1547. Night Candy by Max Tomlinson

 #4 (of 5) Colleen Hayes mysteries. 

Couple details: It's December 1979. Colleen is an unlicensed PI in San Francisco. She's from Colorado where she served near 10y for murdering her husband when she found out he was abusing their daughter Pam. Near the end of Colleen's sentence, Pam took off for California where she joined up with a cult (the subject of a couple earlier books). When paroled, Colleen took off for California hoping to reconnect with Pam. They did, sort of. Pam was pregnant, lost the baby, and bolted again. Finding Pam remains Colleen's primary obsession. 

But bills have to be paid and she does what so many PIs do, tracking down philandering spouses. Plus she is attempting to get three young girls off the street corners. And she remains a sympathetic shoulder for SF homicide inspector Owens who, even a year later, hasn't moved on from his divorce from Alice. 

And that's the problem. Owens and Alice were making an attempt at reconciliation. They are headed for a romantic weekend at the site of their honeymoon near coastal Sonoma County. That's the last Colleen had heard from Owens until she gets word that that the romantic bungalow had burned down. In the debris is a badly burned female corpse tentatively identified as the former Mrs. Owens, a handgun licensed to Owens, and 2 bullet holes in the corpse. Doesn't take long for the local and county cops to lock up Owens. 

Most would see this as and open and shut case. Not Colleen. She and Owens may have butted heads on  earlier cases, but now, he is her closest confidant. The feeling is mutual. No one believes Owen other than Colleen. 

The trail seemed fairly straightforward. Find out who's framing Owens and why. And the why is where the trail takes a circuitous path toward the truth. An old beau (hers and Alice's), an insurance policy, a less than trustworthy dentist, one of the 3 street hookers and their pimp, SFPD Internal Affairs office, the lack of a corpse for a missing trans hooker. What started off looking to be a straight line investigation is anything but.

As stated, this is the 4th (of 5) Colleen Hayes mysteries (published by Oceanview Publishing . . . there's that name again. Publishers on quality mysteries and police procedurals). About the time I had read 50% of the book, the cards sure looked to be stacked against Owens. The case looked like it was locked up tight. What else could Tomlinson do with this story? Plenty. By comparison, the 2nd half of the book was a ton more interesting and engaging with the rapid fire twists to the story. 

I tend to read books envisioning whether it has TV/Movie potential. The best thing about this series is Colleen Hayes. Ex-con, tough as nails, not quite middle aged, unconcerned about chain of evidence, B&E, carrying a firearm (a felony), or any number of things that might get tossed out of court, her hippie/cowboy/surfer lawyer, and Tomlinson's attention to late 1970s detail. Lot of fun characters. What's not to love for Hollywood? And I'm the right age to identify with the 70s.

Check out the Colleen Hayes books. I will find #5 and get back to you. Confident they'll be a hit with you.

East Coast Don

Line of Darkness by Max Tomlinson

Remember. Colleen Hayes is an ex-con who did 10yr for killing her abusive husband in Colorado. It’s 1978 and she’s in San Francisco trying to get her life in order attempting to her PI license.

A German businesswoman, in SF for a conference, hires Colleen to track down her missing nephew. The two were to meet in SF but he never showed up so Colleen gets enlisted to do what the local cops can’t or won’t do. She finds the guy in a fleabag hotel and tells the aunt. Quick resolution. Cash the check. It’s up to the aunt to make contact.

Tidbits picked up by Colleen don’t sit well with her. She broke into the guy’s hotel room and found half of an old British five-pound note, a pistol, and a photograph. All neatly hidden in a heating duct. The more she digs, the more confusing are the clues and her client.

Turns out that the connection between the aunt and nephew dates back to a German concentration camp. And Colleen starts to wonder if the two really are related. Colleen has been told by SFPD to lay off the case, but that’s not in her DNA. She must find out about the nephew, the businesswoman, the torn 5-pound note and the connection to an international trail of murders that all seem to date back to that one concentration camp.

Tomlinson has four books about Colleen Hayes and the third reviewed by the boys at MRB. I’ve found this series to be quite entertaining, fun to read and certainly not a waste of my time. If I had to assign a category, I might say that it’s high-quality PI pulp that is a great way to kill some time.

And did I forget to mention? It’s from Oceanview Publishing. So for, I’ve not gone wrong with any Oceanview mystery. Need to find the one title I’m missing.

ECD

Bad Scene by Max Tomlinson

Reported on Colleen Hayes in my review of Tie Die not too long ago, which is #2 in the Colleen Hayes Mystery series. Bad Scene is #3. 

Backstory in brief. Colleen is from Colorado. Got pregnant at 16. Had Pam. Her husband was worthless. When Pam hit puberty, the abuse got real. When Colleen learned of the abuse, she struck back, stabbed the pig in the neck and watched him die on her kitchen floor. Called the cops. Confessed. Spend just shy of 10y as a guest of the Colorado Dept of Corrections. In that 10y, Pam's anger with what her mom did boils over and off she goes into various communes in the mountains and west coast. When Colleen is released, Pam wants nothing to do with her mom. That doesn't fly with Colleen and she goes on the hunt, eventually settling in San Francisco. While doing a nothing job, she ends up doing some off the books investigative work that leads her to taking steps to become a licensed PI, which is kinda tough for an ex-felon. Backstory done. Current day in this series is the late 1970s. Disco, platform heels, and bell bottoms are the norm.

For a PI, divorce cases pay the bills. While tracking down nefarious lotharios in her short time as an off-the-books PI, Colleen has developed a bit of a network of sources. One, nicknamed Lucky, tells her that he overheard some bikers talking about an upcoming plot to murder the mayor and the person behind the threat is a current SF Board of Supervisors member. Being a good citizen, Colleen tells her contact in the SFPD. They check out the Board member and find nothing so the threat gets lost in the SFPD bureaucracy. 

But one other thing Lucky overheard was that the bikers were expecting a delivery of LSD from The Moon Ranch, a commune of hippies in the CA mountains outside of the bay area. And The Moon Ranch was the last sightings of Pam. So Colleen starts digging learning that Pam may actually be part of the delivery.

Or maybe not, but Colleen has to find out. To her horror she finds out that Pam has taken up with a cult run by a charismatic South African committed to perfection in everything . . . including death. And this guy has taken a couple hundred devotees to the slopes of an Ecuadorian volcano that is coming back to life. Colleen scrambles to get to Ecuador in search of Pam before . . . before what?

Tomlinson is cool. His stories take place in the not too distant past in an era and place where society was tilting in mulitple directions. It's easy to root for Colleen. She's in a place of her own doing and determined to dig her way out . . . if she'll just put down that damn shovel. 

Good stuff. Really good stuff. 

Now to find the first one.

Available August 2021

East Coast Don

P.S. one more thing. I suggest that readers pay attention to the publisher, specifically singing the praises of Emily Bestler Books. Add Oceanview to the list of publishers that consistently deliver the goods. Can't remember reading an Oceanview product that I didn't like.

Tie Die by Max Tomlinson

Late 70’s San Francisco. Two disconnected events from the late 60’s. 1. Colleen Hayes discovers that her husband has been abusing their daughter. In a fit a rage, Collen drives a shiv into his neck, and she gets 10y courtesy of the State of Colorado. Pamela, the daughter, hates mom and eventually finds her way to a commune in rural northern California. 2. Steve Cook was a Brit rock singer on the way up. The Lost Chords' first album just knocked The Stones off the top spot. The boys are up and coming rock gods. All the booze and birds they can handle. Cook wakes up one morning after a mega concert with a dead minor in his bed. He’s barely out of his teens and runs off leaving his band mates behind without a word. Ends up in Brazil. Bye Bye rock god. Meets Lynda. A wannabe music producer. Convinces him to come to SF so she can resurrect his career. They marry. Have a daughter, Melinda, now 11. Steve and Lynda are divorced. 

Colleen has been out on parole and lives in San Francisco. Being a convicted felon kind of limits one’s career options. She’s worked security and now is working as an unlicensed PI. Gets a call about a kidnapped girl. Told to meet the dad at a bar where the dad works with some band and discovers . . . son of a bitch . . . the lead singer, the dad, her client, is THE Steve Cook, whom she had a crush on when The Lost Chords were an item.

He’s renovating a row house. When she interviews him about Melanie, Lynda comes in unannounced and uninvited. Real piece of work is she. There’s a ransom demand and instructions for the delivery. Colleen will make the trade per the kidnapper’s instructions. The swap goes bad. The bag man ends up under a bus, the money gone in a handoff, and no Melanie. Almost as bad, Steve got the money from a loan shark with a short fuse.

As Colleen and Steve go back over what happened, Colleen starts to think that the kidnap was a sham. The main target is not money, but Steve’s catalogue of songs he wrote for The Lost Chords. Hollywood wants one in particular for a movie. The rights fees for that song and the catalogue could bring in millions. Colleen starts tracking Lynda and eventually finds Melanie safe down by the coast, placated with a new horse. She shows photos to Steve and, for the most part, the case is done.

Problem is, I’m only 50% through the book. Lots more to come.

Like a 2^nd kidnapping of Melanie . . . Lynda’s dad (a film and music producer) . . . a titled music promoter in London . . . his old band mates . . . more ransom demands (for real this time) . . . Cook being arrested . . . a shootout in the Mojave.

Tie Die is a welcome glimpse back to the shift from the mod to the disco culture of that era, an era I lived through. It’s the 2^nd in a planned Colleen Hayes series. Most ‘noir’ mysteries have a hard boiled (male) detective and a femme fatale. Those roles are reversed with Colleen and Cook. Tomlinson presents Colleen as a seriously flawed heroine who sees this case as a parallel to her own relationship (or lack thereof) with her own daughter. Maybe solving one will help repair the other? Guessing that’s that’ll be his next book. Tie Dye is a very good noir mystery whose pace really picks up in the 2^nd half of the book. I think I may just try to find the first (Vanishing in the Heights) so I have the full backstory prior to what I suspect will be the all out hunt for her daughter.

The book is published by Oceanview. The only publisher I’ve ever pointed out in the past is Emily Bestler Books. I’ve had very good luck with Oceanview so it’s time I gave them some props, too. 

Published June 2020.

ECD