Gunner attempts to set the record straight for a dead police officer with a racist past
No one in South Central is surprised when Jack McGovern, a brutally racist cop, is accused of gunning down a black teenager in cold blood. But they are shocked when the LAPD actually responds to the charges, firing McGovern and leaving him without badge, pension, or pride. Eight months later, a thief breaks into a stereo store and encounters the disgraced ...
Gunner attempts to set the record straight for a dead police officer with a racist past
No one in South Central is surprised when Jack McGovern, a brutally racist cop, is accused of gunning down a black teenager in cold blood. But they are shocked when the LAPD actually responds to the charges, firing McGovern and leaving him without badge, pension, or pride. Eight months later, a thief breaks into a stereo store and encounters the disgraced cop, now a night security guard. McGovern draws his gun and, to the thief’s surprise, shoots himself in the head.
Few mourn the suicide, but one citizen is unsettled. A witness to the shooting that ended McGovern’s career, Mitchell Flowers knows the cop wasn’t lying when he said the teenager had fired first. Flowers hires private detective Aaron Gunner to clear the dead cop’s name—pitting Gunner against every civilian in South Central. Soon Gunner tugs on a chain of police corruption that stretches all the way to the top of the LAPD.
In the third novel to feature African American L.A. private investigator Aaron Gunner (after Not Long for This World ), a white cop much loathed in the black community apparently guns down an unarmed black kid in a dark alley following a robbery. After being publicly crucified, the policeman puts a bullet through his head and dies unmourned. But then an eyewitness confides in Gunner that he saw the kid shoot twice before the cop fired and asks the PI to investigate. In need of a client, Gunner reluctantly takes the volatile case. He finds the gun (a dummy that shoots blanks) and a Latina policewoman willing to listen to this discomfiting new evidence. Barely pausing for narrative breath, the author adds intriguing elements to his plot: the eyewitness isn't a thoroughly convincing player; his brother is beaten up; another kid involved in the robbery is tight-lipped; the dead boy's uncle is a gambler with big debts; and most people in the black community are ready to let this possible injustice pass, believing a larger justice has been served by the cop's death. Gunner is a rarity in recent detective fiction: soured, yet utterly believable, tough and resourceful without being cartoonishly overblown. This pulsating mystery strengthens an already forceful series. ( July )
Wes Lukowsky
Jack McGovern was a brutal cop with a history of violent racial incidents. He killed a young black male in a dark alley after a convenience-store robbery. Though he claimed the boy fired on him, the evidence failed to corroborate his claim, and McGovern's career was over. A year later he committed suicide. Black private eye Aaron Gunner is hired to prove McGovern's innocence by a witness who did not step forward at the time because he was intimidated by a threatening, anonymous note. All sides impede Gunner's investigation: the cops, who resent anyone looking into their internal affairs; the mother of the dead boy, who seeks to preserve her son's memory; the residents of the neighborhood, who feel McGovern got what he deserved; and the local black activist group, which agrees with the residents. Gunner, ever loyal to his client, plugs on through intimidation, physical violence, and his own doubts about the case. This third Gunner novel is tightly plotted with a satisfyingly tricky conclusion. Most readers will miss the real culprit. Excellent reading.
Gar Anthony Haywood (b. 1954) is the Shamus Award–winning author of the Aaron Gunner mysteries. Born in Los Angeles, he spent over a decade as a computer technician before first publishing fiction in the 1980s. Influenced by a love for the Los Angeles mysteries of Ross Macdonald, he wrote Fear of the Dark (1987), winning the Shamus Award for best first novel and introducing the tough-nosed Los Angeles detective Aaron Gunner.
Haywood continued the Gunner series through the bestselling All the Lucky Ones Are Dead (2000), and in between Gunner novels produced the two-book Loudermilk pair of seriocomic mysteries. Haywood also wrote two stand-alone thrillers, Man Eater (2003) and Firecracker (2004), under the pseudonym Ray Shannon, finding critical acclaim for both. He has written for newspapers and television, including an adaptation of the Dennis Rodman autobiography, Bad as I Wanna Be. His most recent novels are Cemetery Road (2010) and Assume Nothing (2011).
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Overview
Gunner attempts to set the record straight for a dead police officer with a racist past
No one in South Central is surprised when Jack McGovern, a brutally racist cop, is accused of gunning down a black teenager in cold blood. But they are shocked when the LAPD actually responds to the charges, firing McGovern and leaving him without badge, pension, or pride. Eight months later, a thief breaks into a stereo store and encounters the disgraced ...