It began with The Drifter Detective and continued
on with Hell Up In Houston and now traveling private investigator Jack Laramie
is back in The Girls of Bunker Pines. It is 1956 in Kilgore, Texas as a
hail storm pulls Jack Laramie from an intense dream of his B-17 being shot down
over Germany during the war. While he is back home and has pretty much adjusted
to civilian life by wandering across Texas in his Desoto hitched to a horse
trailer while working as a private investigator, the nightmares of war persist
from time to time. His normal solution of downing a couple of shots won’t work
this night as he is on a surveillance job outside a traveling church revival
led by pastor Dalton Byrnes.
He may have fallen asleep, but it is clear that
nothing much is going on. The pastor may
be a lot of things, but he isn’t having sex with his client’s wife. Though she
does seem very interested even if the attention is not reciprocated. While one
case seems to be drawing to a close, Jack’s being there has led him to meeting
Joe Crewes. One look at Joe and Jack knows he sees a fellow veteran with his
own demons. Joe Crewes served in Korea
and has a very complicated case for Jack Laramie if he is interested.
What follows is a complicated tale set in 1956 interspersed
with Jack’s memories of flying in a B-17, being shot down over Germany, and the
aftermath. Those flashback sections are intense and are skillfully woven into
the main storyline of a client who may or may not be helped by Jack. The
Girls of Bunker Pines: The Drifter Detective Series is another solidly
good read that works on all levels all the way to the end. While it would
obviously be best to read the series in order, one could read this as a
standalone before going back and picking up the other installments of so
desired. Author Garnett Elliott puts you in the moment with Jack and does not
let go till the very end.
The
Girls of Bunker Pines: The Drifter Detective Series
Garnett
Elliott
Beat
To A Pulp
ISBN#
978-0991203949
February
2014
E-Book
(also available in print)
104
pages
$1.19
Material supplied by the publisher in exchange for
my objective review.
Kevin R. Tipple ©2014
Posts
2 comments:
Thanks for the review, Kevin. I did, indeed, write this one so it could be read "out of sequence"--sort of a re-introduction to Jack Laramie.
I really thought so, but didn't want to crawl out on that ledge and say so publicly.
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