Tag: Madison Kelly

I read 114 books I put in the category of “Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller” last year (and there are a couple of multi-genre novels that could beef that number up a bit), so I have to consider it apart from everything else when I put together my Favorites Lists, or just about everything else would get ignored. Even if I went with a Top 15-20 instead of a Favorite 10, maybe 2-3 books from the previous lists would’ve made it along with all of these.

I had a hard time writing up this post—not because I had a hard time picking the list this year (thankfully). Partially because I’m tired of doing these little snippets at this point in the week, but mostly because I want to write a thousand words or so on each one (and probably spend time re-reading huge chunks of each of these books in order to do that properly), so keeping myself to a paragraph or so is really difficult. I ended up borrowing liberally from things I’ve written here and elsewhere just to make sure this list was able to be posted before Feb. 26th.

Once again, I’ll note that I limit my lists to things I read for the first time. I’d be willing to guarantee anyone reading this page will enjoy at least 6 of these (which six will vary from reader to reader, however). I’m tempted to say that all the listed books are guaranteed for everyone, but people’s tastes are too varied, so I’ll hedge my bet. Try these, and you’ll be glad you did.

(in alphabetical order by author)

Robert B. Parker’s Bye Bye Baby

by Ace Atkins

My original post
It’s really no surprise that Atkins’ final Spenser novel makes this list—Spenser is one of my all-time favorites, and the decade that Atkins spent at the helm included several of the best novels in this long-running series (this is the 50th novel!!). He also helped legions of fans deal with Parker’s death by doing such a capable job. This book evokes some of Parker’s best early novels while remaining wholly original and compelling—true to both authors. It’s a great way for Atkins to go out.

Double Take

by Elizabeth Breck

My original post
In my original post, I said that it felt like Breck wrote this novel for me—I’m not that delusional, but it resonated with me in so many ways that she might as well have. Madison Kelly was one of my favorite discoveries of 2021 and her sophomore adventure solidified my impression of her. Madison’s tough, smart, lucky (and knows how important that is), and committed. Brisk and assured writing. A nice bit of sleuthing to find a pretty clever crime (committed by some people who really shouldn’t ever get into criminal activity—and some who seem born to it). Featuring the kind of ending where you find yourself leaning forward as you read, because somehow that helps you get to what happens next faster; you don’t hear the music/people/animals around you; and your eyes move just too slowly.

Racing the Light

by Robert Crais

My original post
We leave one of my newest PI obsessions to go back to one of my oldest—Elvis Cole. This is the best use of this character in years, and I loved every second of it. Like the best Cole novels, it starts as a missing persons case before turning into something far more complicated and deadly. But Cole is able to keep his focus on the victim (while finding justice for the wrongs he encounters). Joe Pike doesn’t get as much “screen time” as he has been lately, which makes every second that he’s around so much more effective—he owns one of the best moments of the book (and barely does anything in it). Racing the Light will no doubt be considered one of the pivotal moments in the series and I can’t wait to see what comes after this point.

The Botanist

by M.W. Craven

My original post
The last note I made on this novel was, “the last 30 pages made me happier than almost anything else this year.” And thinking back on those pages right now still makes me almost giddy. While Poe and Tilly are vital to the novel—ultimately, this novel is about the secondary characters—victims, suspects, and the killers. The primary case is brilliant on every front—the method of murder, the way that the method is finally discerned by the good guys, and then the way the case is closed? It’s all a thing of beauty (in the dark, warped way that Crime Fiction is to fans of the genre). I’m on the verge of babbling now, so I’m going to leave this and move on to the next novel on the list.

Don’t Know Tough

by Eli Cranor

My original post
I was blown away by this novel. I read it in May and I’m not convinced I’ve wholly recovered. It’s a story about faith, family, and (American) football. I can’t tell you which is more important to any character in this novel at any point (but I’d lean toward the latter for just about all of them). The prose is gorgeous and visceral, the story is intense and heart-breaking–it’s about a high school coach and a star player trying to keep their heads above water in the middle of a murder they’re both connected to. I can easily sound like I’m over-hyping this, so I’m not going to go on the way I want to. I’ll simply say that Cranor’s work is just gut-wrenching, beautiful, and powerful. And not to be missed.

Movieland

by Lee Goldberg

My original post
This series started off strong and keeps getting stronger. The overall arc of the series is a rookie detective (who got promoted earlier than she should have) learning how to be a good, maybe great, detective. Eve Ronin makes mistakes, she learns from many of them, but her instincts are on point and she eventually gets her criminals. If she can learn to do it without burning every bridge in sight and unintentionally antagonizing everyone she works with, she’ll get there faster. This is likely the last case her partner will work and he gives it everything he’s got—while imparting every bit of hard-earned wisdom to her as he can—and boy howdy, does he shine here. This is likely the best thing by Goldberg that I’ve read—and I’ve been a fan for a long time.

Reconstruction

by Mick Herron

My original post
Dead Lions by Herron would’ve been on this list, but I don’t let myself use one author more than once, so the spot goes to Reconstruction. Possibly because I spent far more time with this than I do with most books on a first read. Herron got everything right with this book. None of the primary characters are who you think they are at the beginning—most are far worse people than you think (including the ones you have a bad impression of—they’re even worse than you imagine). Which doesn’t stop them all from being some of the best designed and executed characters you’ll run into. The plot is like an onion (or a parfait, to appease Donkey)—you keep peeling back layer after layer after layer until the very end—and each layer is practically perfect and delicious (making it more like a parfait, now that I use that word). The narration is sneakily hilarious and dark. One of my earliest reads of the year and it set the bar high for the next 11 months.

The Self-Made Widow

by Fabian Nicieza

My original post
The premise of this sequel is fantastic—what’s a detective to do when they know who the killer is, but they’re not sure how or why the murder was committed. In fact, in the beginning, Andi’s the only one sure the victim was murdered at all. Kenny takes some time out from the documentary he’s making about the events of the previous novel to help Andi out (and hopefully to get another book, documentary, whatever out of it all). Andi’s up against someone as smart as her this time, and it’s going to take more than just Kenny’s help to crack the case. Told in Nicieza’s fantastic style this is a sure-fire winner.

The Bullet That Missed

by Richard Osman

My original post
This third book in The Thursday Murder Club series is about two things—the new case the Club decides to look into (mostly so Joyce can meet some local TV personalities) and fallout from the last book–on multiple fronts. As much as I enjoy this series for the lightness and joy it brings—the looming danger that arises as a side effect of their recent success was great. By all means, let’s let things get serious. Elizabeth’s husband, Stephen, steals this novel, however. He shines brighter than ever—and is in worse shape than ever before. This series is ultimately about grief and living in its shadow—that shadow seems larger than ever, and it’s just going to get bigger.

Family Business

by S. J. Rozan

My original post
This was the first novel I read in 2022, and it stuck with me throughout the year. I was shocked—and very pleased—by the actions of a long-term character. The narration was as good as Rozan has ever given us. Once again, Rozan takes us into the depths of Chinatown’s Organized Crime and does so in a way that no one expects. Lydia’s at her cleverest when it comes to solving the crime here—even if she might not be that wise when she reveals it. The relationship between Lydia and Bill has taken on new depths, and remains one of the best relationships in detective fiction. Family Business just made me happy from beginning to end.

I want to mention really briefly the books that almost made the list—tied for 11th, I guess you’d say. (fatigue and trying to keep this list from getting too long prevents me from just making my Favorites list long enough to contain them—preventing Reader Fatigue is more important than my own).
Hell of a Mess by Nick Kolakowski
Roses for the Dead by Chris McDonald (the other two parts of this trilogy could easily be substituted for this one)
Blood Sugar by Sascha Rothchild
Jacked, edited by Vern Smith
Killer Story by Matt Witten
(links will take you to my original posts about them)

Double Take by Elizabeth Breck: It’s As If This PI Novel Was Customized For Me…

By HCNewton

On March 24, 2022

In Uncategorized

Double Take

by Elizabeth Breck

DETAILS:
Series: Madison Kelly, #2
Publisher: Crooked Lane Books
Publication Date: October 11, 2021
Format: Hardcover
Length: 321 pg.
Read Date: March 21-22, 2022

Five days was an eternity with a missing person; forty-eight or even seventy-two hours was the cut-off for a good chance of finding the person alive. But five days was still something to work with. Madison could help bring another person safely home. Finding someone who was kidnapped or lost or just needed help to get home was so fulfilling, it was like having a life’s purpose she’d never known she’d been without.

What’s Double Take About?

Madison is approached by Travis, the desperate boyfriend of Barrett Brown, a reporter for an almost impossibly-small newspaper who’s been missing for five days. He’s afraid she’s been abducted, he’s afraid she’s being tortured or worse, and is about to die.

Madison is dealing with some medical issues and just finished a case that took her out of state, but how can she possibly leave this to the police (who don’t seem to believe that Barrett didn’t just ghost Travis)? So she jumps into action—retracing Barrett’s steps, figuring out what story she was working on—assuming that’s the reason she’s missing.

This leads Madison down a twisty path into a criminal conspiracy that she can only see the barest outlines of—and might end up leading her into grave danger.

While she’s searching, Madison has to deal with someone having her followed, the aforementioned medical issues, and a truly inconvenient spark of attraction between her and Travis. Who might not be the great boyfriend he gives the initial impression of being.

My Alma Mater

Chapter One takes place on the campus of the University of Idaho—so you know Breck gets extra points from me for that. Would’ve been an easy 5-Star read if the whole book had taken place there—or at least most of it.

But no, Madison has to go home to San Diego—sure, it’s hard to blame her, San Diego in October has got to be more pleasant—wrecking my hope for a PI novel on campus.

Madison’s Development

After the events of Anonymous, Madison’s picked up some notoriety—she’s become a go-to for missing persons. This is great, she’d been bemoaning how all she’d been doing was insurance work in Anonymous, and it wasn’t that fulfilling—but as we see in the above quotation, she’s finding satisfaction in her work. It’s also nice to see that she’s getting some attention, you frequently get the idea in P.I. fiction that the work is largely unseen.

Another departure from the norm is that Madison’s monetarily successful at the moment—the typical PI is scraping by. Not Madison—at least not now.

The focus on missing persons reminded me of Elvis Cole, just up the coast from Madison—but despite some wealthy clients, you don’t get the idea that he’s as successful. He definitely doesn’t seem to get the notoriety. So, I guess I have to update my one sentence description of Madison from being “Kinsey Millhone for today” to add “with an Elvis Cole twist.”

It’s good that she’s got money coming in, because this self-employed, and likely under-insured woman has medical bills. I wasn’t sure what to think of the discussion of Madison’s past cancer in the first book, but seeing it here, I’m seeing what Beck’s intention is and I like the way it gives the character another dimension and unconsciously (sometimes, anyway) shapes her actions.

Madison and Barrett

One of the ways you can see the appropriateness of the title is that from the first conversation with Travis, Madison starts noting all the coincidental parallels between what’s she’s told about Barrett and what she knows about herself. This can go one of two ways, typically—either this becomes a large hurdle for the protagonist doing their job, or it’s a motivator. This largely serves as a motivation—but it also causes a couple of problems for Madison—at most it’s a distraction occasionally.

It’s arguable that she gets invested pretty quickly because of the parallels, but not by much. Also, Breck finds a way to use this sense of them being so similar in both a positive and negative way for Madison—and then adds a new layer to this later in the book. It didn’t go the way I expected, fully, but I appreciated it.

So, what did I think about Double Take?

I was pretty enthusiastic about Anyonymous, and this cemented my initial impression of Breck and Madison. I was enjoying this the entire time, but toward the end, Beck shifts into high gear and…wow. It’s the kind of ending where you find yourself leaning forward as you read, because somehow that helps you get to what happens next faster; you don’t hear the music/people/animals around you; and your eyes move just too slowly. Okay, maybe I’m exaggerating there, but woe betide anyone who attempted to distract me during the last quarter or so of the book.

This is a fast-paced book. The main action starts Monday evening and ends in the pre-dawn on Friday. In that time, Madison has to find a missing (hopefully still alive woman), figure out why she’s missing/abducted (which leads to a larger criminal act), deal with some personal (some of which should have been dealt with already) and medical issues—and maybe catch a wink or two of sleep. All that in a short amount of time helps explain a couple of the blunders she makes—but those help ground and humanize her, so who cares about them? Especially the way Breck uses those mistakes.

And, hey, she still quotes Nero Wolfe twice. University of Idaho and Wolfe quotations—it’s really like Elizabeth Breck wrote this for me. A delusional thought, I realize, but I like my delusions.

I do wish Breck had made it a little more difficult for the reader to see the things that Madison didn’t/couldn’t put together. I get why she did that, and it was probably the right move, but I still would’ve preferred to work a little harder. That’s the sole issue I have with Double Take, and who knows, any other day, I might have considered that a feature instead of a bug.

Even if you’re not me, if you’re a fan of P.I. novels, I don’t see how this novel/author/character/series doesn’t appeal to you. Madison’s tough, smart, lucky (and knows how important that is), and committed. Brisk and assured writing. A nice bit of sleuthing to find a pretty clever crime (committed by some people who really shouldn’t ever get into criminal activity—and some who seem born to it). My only regret is that I have to wait for the third book in this series to be published before I can dive in.

4 1/2 Stars

This post contains an affiliate link. If you purchase from it, I will get a small commission at no additional cost to you. As always, opinions are my own.

Anonymous by Elizabeth Breck: This PI Will Fill the Kinsey Millhone-Shaped Hole in Your Heart

By HCNewton

On January 3, 2022

In Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Anonymous

by Elizabeth Breck
Series: Madison Kelly, #1

Hardcover, 309 pg.
Crooked Lane Books, 2020

Read: December 28-30, 2021
Grab a copy from your local indie bookstore!

The thing about being a private investigator was that she liked to investigate things. Madison had never been able to interpret whether she liked mysteries or she hated them; all she knew was that she was compelled to solve them.

What’s Anonymous About?

Madison Kelley is a freelance PI who has been between jobs for a while (we’re never told exactly why, a little touch that I loved more than I was annoyed by it being left dangling to tempt me). So she does what any mystery junkie would do when she’s not being paid to investigate—she listens to True Crime podcasts, and with her favorite focusing on a local investigation (or two, as we join the action it’s unsure if they’re connected) she spends a lot of time thinking about the case(s) and tweeting the hosts with her ideas.

Madison starts receiving threats telling her to stop her investigation. But she has no idea what investigation the threats are referring to—it can’t be her tweets to the podcast, can it?

Madison has to move from fan-interest in the crime to actually investigating it, just to find out who is threatening her. Assuming it’s not someone from a previous case, a prank, or a case of mistaken identity. I know I’m not in the evaluative portion yet, but I have to say that I don’t remember the last hook that got me like this one. So, so, clever.

Kinsey 2.0?

By page 10, I’d already put in my notes, “She’s Kinsey, but not.” The sentiment just grew. I’m not really suggesting that Breck designed Madison to be a Kinsey Millhone clone/knock-off, but if someone was to design a contemporary version of Grafton’s protagonist, the result would look just like Madison Kelley.

So here are just a few things that made me think of Kinsey over the course of the book: she’s from California (although Breck uses San Diego without a fake name); her PI work (up until this novel) has primarily been as an insurance investigator; she has a strange not-really-romantic relationship with a married cop; she’s not afraid to stand up for herself or to take on situations she might be wise to avoid; she refuses to let being a woman in a male-dominated field hold her back; she’s interested in romance but needs her space/independence. Frankly, a lot of these will apply to several other female PI’s—I realize that. But there’s just something about the way that Breck showed Madison to the reader that screamed Kinsey, but not.

How is she not Kinsey? A few quick notes (I expect this list will grow in subsequent novels—and could be longer now if I took more time to compile it/didn’t mind spoiling anything): Madison doesn’t once resort to/mention a Little Black Dress (and I don’t see her donning one), Madison eats so much better, she seems better with people naturally, I can’t imagine Kinsey listening to the 1980s equivalent of True Crime Podcasts—and being on Twitter? No way.

Investigative Tips

One of the best parts of Detective novels is when you get some insight into PI/Detective methods—sometimes it’s in a didactic way like Michael Westen would do on Burn Notice, sometimes it’s just in the narration like Archie Goodwin would do. It’s what convinces people like Harvey Mapes, Adam Whyte/Colin McLaughlin, Cat Caliban, or me that we can handle a murder investigation when one drops in our laps.

The descriptions of Madison tailing someone, noticing someone tailing her, shaking the tail, and so on are just great. I assume given Breck’s résumé that they’re authentic (and if I’m wrong, she pulls it off in such a way that you’d never know). Not only do you feel like you’re in the moment in a way you sometimes don’t when reading about someone tailing another car (even when reading really good novels), but you walk away convinced that you could follow a random stranger for a while without them noticing and seeking a restraining order against you.

She has Good Taste, Too

The coincidences were stacking up. Her favorite fictional detective, Nero Wolfe, always used to say, “In a world of cause and effect, all coincidences are suspect.” She agreed.

Like other detectives I’ve read recently, Madison reads Mystery/Detective Fiction—although it hits me, that I can only think of female detectives that fit this bill (or amateurs). Why is that? Are male detectives illiterate or are do they only read intellectual fare (see: Spenser)?

Anyway, I had noted that Madison had some good tastes in reading when I came across the above quotation—and knew we were going to be friends for a long time to come. Sure, I’d already decided to read the next novel by this point, but this cemented it. Nero Wolfe is her favorite? That’s worth me picking up at least three sequels.

So, what did I think about Anonymous?

Madison had had a supervisor at one of her first investigation jobs tell her, “Being a good investigator is fifty percent technique and fifty percent luck. And Madison, you have good luck.” She had thought about that a lot. She did have good luck.

Never underestimate luck—that’s pretty much always true of fictional detectives (private, police, or amateur)—at least Breck’s upfront about it.

This was my last novel of 2021, and what a novel to go out on! Madison’s a great character—who makes one pretty big error in judgment but is otherwise sharp as a tack. And you can’t beat her kind of luck.

I really liked Breck’s prose and pacing—she kept things moving while giving us enough background on Madison to really get a good feel for her (and I have to know more about the lawyer, Haley—I think she promises to be fun). Also, of all the ways to bring in True Crime podcasts and social media into detective fiction, this is my favorite.

Clearly, I had a blast with this. Anonymous starts with a killer hook, has enough twists and turns to keep things interesting and the reader invested, has some good emotional subplots, a great setting (and we get a decent feel for Madison’s little corner of it), and a bang-on ending. It’s hard to ask for more from a debut.

This post contains an affiliate link. If you purchase from it, I will get a small commission at no additional cost to you. As always, opinions are my own.