Aubrey Nye Hamilton Reviews: Murder in the Arts District by Greg Herren

Greg Herren is a contemporary mystery writer and editor from New Orleans. He is a co-founder of the Saints and Sinners Literary Festival, which focuses on LGBT writers. This year the 19^th festival took place in March in New Orleans. He has written thirty-three novels for adults and teenagers, including seven about private investigator Chanse MacLeod and eight about personal trainer Scotty Bradley, winning multiple awards. He has published over fifty short stories and edited several anthologies.

The latest book in the Chanse MacLeod series, Murder in the Arts District (Bold Stroke Books, 2014), finds MacLeod recovering from a debilitating accident. Denied his usual gym time and relying on strong painkillers, he is not operating on all cylinders but he agrees to look into the theft of rare paintings from a wealthy gay couple who live outside New Orleans on an historic estate. The local homophobic sheriff questions that the theft took place or that the paintings even existed to begin with.

The transaction was peculiar. The gallery owner delivered the paintings to the estate, even though the sale had not been finalized, pending the establishment of their provenance. The paintings themselves were last seen shortly before the artist and his family vanished in the Holocaust. His sole surviving daughter was believed to have brought them to the United States but no one could prove it. They could have easily been destroyed by the Nazis. Under the circumstances it was strange that the buyer, a knowledgeable art collector, would have agreed to the sale and paid for it, even using an escrow account.

Not long after MacLeod and his partner start looking into the theft, the gallery owner’s husband is found shot to death and the gallery owner herself disappears, which brings the New Orleans police into the mix.

I love mysteries that showcase a distinctive geographic region while delivering a solid story, and this one certainly qualifies. The description of post-Katrina New Orleans is compelling and atmospheric. One of the highlights of Bouchercon 2016 was my bus tour through the ravaged 9^th Ward. It’s one thing to read about a catastrophe but quite another to see the devastation, even 10 years later.

MacLeod is a charmingly human protagonist. He’s fallible and knows it and hates it, a pleasant contrast to the superhero I see in so many thrillers. Despite his reliance on strong analgesics to control pain which also cloud his thinking, he still manages to sort through the satisfyingly twisty plot. I am adding the rest of the series to my TBR mountain. For fans of regional mysteries, LGBT protagonists, and private investigator crime fiction.

 

 

·         Publisher: ‎ Bold Strokes Books (October 14, 2014)

·         Language: ‎ English

·         Paperback: ‎ 264 pages

·         ISBN-10: ‎ 1626392064

·         ISBN-13: ‎ 978-1626392069 

 

Aubrey Nye Hamilton ©2022

Aubrey Hamilton is a former librarian who works on Federal It projects by day and reads mysteries at night.