characters, plot, pacing, dialogue, locations all work for me. Tired of the usual police procedural? Courtroom drama? International thriller? Do yourself a favor and do your best to find any of the titles by this  small town lawyer. To borrow a line from NFL All-Pro Chris Carter: “C’mon, man.” Redneck Noir. 

East Coast Don

Lawyers, Guns and Money by JD Rhoades

No matter what the population, information is power.

Small town and county politics are being played out in rural North Carolina. Andy Cole has taken over his father's law practice, playing the 'to get along, you go along' game with the local sheriff, cops, judges, DA. His conscious, aka office manager Max(ine), keeps him mostly on the straight and narrow, despite his two failed marriages (he's the definition of the old joke about men having 2 heads and only enough blood for one at a time).

Danny Fairgreen is in lockup for a particularly gruesome murder of Chloe, a local low rent party girl. Doesn't help that he was found passed out in a chair in her house with her gutted corpse at his feet. But no knife was found. Danny is kin to a particularly questionable clan in Blaine County with a history of drugs, other crimes against the local humanity, and maybe even murder. Danny's older brother Voit heads the family, including a set of intimidating twins, Liberty and Justice. Voit plops a big bag of money on Cole's desk to retain Andy for Danny's defense.

Cole's investigation starts out badly. A judge has sealed the murder scene. Cole get's p.o.'ed in arraignment court and ends in lockup for up to 30 days. He and Voit (backed up by Liberty and Justice) go back and forth trying to establish who swings the biggest dick in this relationship. And it seems the only person on his side, besides the people in his firm, is the lady who owns the local newspaper (see comment above about 2 heads and insufficient blood).

Danny can't remember anything, but is sure he didn't kill Chloe; too stoned that night. A random comment steers Andy toward Chloe's sealed juvenile records. Of course, he can't get them, but lo and behold, one day the records (not a copy, the original records) shows up at Cole's office. And the details start Andy down a path that he may wish he'd never ventured. With this ill-gotten information, now Andy has some power.

But that power, important to the case, is but one aspect of an iceberg that has been lurking in Blaine county for decades. It turns out Andy's father, whom he always thought of as a pillar of integrity, may have a chink or two, and those chinks date back to an affront to Voit's daddy. The power structure of Blaine County is about to come tumbling down like a house of cards, lopping off more heads than one can count.

I think this brings me up to date on all the titles by JD Rhoades (insert frown here), and if I'm wrong, I'm sure he will tell me as he's replied to recent reviews here at MRB. I've often wondered when an author writes a story resembles his day job or history (Rhoades in a practicing lawyer in Carthage, NC not far from Raleigh) just how much of the story is quasi-autobiographical. If any of this is, Rhoades has led an interesting life.

This rather grand tale of secrets, lies, and deception told on the local county level is not just a terrific legal procedural, it is also just one dang fine read. Rhoades expertly had me pulling for Cole to uncover the secrets, hope that Voit and clan really aren't as bad as everyone believes, believe that Cole and his newspaper owner/hottie/girlfriend really are made for each other, and that just maybe, the sun will shine a little brighter on Blaine County after the dust clears. The plot twists and the delicate dance of allegiances are unexpected and delicious. This really does have a lot to offer to readers of legal mysteries where the little guy really does squash the bad guys with extreme prejudice.

East Coast Don

p.s. to those with some rock 'n roll history, the story does not appear to be related to Warren Zevon's 1978 song of the same name.

Storm Surge by J.D. Rhoades

Life didn’t start out too well for Kyle Mercer. His parents rushed into an ER when the mom went into labor. After he was born, a gunman bursts in and kills his parents. Hello to a life of foster homes. He learns quickly to protect himself and as fate would have it, grows up to be a contract hit man for the Chicago mob.

But he has rules: no women, no children, no civilians. Only those who ‘need killing’ meet his code.  A job ends in a quandary and Kyle has to leave Chicago for warmer climate.

Good bye Kyle Mercer, hello Max Chase – a nice guy who works for the marina at Pass Island, a luxury community off the coast of North Carolina. Sharon Brennan, a local waitress, has just had her car repossessed. Daughter Glory is one sullen teenager.

The island is evacuating in advance of a category 5 hurricane headed right for the old lighthouse. Everyone is leaving the island, except five bad guys headed in against the tide of humanity. They’ve been hired to break into a US Senator’s house and steal a notebook out of a safe. And they are doing it under the cover of the hurricane. 

Sharon and Glory have to return to the island so Sharon can get her paycheck (stupid policy as it turns out). Glory had been hanging with some friends on the beach and she left her iPod in an under construction house where they’d been smoking weed.  Problem is, that’s the house the bad guys are using as a staging area, so they snatch Glory and then take Sharon who’d been looking for Glory.

Being an island employee, Max was helping get things locked down, but follows these 2 into the house (after picking up a meat cleaver, just in case), discovers they are tied up and their guard is getting ready to have his way with them. Max separates the right side of this guy’s head from his left. To say these captives have seen a raw side of Max is an understatement.

As the storm builds, Max takes out bad guys one by one while forming an uneasy alliance with Sharon and Glory to survive both the storm and the mercenaries.

[For those not smart enough or lucky enough to live in the South, there is an old joke (sort of like those 'you might be a redneck' jokes) that says in the South, 'he needed killing' is considered a reasonable defense. Interesting to see how Rhoades takes that line and develops a plot around it. Pass Island stands in for Bald Head Island that sits at the mouth of the Cape Fear River at Wilmington, NC.]

This is PJ Rhoades first eBook only product. And it kicks some serious ass. Kyle/Max is a man with a dark past that surfaces when his code is challenged so you have to admire him a bit. Sharon and Glory are in way over their heads and have to face up to what’s happening or die miserably. Rhoades lets the reader meet each of the mercs set to burgle the Senator’s home so that we get to realize why each ‘needed killing.’ My last post (Back Door Man) was a lightening fast read. So is Storm Surge. I liked Kyle/Max, Sharon, and Glory and really wanted to see how the bad guys were going to be handled. A really satisfying, and highly plausible, tale of good guy (with skills) vs. bad guys all vs. a hurricane. I’m remembering just why I like Rhoades so much. Got one more on my Kindle and that’ll be moving up my to-read list very quickly.

East Coast Don

Gallows Pole by JD Rhoades

Iron Horse is an off the books with no oversight squad taking the fight to the terrorist’s own ground and rules. They chart targets and take out the scum and the scum’s crew mostly by hanging and leaving a tiny iron horse statue. “The Horsemen” have the terrorists running scared.

An incident in Riyadh gets out of hand and the squad’s leader, Colonel Mark Bishop, declares himself a war criminal and sentences himself to a self imposed prison sentence built in rural Virginia.

In the US, a Honduran family, an Arab family, and an Iranian family are all found hanged in an apparent murder-suicide orchestrated by each father, neatly ordered by size . . . and a tiny iron horse is found at each site. 

One of the original Iron Horse squad, Heineman, has gone off the reservation. The FBI has assigned Melissa Saxon’s team to stop the killings, but the word gets to Bishop through his former squad convincing Bishop to end his exile and get back in the game.

Behind the scenes is the shadowy Mr. Campbell who was originally tasked to set up Iron Horse. Now he wants to bring Heineman and Bishop’s team back into the fold. Campbell manipulates the director of the FBI, Saxon’s team, and Bishop into a confrontation at his Shenandoah farm that where . . .  well you can probably guess the outcome.

Rhoades lives just down the road from Raleigh and made an initial splash with the redneck noir series starring the bail bond enforcer Jack Keller, but then went dark. A check on his blog showed that he had all but given up on the print business and had gone entirely electronic, now with 3 e-books available for Kindle and probably for the Nook, too. While one might say his stories are somewhat formulaic, they are no less engrossing. The acknowledged  cheapskate that I am has already purchased the other two, so be on the lookout. 

East Coast Don

Breaking Cover by J.D. Rhodes

Rhoades is a lawyer living in Carthage, NC...a outlying small town from Raleigh that is slowly becoming one of the trendy places for people who can afford the gas to drive to Raleigh or the business park here known as Research Triangle Park (so named cuz of the 3 corners of the triangle-Raleigh and NC State, Durham and Duke, Chapel Hill and UNC). I stumbled across him at a B/N reading one evening. This is his 4th novel. His first 3 followed a Wilmington NC (that's the eastern terminus of I-40 for you west coasters-better known as the hometown of Michael Jordan) bail skip tracer. The genre of book is a subspecialty of crime fiction termed redneck noir...in my book, that alone is reason for reading.

2 young Raleigh boys are kidnapped by a sex predator. a shadowy resident of the small town of Pine Lake spots the kids in a van, follows it to a decrepit trailer, blows the perp away then runs off. an intrepid reported tracks down the hero only to find out he doesn't want to be found. turns out he's an undercover FBI agent who disappeared off the grid 4 years earlier when a job went south. With the publicity, those bad guys, and i do mean bad guys, as well as the FBI, come back looking for him.

Before this group expanded, i had told WC Don about this author and as I recall from his comments, JD Rhoades wasn't going to be on his power rotation of authors. but he is for me. may be the locations, may be the red neck theme, may be the ridiculously high body count, I don't know, but I'm up to date on his books and will continue to stay that way. A- to B+ for me. 330 pages of a 5x8 book with, what seemed to me, wide margins so it went really quick.

gtg

East Coast Don