MIKE RESNICK - DOG IN THE MANGER

Synopsis/blurb………..

Hired to investigate the disappearance of a Westminster winner, Eli Paxton stumbles into a web of intrigue.

A dog is missing. Not just any dog. The number one Weimaraner in the country and current Westminster winner.

Down-on-his-luck private eye Eli Paxton is hired to find him. Not exactly an elite assignment, but better than nothing. Maybe it will help him pay his rent.

It turns out to be anything but a routine case. People start dying in mysterious ways, a cargo plane goes missing, and someone is taking shots at him. It makes no sense. Even a top show dog isn't worth that much. 

Now the hunt is on. Paxton needs to find this dog to save his own skin. The trail leads to Arizona, then Mexico, and finally back to his hometown of Cincinnati—

Where he finds the startling solution. 

Praise…..

"I did something I rarely do these days—I read [Dog in the Manger] in a single sitting. I think you'll do the same."

—Ed Gorman
Author of the Sam McCain mystery series

"Eli Paxton is a likable addition to the ranks of fictional private eyes. Mike Resnick's fast-paced, cleverly plotted, wryly amusing adventures are sure to please both mystery readers and fans of his award-winning science fiction."

—Bill Pronzini
Grandmaster of Mystery Writers of America

Another author here who I have vaguely heard of before, but as he is better known for his numerous science fiction novels, one I have never tried. This mystery was originally published back in the mid-90’s and has been given a new lease of life by Seventh Street Books. Resnick has written two more with Eli Paxton as the main focus. The second – The Trojan Colt was released last June and the third – Cat on a Cold Tin Roof will be published in August of this year.

Unlike a few other PI novels I have read, Eli Paxton has few personal issues dogging him. He’s well adjusted, fosters decent working relationships with the police and his competition. He has an interesting back-story which establishes him as an honest, conscientious investigator; unafraid of doing the right thing and without the obligatory bottle of JD in his bottom desk drawer. In his 40’s, single, overweight and balding and without a multitude of martial arts belts and hand to hand combat skills. Jack Reacher he isn't and for all his ordinariness, he rather likeable and more importantly for me, believable.

Paxton is hired to investigate the disappearance of a show-winning Weimaraner dog; Baroness, by the show handler, who is himself being sued by the dog’s owner for its disappearance. The dog was due to have been shipped back to its owner on a small internal flight from Cincinnati to Arizona but never arrived. Paxton makes inquiries at the freight handling operation and soon discovers that the mystery itself is linked to the flight……..employees at the company are transferred, a couple die in “accidents” and when visiting the dog’s owner to make inquiries at the other end of the chain, someone takes some pot shots at him.     

Our missing dog case has morphed into someone somewhat larger and more dangerous for Paxton to unravel.

Only about 190 pages long, so this was a fairly quick read, but without the author sacrificing the development of the main characters within the book. Our settings for the mystery jump around and we enjoy a bit of Arizona and Mexico in addition to Paxton’s Cincinnati base. We have an involvement with the local police, in addition to some national agencies, as well as Mexican law enforcement and we get to learn a little bit about the world of dog breeders and dog showing and judging. Hmm….what a strange lot they are.

Lots to like and enjoy here and I’m looking forward to the second in the series sometime soon.

4 from 5

Thanks to Seventh Street Books for my copy of this.  

      

LES EDGERTON - THE BITCH

Synopsis/blurb……

Ex-con Jake Bishop is several years past his second stint in prison and has completely reformed. He’s married, expecting a child, and preparing to open his own hair salon. But then an old cellmate re-enters his life begging for a favour: to help him with a burglary. Forced by his code of ethics to perform the crime, Jake’s once idyllic life quickly plunges into an abyss. Jake soon realizes that there is only one way out of this purgatory . . . and it may rupture his soul beyond repair.

Advance Praise

“The Bitch is the kind of raw crime fiction that’s right up my alley, like sandpaper for the brain. Edgerton has got the chops. Mad chops. Gonna make us all ashamed of our puny efforts one day.”

—Anthony Neil Smith, bestselling author of Choke on Your Lies, Psychomatic, Hogdoggin’, Yellow Medicine, The Drummer, To the Devil, My Regards, and others.

It might be a bit of an understatement but author Les Edgerton has lived an interesting life. Born in Texas, his Wikipedia entry states the following:

Later Edgerton entered a period of his life he refers to as a years-long odyssey, during which he:

·         Sold and used drugs

·         Worked for an escort service for older, wealthy women in New Orleans

·         Sold life insurance

·         Worked as a headhunter for a firm specializing in recruiting executives for businesses dealing with electronic warfare

·         Was a sports reporter

·         Won 16 state championships for hairstyling, a skill he learned in prison

·         Co-hosted a cable-television show about fashion in New Orleans

·         Made a television commercial

·         Acted in a movie

·         Was homeless and eating out of a dumpster

·         Went through several marriages

·         Attended A.A. meetings

·         Began writing seriously

Back to The Bitch then.

Not as bleak as many “noir” tagged novels I’ve read and without spoiling anything for potential readers we don’t exit the book with everyone living happily ever after. It is an interesting journey though in the company of Jake Bishop, our main man – a rehabilitated ex-con. He’s happily married, holding down a steady job and he’s got big career plans which will provide for his future family. Life couldn’t be better.

Les Edgerton

Cue wheels falling off wagon, brown stuff hitting the fan etc etc.

Bishop ill-advisedly takes a call from his old cell mate at Pendleton. Despite his resolve to go straight and stay straight, Jake is then sucked back into the criminal world and at risk of a life sentence back in prison;  a three-time felon or habitual offender - in con-speak “The Bitch.”

Job, hair-dressing, wife, pregnancy, going straight, business plans, brother, cops, burglary, blackmail, diamonds, friendship, history, prison, alcoholism, recidivism, family, secrets, suspicion, snow, murder, kidnap, shovels, bad luck, poor choices, more bad luck, more bad decisions….ergo, death and everyone who survives initially lives unhappily ever after, albeit with a much reduced life expectancy.

Edgerton gives us a likeable protagonist who through a combination of ill-luck and poor decision-making gets locked in a downward spiral from which there is no escape. Enjoyable and satisfying, with well-drawn characters, a decent plot and great pace – overall an entertaining read. Even if at times I was shouting……….NO!.....at Bishop’s fall!

This was my first taste of the author, but with a few other books of his on the pile………The Death of Tarpons, Monday’s Meal, The Rapist, Just Like That……….not my last.

I will count this as my Texas entry for my USA State Reading Challenge. (4 down 47 to go!)

4 from 5

Accessed through the Net Galley website.     

     

  

2 BY SEYMOUR SHUBIN

2 more from the shelves of the library this week are by Seymour Shubin - a household name surely?

Never heard of him?  There’s a bit of an author biography on the Hard Case Crime site which reads as follows……… In 1953, Seymour Shubin published his first novel, Anyone’s My Name. It quickly became a New York Times bestseller and went on to be recognized as a classic of the field, published in numerous international editions and taught in college courses on both literature and criminology. Subsequently, Shubin wrote more than a dozen other novels, including one, The Captain, that was a finalist for the Edgar Allan Poe Award and selected for the mystery reference work 100 Great Detectives.

Born in 1921 his most recent work The Hunch was published in 2009 when he was in his late 80’s! He's still with us, so what chance another new novel?

Most of his books seem to have a tag of psychological crime, which if I’m totally honest isn't always a strand that appeals to me……..maybe I have just read poor examples of it! 

THE GOOD AND THE DEAD

The good and the dead -- what does it mean? Don't even try to guess.

Ben Newman, a writer of true-detective stories, has written about scores of murders and thinks he has seen it "all" -- until he's confronted with the murders of adults from his old neighbourhood whom he hasn't seen since childhood. It begins with the body of his brother's wife found floating in the family swimming pool. Suspicion immediately centres, with good reason, on Ben's brother, a physician. But then Ben -- who has always looked on murder as something that happened to "other people," finds himself confronted with a series of strange deaths: among them a pharmacist he'd known since kindergarten, and a woman whom he'd kissed in the moonlight on a long-ago school trip.

In this, his eleventh novel, Edgar-finalist Seymour Shubin takes us on a bizarre journey through several murders that eventually come to reflect on our own humanity. This is a novel, a rarity in psych/suspense mystery fiction that combines truly unforgettable characters with pure action.

WITNESS TO MYSELF

A NEW NOIR MASTERPIECE BY THE AUTHOR OF THE CLASSIC 1953 BESTSELLER ANYONE'S MY NAME

Fifteen years ago, teenager Alan Benning jogged off a beach - and into a nightmare. Because what awaited him in the Cape Cod woods was an unspeakable temptation, a moment of panic, and a brutal memory that would haunt him for the rest of his life.

Now a successful lawyer, Alan finds himself drawn back to the scene of the crime, desperate to learn the truth about what happened on that long-ago summer day. But even as he grapples with his own dark secrets, he finds himself hounded by a shadowy adversary - and by the forces of justice, drawing their net around him tighter by the day.

HARRY HUNSICKER - THE CONTRACTORS

Synopsis/blurb……

Private military contractors. They're not just for foreign wars anymore. Jon Cantrell, a disgraced ex-cop, works for one such company. He's a DEA agent paid on a commission basis, patrolling one of the busiest drug-hubs in the country: Dallas, Texas. 

When Cantrell and his partner and sometimes lover confiscate the wrong shipment of drugs, they find themselves in possession of a star witness in an upcoming cartel trial that could destroy the largest criminal organization in the hemisphere. 

To turn a profit, all they have to do is safely deliver the witness to the US Attorney on the other side of the state. An easy trip, except the witness doesn’t want to go and a group of competing DEA contractors and a corrupt Dallas police officer want everybody involved dead. 

This heart-stopping thriller takes readers deep into a strange underworld where the lines between government officials and mercenaries blur. In this complex network of drug traffickers, cartels, politicians, and police, no one's hands are clean.

Another new author and another Net Galley book which on the face of it……..drugs, corruption, dirty cops, Mexican cartels and hit squads…..ought to have been up my street. Whilst it was enjoyable up to a point I wasn't engaged in the outcome and felt somewhat indifferent as to how things played out.

The author provides a decent back story for our main character and puts flesh on his bones ….. a troubled job history, family difficulties with an unstable half-sister looking after his father who is suffering from dementia, on/off romance with an equally troubled partner, Piper……but I just didn't feel any connection or empathy towards Cantrell and less for Piper, the other main figure on the side of the good guys.

Cantrell and Piper take down a drug shipment. Cantrell and Piper find themselves in possession of a witness in an up and coming trial against a top figure in one the Mexican drug cartels. Cantrell and Piper endeavour to deliver her to a US attorney somewhere else in Texas and in return secure themselves a big pay-day. A road-trip ensues, with numerous encounters and a fair bit of blood-letting as a variety of miscreants on both sides of the law try to stop the pair and silence the witness permanently.  

Gun fights, death, betrayal, secrets, corruption, drug-addiction, tech-wizardry, family, Texas, Mexican hit squads, indifference, constant mind-wandering, page-counting, loss of reading momentum, ennui, swimming through treacle…… the end, joy, relief, a burden lifted.

I’m possibly being a little bit unfair to the author as the plot was ok, the characters were more than caricatures and the setting was well-described……..I just wasn't swept along – when I read a 500 page book, I want it to be epic and in my opinion this fell some way short. Maybe 200 pages less and it would have been more.

Better than a 2 – as I didn't contemplate stabbing myself in the eyeballs with a pen at any point, but only marginally. In the spirit of generosity a 3 then.

3 from 5

Hunsicker has previously written 3 other books in a series with a protagonist named Lee Henry Oswald set in Dallas! The first of these – Still River was nominated for a Shamus Award back in 2005. Whilst this one wasn't to my taste, I think I would be prepared to give this first book a read.  

My copy was accessed via Net Galley website. The Contractors was published in February, 2014. 

2 BY BRIAN FREEMANTLE

Two more books from the ranks of the library. Late 70's espionage books, focusing on the Cold War and both in the region of 200-odd pages long. Perfect!

Brian Freemantle is the author of the highly regarded Charlie Muffin series. Muffin is a British secret service agent who's position in his service is quite insecure. His modest background sets him apart from his colleagues and superiors who are scornful of his abilities and background.

Randall from Spy Guys and Gals sums him up quite well.
"If Lt. Columbo had been a spy, he would have been Charlie Muffin. Or vice versa. Charlie is a public school product of the middle class who just happens to be better at the spy game than all the privately schooled superiors he is forced to work under. Two elements stand out about the character of this amazing agent. The first is that he is very good at what he does and the second is that he doesn't look or act like he is."

On and off over the years Freemantle has written a total of 16 Muffin books in the series. The first 5 came out late 70's to early 80's at a rate of 1 a year. There's a gap of around 4 years then 4 more books in the series taking us up to the late 80's. Another 4 during the 90's and early 2000's, before the last 3 published in 2010,2011 and 2013. Hopefully the author decides to take another 10 year break from writing about Muffin, as it may give me a chance to get caught up.(I have the whole series with the exception of the last!)

None read so far, but I have dipped into the first 30-odd pages of the first and I do like it. Irrational to buy 15 books in a series when you've never read any - but that's what I'm like. Just don't ask me how many of the 87th Precinct books I have bought by Ed McBain without sampling one yet!  



Charlie Muffin

A cagey British spy fights enemies from without and within

Charlie Muffin is an anachronism. He came into the intelligence service in the early 1950s, when the government, desperate for foot soldiers in the impending Cold War, dipped into the middle class for the first time. Despite a lack of upper-class bearing, Charlie survived twenty-five years on the espionage battle's front line: Berlin. But times have changed: The boys from Oxford and Cambridge are running the shop again, and they want to get rid of the middle-class spy who's a thorn in their side. They have decided that it's time for Charlie to be sacrificed.

But Charlie Muffin didn't survive two decades in Berlin by being a pushover. He intends to go on protecting the realm, and won't let anyone from his own organization get in his way.


Here Comes Charlie


Disavowed spy Charlie Muffin wages war against his former employers

Charlie Muffin has come back to England. The ex-spy, a veteran of twenty-five years' service to the Crown, was last seen in Berlin, where an attempt on his life by his own organization led to international embarrassment. They had expected Charlie - a disheveled, middle-aged survivor of every double cross in the book - to die easily. Instead, he disappeared.

But after months on the run, dulling his instincts with alcohol and laziness, the strain of life in the shadows finally gets to Charlie. By now the heat back home must have died down, and he shouldn't have any trouble sneaking across the Channel. Now, he expects, he can finally be safe in England.

Charlie Muffin is dead wrong.

FEBRUARY ADDITIONS TO THE LIBRARY.............SOME OF AT LEAST

Time for some honesty, there's probably more chance of hell freezing over than me ever stopping my acquisition of new books. I'll shut up about it then, as perhaps less talk and more inaction would be a better recipe.

Some of the February haul............

Nice cover!

LA author!

Modern classic apparently!

Heads-up from Glen on this one! (Tracy's hub)

Valentine's Day freebie!

Chicago writer and taxi driver!

40's banned book!

Reprint e-book from publisher!

One of the best mysteries of the 90's!

Nice cover art!

Read 2 of hers last year and liked them!

FEBRUARY FILMS AND TV

A quieter month in the Keane household film-wise. I can claim four films only but am fairly positive there were a couple more, but if I don't write them down, they disappear from the memory banks almost immediately. I'm hopeless at remembering recent things, stuff from long ago seems ingrained though...........should I be worried?

TYRANNOSAUR was uncomfortable but compelling viewing. Made I think in 2011, it features the always excellent Olivia Coleman (Broadchurch) as a victim of domestic abuse. Peter Mullan is superb also as Joseph. Set in Scotland there are some harrowing scenes involving violence against women and animals. Difficult to watch in places, but I never felt that the film gloried in violence but instead tried to deal with important issues in a kind of in-your-face fashion rather than skirt around them. Not a typical happy ending, but I felt the film left a message of hope for the main characters future.

Olivia Coleman and Peter Mullan

BATMAN: THE DARK KNIGHT RISES. I put the books down long enough to watch this with the family on a Saturday night. Enjoyable but over-long in my opinion. Not as good as the earlier one in the series featuring Heath Ledger. I don't think Christian Bale would rank on my list of favourite actors and whilst I do like Anne Hathaway I struggle to buy into her as vamped up glamour puss Cat Woman. There is something a little bit unconvincing about her as a sex symbol. She has more appeal when portrayed as the girl-next-door type. Michael Caine is enjoyable to watch. I don't think he ages as he seems to have had the same look and demeanour for the past 30 years and he must be about 178 years old by now.

Speaking of Anne Hathaway, next film up was THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA. Second viewing for me, which must have coincided with a slow book. Glenn Close is great, but I wouldn't claim the film as my favourite genre.

Lastly I went to my local library the other night with my wife to see THE RAILWAY MAN. No word of a lie, this is the second time my wife has been plonked in a seat next to someone with less than perfect personal hygiene. Try watching a film for two hours whilst holding your breath, not easy I can tell you, particularly when your husband spends half an hour giggling, before a whiff of unwashed flesh drifted across and nearly melted my eyeballs. At which point I decided to concentrate on the film. I read the book back in 2010 and was moved by the story of Eric Lomax and his war-time experiences as a prisoner of the Japanese in Burma. Colin Firth is great as the older Lomax and I do like a bit of Nicole Kidman now and again. (Just not too much of her please). An enjoyable, uncomfortable film. On balance I think I got more from the book.

TV, nothing much new. We continued with BROOKLYN NINE-NINE and I caught some of the Winter Olympics in Russia. How big a heart must you have to do ski-jumping? Absolutely petrifies me when the camera pans down the runway....give them all a medal I reckon. A bit of Six Nations Rugby - shame Ireland didn't hang on and beat England, but that's the nature of sport - your team doesn't always win. Lastly a few too many episodes of Aussie soap Neighbours. Well the kid's watch it and what am I supposed to do whilst its on? Will Georgia have Kyle back? Compelling stuff.......stay tuned.