Saratoga Payback
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
The latest installment in Stephen Dobyns's Charlie Bradshaw mysteries, Saratoga Payback follows the latest exploits of Saratoga Springs' most unusual and sardonic detective.
Ever since the cops revoked his private investigator's license, Charlie Bradshaw has been adjusting to life as a regular senior citizen. But reading, sitting around the house, and making amateur home repairs is a far cry from his past life as Saratoga Springs' most successful everyman detective.
So when Charlie discovers the sprawled corpse of Saratoga Springs' biggest nuisance on his sidewalk, the ex-P.I. is torn. Should he risk asking questions of his own, knowing he could easily be prosecuted for doing P.I. work without a license? Or should he avoid the trouble and spend his twilight years in peace? Well, the case was practically delivered to his doorstep...
Saratoga Payback, the latest installment in Stephen Dobyns's critically praised Charlie Bradshaw Mysteries, follows Charlie as he toes the line between concerned private citizen and practiced private eye. As he begins to look into the murder of the town pest, Charlie also finds himself entangled in problem that is purely Saratogian--a mission to rescue an old acquaintance's kidnapped horse. Wry, entertaining, and adroitly written, Saratoga Payback is an immensely satisfying addition to Dobyns's popular mystery series.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Senior citizen Charlie Bradshaw, last seen in 1998's Saratoga Strongbox, knows the last thing he should be doing is nosing around a homicide investigation, having been stripped of his PI license and gun permit largely through lobbying by the Saratoga, N.Y., police department he once worked for. But it's tough not to when the victim, inveterate scammer Mickey Martin, is an acquaintance, whose corpse Charlie discovers dumped on the sidewalk in front of his house at the outset of Dobyns's entertaining 11th series outing. Charlie starts making discreet inquiries, but, when he practically stumbles across a second body, he's off to the races. Though the department's working theory of the case regards the murders as somehow connected to a gruesome series of horse-nappings, Charlie suspects a darker, deadlier plot rooted back in the time both victims spent in prison. With a lively pace and plenty of quirky characters (including Charlie's finagler buddy, Victor Plotz), this entry makes the case that this sleuth definitely shouldn't be put out to pasture.
