Monkey in the middle : an Amos Walker novel /

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

From the master of the hard-boiled detective novel and recipient of the Private Eye Writers of America Lifetime Achievement Award comes Loren D. Estleman's next enthralling Amos Walker mystery, Monkey in the Middle

"Loren D. Estleman is my hero." --Harlan Coben

The monkey in the middle is the one who "hears no evil."

Private eye Amos Walker doesn't have that luxury. Hearing the truth, on the other hand, is a lot less common, even from people who need his help.

It's summer in Detroit and Walker's just received word that his ex-wife has passed away. He can use a distraction, which arrives in the form of a young, would-be investigative journalist who has gotten in way over his head. He needs Walker's protection, but is suspiciously vague about why and from whom. And he's not the only one playing their cards way too close to their chest, including:

- A bestselling author who claims to be retired, but who knows a good story when he hears one.
- A fugitive whistleblower who skipped out on a $100,000 bond.
- A headline-hungry defense attorney who spends as much time before the TV cameras as in court.
- A career assassin with whom Walker has a long, ugly history.

Not to mention any number of covert government agencies pursuing their own agendas, possibly in opposition to each other.

Walker just wants answers, but what he finds is a dead body--and enough trouble to put him on ice for good, unless he can discover what everyone's not telling him.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Publishers Weekly Review

Razor-edged prose that Raymond Chandler would appreciate lifts Estleman's excellent 30th outing for Detroit PI Amos Walker (after Cutthroat Dogs). Walker has just learned of the death of his ex-wife, Catherine, when he takes on a new client, Shane Sothern. Sothern, who has built a reputation as a top-notch research assistant, is seeking to become an investigative reporter, but he fears he's being surveilled by someone looking to find a valuable source. Walker confirms that when he tails his client himself, spotting other watchers who look like feds. In the process, he discovers that Sothern's source is a fugitive whistleblower charged with leaking government secrets. The case turns into a murder inquiry, and Walker's life is further complicated when he learns that Catherine had also been under surveillance. The portrayal of the Motor City (the PI refers to a bleak urban landscape as "the pipe dream of a dull-witted former governor who knew nothing of meth labs and crack houses, now waiting their turn at demolition") is as vivid as James Ellroy's L.A. Estleman makes sustaining a long-running series' high quality look easy. (June)

Booklist Review

Trends in crime fiction wax and wane, but Estleman's Amos Walker, a hard-boiled PI straight off Chandler's mean streets, keeps shuffling along well into the twenty-first century, burning shoe leather, lighting cigarettes, and sipping rye as if it were 1947. In his thirtieth adventure, the Detroit gumshoe is grieving the death of his ex-wife while trying to protect two people: his client, a naive investigative journalist and former researcher for a celebrated crime novelist (clearly based on Elmore Leonard), and a whistleblower, Abelia Hunt, who has raised the ire of the NSA. It's a complex story, full of switchbacks, but the real joy here is watching Walker employ old-school detecting techniques in a decidedly new world of cell phones and high-tech tracking devices. Estleman can sling similes with Chandlerian brio (driving through a rainstorm, Walker notes that "the wipers whooshed and thumped like idiots, signifying nothing"), and his flair for describing a bedraggled cityscape is as razor-sharp as ever ("Roofs sagged, chimneys leaned; every porch was seceding from the rest of the house."). Those who can't get enough of fast-talking PIs are in for a treat.

Author notes provided by Syndetics

Loren D. Estleman was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan on September 15, 1952. He received a B.A. in English literature and journalism from Eastern Michigan University in 1974. He spent several years as a reporter on the police beat before leaving to write full time in 1980. He wrote book reviews for such newspapers as The New York Times and The Washington Post and contributed articles to such periodicals as TV Guide.

He is a writer of mysteries and westerns. His first novel was published in 1976 and since then he has published more than 70 books including the Amos Walker series, Writing the Popular Novel, Roy and Lillie: A Love Story, The Confessions of Al Capone, and a The Branch and the Scaffold. He received four Shamus Awards from the Private Eye Writers of America, five Golden Spur Awards from the Western Writers of America, the Owen Wister Award for lifetime achievement from Western Writers of America, and the Michigan Author's Award in 1997.

(Bowker Author Biography)