Stephen Solomita

This is one that has been on my shelf forever. I've never read anything of his before and now I have no idea why. This one is excellent! PI Stanley Moodrow still hasn't quite reconciled his life as a private investigator - in his mind, he's still a New York City cop. So, when an obnoxious woman hires him to find out what happened to her daughter who is now in an irreversible coma, he dogs it as if he was still on the force. It doesn't take him long to find the cult that the daughter had joined and to focus on its very creepy leader. It turns out to be far more difficult, however, to figure out the cult leader's deal and how to nail him. The plot is excellent and the characters are very credible. I'm off now to find his earlier works.… (mere)

A hit man is hired to kill a mob figure and when he does, the man was on a date with Angel Tamanaka, a prostitute working at an escort service.

The story deals with the hit man's life and how the two worlds come together between the hit man and the prostitute.

Someone wants revenge for the recent hit and the hit man thinks the lovely prostitute will be in danger so tries to save her.

The characterization is insubstantial and the plot seems overdone.

I've read other work by Solomita and enjoyed them but this book misses the mark.… (mere)

This is as much a family drama as a murder mystery and thriller. The main focus of the story is New York detective Boots Littlewood. He's a people person, skilled in using his resources to find suspects and people he needs to interview. He also has a good relationship with his father who is planning to remarry, and with his son, a college student, skilled in computer knowledge.

The author is a former cab driver in New York and his descriptions of New York and surrounding suburbs is right on.

There have been a number of murders of NYC police officers. One was on the job investigating the Lipstick Murderer. Another was a captain who thought he was invincible.

Boots investigates these murders and when one of his snitches is arrested for one of the murders, he knows there is a coverup and so will have to prove his man wasn't guilty.

He's assigned a partner, Jill Kelly, who is the daughter of one of the slain cops and the niece of the chief of detectives.

An interesting side is Boots is a small time gambler, mostly in Yankee baseball games. It's fun to see his reactions to the Yankee games on TV or the radio.

I read this over two days and enjoyed every minute.… (mere)