Red Deuce

 After reading Thomas Roehlk’s second book, Fire Feud, I decided to read the first on in this series, Red Deuce. Red Deuce is the nickname given by a brother to his identical twin redheaded girls, the middle kids in a sibship of 10, Mandy and Reggie Doucette. The twins were 29 years old and still often chose to wear the same clothes just to get the reaction of people they were meeting for the first time. They had shared a bedroom for the whole lives except during their graduate school years and the beginning of their careers. Both were bright women, Mandy became and attorney and spent three years working for the Department of Justice, but then she returned to her roots in Chicago where she became the chief compliance officer for a very large corporation. Reggie had gone to med school and then became a forensic pathologist with the FBI. She had also returned to Chicago to live with her sister where the two of them shared the details of their lives and their love of running. They were beautiful and very eligible women.

 

This is a story of corporate corruption and espionage. Lurking behind some corporate troubles was an international conspiracy of spies. I thought the first few pages of the story were weak, but the characters were quickly developed, I found myself thoroughly enjoying Roehlk’s tale. This may not be great literature, but I was entertained by how the author developed his plot and subplots. There were five murders that had to be solved, and the twins were in danger for their lives, as well engaged in finding good men who became their marriage material. So, it’s also a love story.

Fire Feud

 Fire Feud is the second novel by Thomas Roehlk, but now that I’ve enjoyed that murder mystery published in 2025, I’m going to find his first novel, Red Deuce which was published in 2024.

 This story involves two construction companies that have been rivals for more than 100 years, and under suspect circumstances, one of them has consistently underbid and won the major construction projects while the other has played second fiddle to those biggest deals. The founders of the companies, both immigrants from different companies, had learned to hate each other while they were helping to dig the Erie Canal. At the conclusion of that project, they went separate ways although both continued to work mostly on canal projects until they both ended up founding construction companies in Chicago. It was during a current major dig in Chicago that a body was discovered, hidden in the pilings of a bridge abutment. It turned out to be a man who had been the founder of one of those companies.

 

Patrick Carney was thought to have perished in the 1871 fire that devastated the city, The Great Chicago Fire, but his body was never recovered. By legend, it had been Mrs. O’Leary’s cow that knocked over a lantern which set the city on fire. Roehlk wrote that it now looked as if the fire had not killed him, but that he was murdered, and his body had been purposefully hidden. Meanwhile, more murders happened involving the two families who had been feuding with each other since the two companies had been founded Frank Wagner was the founder of the company that had been significantly more successful than the other. Could he have been involved in the 1871 disappearance of Mr. Carney?

 

Meanwhile, an important subplot was developing. The term Red Deuce was a reference to identical twin redheaded sisters. One of them was an attorney who worked for the more successful company and the other was a forensic pathologist employed by the FBI. They lived together in Chicago and were sometimes involved in the same cases, and both were very eligible women in their 30s.

 

Good plot, good characters. I recommend this one highly. I thought the book should have been dedicated to Mrs. O’Leary since it absolved her of having caused the fire that killed hundreds of people and destroyed most of Chicago.