Mysteries to Die For’s newest Toe Tag is SEE YOU NEXT TUESDAY by Ken Harris. Listen to the first chapter on my website and everywhere you get your podcasts.
This is a Private Investigator and grift story. The dynamic team of Steve Rochfish and Jawnie McGee tackle their first case as full partners. A line from later in the book gives the perfect synopsis. It’s a simple cheating husband case turned into a search and rescue, cult exfiltration and a wild ride that comes back to two old guys getting ripped off.
Rating See You Next Tuesday on a 5-point scale against the “perfect PI story”, I give this 5.00.
Strengths of the story. By now, you all know I’m hell on logic and Harris lives up to the bar. The actions of all the characters made sense for who they were. Rockfish and McGee drive the story, interfering with the bad guys plans, and the bad guys react, changing plans in a way that both creates unexpected twists and is totally reasonable given the change in their circumstances. Harris thoroughly developed his story, giving his detective material to work with. He worked them into a corner a time or two and let them fight their way out.
I liked both lead characters. Rockfish is older and has the mindset and habits that reflect those of us born in the 60s, 70s, and 80s. Jawnie is his counterbalance, rooted in modern times in terms of technology, mindset, and vernacular. While either character could have been stereotypical, neither are and what really makes them work is the mutual respect and affection they have for each other.
Where the story fell short of the ideal. The first half of the story alternates between Rockfish’s and Jawnie’s points of view. As the story progresses, we have scenes written from the POV for their new Confidential Informant Lynn and, later, the bad guys. Information the reader gains here could not come from Rockfish or Jawnie. Often, I am not a fan of changing the storytelling style mid-book, but Harris did them very well. These changes in POV were the reason the logic and the story were able to stand up as strongly as they did. There were a few stylistic elements that were not my favorite but those were certainly personal preferences. Some minor editing misses were found, but not enough to detract from the story.
Bottom line: See You Next Tuesday is for you if you like PI’s who like to mix it up with the bad guys and refuse to quit—even after the cops tell them too.
It is Spencer Fleury’s turn in Colin Conway’s Back Road Bobby and His Friends 509 crim anthology. Handbrake Hardy Fry may be driving into the sunset, but he did a lot of damage on his way out. Lawrence Clyde Fretwell, aka Larry the Bag Man, was part of the collateral damage. His father had worked with Handbrake and Larry still holds the legendary driver responsible for his father’s death. He’s going to set this right before the old man is gone…in a school bus.
I’m giving this one a solid four stars. This unpredictable story has a lot to offer. Larry isn’t exactly lovable but you feel for the guy. First, he’s driver whose ankle is pinned together so he can drive a school bus but not a getaway car. Second, the kids he drives are jerks! Larry is tenacious, both in his resolute belief that Handbrake is responsible for his father’s absence from his childhood and in his determination to not make it easy for the cops. Run, Larry! Run!
Driver Giddy Up Derrick is trying to live up to the expectations her grandfather set. The only problem is her uncles won’t let her out from behind the reception desk. When the legendary Handbrake Hardy Frye is rumored to be on his deathbed, Giddy Up decides to make the trip to pay respects. Two eighteen year old girls, 1,800 miles, and enough ramen for a week. What could possibly go wrong?
The next story in Colin Conway’s Back Road Bobby and His Friends belongs to me. I thought about skipping this one. You know, recusing myself, and then decided nahh.
This story is has a different tone than the preceding episodes. Giddy Up and her friends Angel and Marcella deal with some grown up problems. Giddy Up isn’t given the chance to live up to her potential simply because she was born female. Angel is a domestic violence victim. First by her step-father, then by her boyfriend. Marcella is an illegal immigrant kidnapped from her family and forced into the sex trade. Real and heavy stuff. Giddy Up and Angel live dangerously by deciding to make the trek to Spokane. Along the way, they save Marcella from the men holding her.
Is this story for you? If you like darker stories, then probably not. It wouldn’t surprise me if you found Giddy Up and her friends silly. If you like dark stories with the potential of a happy ending, then yes, I think you’d enjoy the antics of three girls ready to take on the world.
In Trey Barker’s contribution to Colin Conway’s Back Road Bobby and His Friends, Jesse is ready to leave the world behind and live off the grid. But to do that, he needs some cash. A carefully placed question or two connects him with Wobble Wheel Wooley, a man on a quest for a pile of money hidden by Handbrake Hardy.
This call-and-answer style story has two men whose paths become crossed. Jesse isn’t fussy about where his next pay day comes from, just that it comes. Wobble Wheel is on a Coronado quest for the mother of all payouts. Unpredictable, Wobble Wheel drives the story, dragging Jesse along for the right. A clean, straight-forward story, I give this 4 stars.
There is a lot to love in Nekesa Afia’s debut mystery Dead Dead Girls. This book is an amateur sleuth-style mystery. Our sleuth is 26-year old Louise Lovey Lloyd. A Black woman in 1920s Harlem, she works as a waitress in a café over a kinda sleezy speakeasy by day and dances her feet off in the best club in the neighborhood at night. On her way home from a late night of music and drinking, Louise and her companion Rosa Maria discover the body of a teen in the cafe’s doorway. Louise feels for the girl who reminds her of her younger self, of her younger sisters. With a spine of steel, Louise works with the New York police to go into the one place they can’t, the homes and businesses of Black New York.
Rating Dead Dead Girls on a 5-point scale against the perfect mystery, I give this 3.5 stars.
Strengths of the story. The lead character is vividly imagined and brought out on the page. You can the pride and frustration that would come with being friends with the smart and courageous woman. The setting is equally well drawn out, letting us feel the pulse of the band as Louise dances the Charleston. I simply love the language. I do not know how much research Ms. Afia did, but it was worth it. The slang is a key part of being transported to this neighborhood, at this point in time. The story is well told in the noun-verb-noun sense and is well edited, as you would expect with Berkley Prime Crime.
Where the story fell short of ideal. Ms. Afia weaves a complicated plot for her debut novel and with that intricacy comes the opportunity to make leaps in logic and leave string hanging. It is the type of story that at the end you think ‘ok, fine. That’s good.’ And then the questions start popping up. What about this and how was that managed. Beside the mystery itself, this happens with the apparent constant threat Louise is under. For readers who tend not to dissect the logic of a story, I am confident you will be delighted with this one.
Bottomline: Dead Dead Girls is for you if you like dynamic amateur sleuths and the under explored time of 1920s Harlem.
In Dave Zeltserman’s contribution to Colin Conway’s Back Road Bobby and his Friends, Jack “Gator” Wilson is living a simple life after doing time for his role in a horse track robbery. Billy Slake finds him, plying him with coffee, donuts, and an offer too good to be true.
And you know what they say about offers too good to be true.
This straightforward story is a fast, clean read. A two-character story, the play between Gator and Billy Slake rings true as anyone knows who has followed a friend into a misadventure. A solid read at three stars.
The Nikki Dolson’s Card Shark Molly’s Last Hand is the second story in Back Roads Bobby and His Friends, Colin Conway’s last edition to the 509 Crime Anthology. Molly is picking up a month’s worth of cash in one night by working as a dealer in a very private, pop-up poker game. The crowd is rough but the pot is big and Molly has plans for her share of the take. She is working the crowd as she makes the flop: a pair of eights and an ace. More money is thrown on the table. Molly flips the next card, another ace. The deadman’s hand, she realizes. And that’s went everything goes to hell.
Card Shark Molly’s Last Hand is one of those stories that slaps you in the face if you get so cocky as to assume where it is going. Nikki does a great job of dragging you through a litany of emotions – pride, fear, anger, anguish, more anger – all in twenty-one pages. It is a strong example of short story writing, made more potent by being in the hard crime genre. A 5-star review. Read this one if you are a fan of stories that keep you on the edge of your seat.
This October provided a gorgeous setting for a beautiful full moon. I was staring at the clouds instead of writing my newsletter. This month we explore the goddess of the hunt, the science behind the color of autumn, and go down the rabbit hole on fingerprints.
Image Credit: Aubrey Gemignani/NASA
Space.com curated a collection of specular photos of this month’s moon, including the featured image by Aubrey Gemignani. The Hunter’s moon takes my mind to the Greek goddess Artemis. The goddess of the hunt, moon, and chastity, Artemis was the daughter of Zeus and Leto. Zeus’s wife, Hera, not at all pleased with her husband’s infidelity (again!) went after Leto because, well, her husband was Zeus. Hera took her revenge by forbidding Leto from giving birth anywhere on solid earth. And so Leto gave birth to Artemis while she balanced on an olive branch! Hera railed at being outsmarted. Hera’s daughter, Eileithyia (no idea how you say it), was the goddess of childbirth. (Here I thought the goddess of childbirth was Epidural). Hera forbade Eileithyia from helping Leto birth her son, Apollo. Artemis, at nine days old, helped deliver her twin brother. Talk about being gifted and talented. Spectacular!
The third casefile for Cleveland homicide detective Jesus De La Cruz is set to release in February 2022. That gives you plenty of time to catch up with Cruz, Yablonski, and Aurora before starting their next adventure.
#1 A serial killer is targeting drug dealers. Cruz puts his neck on the line to create the break and stop a killer some are cheering on.
#3 An up-and-coming accountant is killed in a hit and run. Cruz searches his past, present, and future for a ice cold killer
From Down & Out Books. February 2022
Down the Rabbit Hole: Finger Prints
This month, I’ve been working on the adaptation for M2D4 Season 3Episode 7. This story The Red Thumb Mark, by R. Austin Freeman was published in 1907. A story of fiction, it was written at a dynamic time of science and discovery, documenting progress in action. This is first case for the British medical investigator Dr. John Thorndyke was working for the defense on what appears to be an open-and-shut case. A business man locks diamonds in his safe with a receipt. In the morning, the diamonds are gone and on the receipt is a red thumbprint. Which made me curious about fingerprints…and down the rabbit hole we go…
One of my favorite things about living in the Great Lakes region is that each month has a different feel. October is a most comfortable month, a beautiful month, thanks to the colorful theatrical display put on by the leaves. But, what makes the leaves change color?
Mysteries to Die For Season 3 is in full swing! This season is titled Enter the Detective. Each of the 11 episodes features the first case of a detective who went on to an illustrious career. Some you know by a single word: Holmes, Poirot, Chan. Others may be new to you but were cutting edge and set the standard for our modern day detectives.
New to podcasts? An easy way to start is through my website. Click PODCAST
New York Detective Ebenezer Gryce is called in to solve the murder of Horatio Leavenworth. Alone in the room, all doors are locked, it’s a clear case of murder.
Dropped October 22
A man is found dead in an empty room. He wasn’t shot. He wasn’t stabbed. He wasn’t strangled. This is a case for the one and only Sherlock Holmes.
Dropping November 5
In the posh home at Lenton Croft, visiting ladies are losing their jewels. When Scotland Yard is stymied, the calls goes out the expert Martin Hewitt.
Dropping November 19
Support comes in a lot of shapes and sizes. Down & Out Books and imprint All Due Respect support my books and podcast. Help me support them back. I am very proud to recommended these new releases to your reading pile, smart phone, or Kindle. It doesn’t matter how you read…just read!
Sonny Cantone’s having a really bad day. Wait until he sees the next 24 hours… From Greg F. Gifune, author of DANGEROUS BOYS and THE BLEEDING SEASON, comes VELVET ELVIS. Set in one hot and crazy night, and populated with hard drinking, pot smoking ex-cons, shady strippers, aging mobsters, crooked cops and sociopathic drug lords, VELVET ELVIS is one man’s dark and sometimes darkly comic descent into madness and mayhem.
Buy, download, and read Greg F. Gifune’s VELVET ELVIS. From publisher Down & Out Books.
ALL THE GOOD IN EVIL tells the story of Amos Swain and his attempt for redemption. The more he tries, the more enemies he creates. As an enemy maelstrom circles around him, a betrayal he’d never imagined drags him deeper into chaos until the only redemption he can find is a little good in evil.
Buy, download, and read Joe Ricker and his awesomely titled ALL THE GOOD IN EVIL. From publisher Down & Out Books.
Did you get to see that beautiful moon on the 20th? While I was not able to pull this newsletter together on time, I did get outside that evening to gaze up at a moon that glowed like an LED light. My 5 month old puppies, Kane and Skye, wrestled on the moonlight dappled grass. A sight impossible to photograph. The photo below was captured in daylight (obviously) by my husband when our bundles of fur were a bit younger.
It doesn’t take imagination to understand how the Harvest Moon got its name. Here’s a link to our favorite source, The Farmer’s Almanac, if you want the official background. Taking a page from Kane and Skye, let’s be more playful. Looking around my world, if I were to name the moon today, I would call it….
The Spider Moon. Charlotte isn’t the only on spinning her web this September. There are spider webs in my shrubs, in the grass, in our woods, and between our house and our hockey goal. This last was spectacular and I tried to take a picture for you…but it didn’t work. A heavy rain last week undid the spider’s hard work and he has yet to rebuild.
The Concert F Moon. It is marching band season here in Indiana. The marching band Jack (of Mysteries to Die For fame) is in uses Concert F for tuning the band. I hadn’t known marching band was sport until moving to Indiana. The hours these kids, director and techs, and volunteers put in is a cause for applause.
The Pigskin Moon. Nothing screams it’s fall like football. Since the mid-1970s, footballs have been made from cow hide instead of pig but it’s nice that we keep the outdated tech reference. It’s sort like saying “change the dial” on anything today.
I want to know, if you named the moon based on your life, what would it be? Email me at tina at tgwolff.com.
Episode 3 in Season 3 of Mysteries to Die For is an adaptation of the Allan Pinkerton Story “The Detective and the Expressman.” This story may be the first financial mystery. Written about a Pinkerton case in 1858, the story is the investigation into the misappropriation of $50,000 from the Adams Express Company. One of the things I enjoy about reading these original mysteries is the casual, everyday look into normal life. Sometimes, though, it is challenging to understand because our life today can be so very different. In this case, let’s talk about money.
Throughout the story, there are several references to various characters having to “change money.” Today, we certainly have to change money when we travel to other countries. You can’t use a ten dollar bill in London. You can’t use a 10 euro note in the states. You have to exchange one currency to another – or use a credit card in which a bank will do it for you in the background for a nice (not nice) fee.
But this story takes place in the United States, such as it was in the 1850s (31 states plus four territories). The story begins in Montgomery, Alabama and includes activities in New Orleans, Atlanta, Philadelphia, and New York. So why were these characters “changing money”? Click HERE to read the full article
Sights and Sounds: South Haven, Michigan. A Great Spot on a Great Lake One of the fun things about being an author is exploring new places and then bringing those places to life on a page. People who live there or visited get a little thrill recognizing the places they came to cherish. People new to the places get to explore and make a new entry to their bucket list. In the 3rd book of the Diamond series, Diamond tracks a witness to the lake town of South Haven, Michigan. South Haven is located at the mouth of the Black River and Lake Michigan. Her +/- 4,400 residents love everything water, beach, and fishing. According to the LindyLou captain, South Haven has been a vacation spot for Midwesterners since the 1800s. Click HERE to read the full story.
Mysteries to Die For Season 3 has arrived! This season is titled Enter the Detective. Each of the 11 episodes features the first case of a detective who went on to an illustrious career. Some you know by a single word: Holmes, Poirot, Chan. Others may be new to you but were cutting edge and set the standard for our modern day detectives. Episodes 1 and 2 are live! Episode 3 drops on October 8. Jack and I recorded it this morning. Oh, boy, ragweed was messing with my throat.
New to podcasts? An easy way to start is through my website. Click PODCAST
A woman of high esteem is being blackmailed. She turns to the head of the Paris police for the return of her purloined letter. He turns to the first master detective – C. Auguste Dupin.
The young, beautiful Countess de Tremoral is found murdered on the banks of the Seine River. Her home has been ransacked but the only thing missing…is her husband.
Episode 3 Pinkerton’s The Expressman and The Detective
Dropping October 8
It was daring plot. Two thefts, months apart, leave the Adams Express Company missing $50,000. The company turns to the original private eye, Allan Pinkerton, for answers.
Our podcast is supported by my publisher, Down & Out Books. I am very proud to recommended these new releases to your reading pile, smart phone, or Kindle. It doesn’t matter how you read…just read!
In the psychological suspense thriller Stalker Stalked, Lexi Mazur learns the only way to beat her stalker is to use her own stalking prowess to turn the game back around. That’s her plan, but has she finally met her match?
Buy, download, and read Stalker Stalked by Lee Matthew Goldberg. From publisher All Due Respect.
Steve Harrison, thirty-five years old, handsome, has the world in his hands. He is admired by his co-workers, his friends, his wife, and his mistress. And then he gets a call. “Bill” informs him that his wife has been kidnapped and if Steve wants her back alive, he has to do exactly what he says. If Steve deviates from Bill’s plan, tries going to the police, or tries to involve others, his wife won’t be breathing when he brings her home.
Buy, download, and read Person Unknown by Michael Penncavage. From publisher Down & Out Books.
TG Wolff 