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Love and money are the easy motives in the death of a California beachfront nightclub owner, but death claims investigator Dave Brandstetter is certain of one thing: the case is going to be far from easy and the police have it all wrong. Rick Wendell wouldn't hurt a flea. The big, jovial owner of the Hang Ten, a surfing-themed gay bay on the boardwalk, was loved by regulars and new arrivals alike. But Rick was found naked and dead, with a local hustler named Larry Johns standing over him, smoking gun in hand. Wendell's death is ruled as a homicide and Johns is arrested. Everyone thinks it's a simple open-and-shut case. Everyone except the death claims investigator, Dave Brandstetter. Brandstetter, a homosexual himself, doesn't make the same assumptions about the crime scene and easy story it tells. Larry Johns had enough time to escape had he wanted to. Not to mention Johns lacked any discernable motive, especially since the $200 in Wendell's wallet was left untouched. In an investigation that takes him from sun-scorched hillside ranches to seedy boardwalk bars, Brandstetter gets to the bottom of a twisty mystery in this hardboiled and entertaining portrait of the '70s gay culture by groundbreaking poet and award-winning crime writer Joseph Hansen.… (more)
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The Book Description: Who killed gay bar owner and all-around nice guy Rick Wendell? Was it Larry Johns, the attractive young man found wiping his prints off the still-smoking gun mere moments after the murder? If so, why was Johns naked? And what happened to the large sum of
My Review: It's always risky to read or perhaps especially re-read an entire series back-to-back. Fortunately for me, the noir tropes overlaid (!) with gay tropes whisked me past any potential eyerolling and gusty sighing over the flaws present in any book.
I've heard tell that some folks don't find Hansen's descriptive passages all that much fun. I don't understand this opinion. I can see, hear, feel along with Dave...and Hansen's words cause that. Since I experience Brandstetterworld so viscerally, I am verschmeckeled by reports others can't.
This story is a real downer for family-oriented types. Dave neglects his man Doug, the families of exactly no one in the story are anything other than vile, venal, and grasping...sounds like the real world to me. At least it accords with my own experience of family life. The mystery of who kills the victim is more easily solved than the mystery of why any of these people aren't dead at each others' hand. And frankly, good riddance!
Dave, of course, solves the crime and Justice prevails. The idea that someone would kill for $25,000 doubtless made more sense forty years ago. Now that's not enough to buy a decent new car.
What a wonderful treat it was to immerse myself in this series again. Now it needs to be made into a TV series. Who knows someone who could make that happen? Anyone?