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Sharon McCone #5.5
Double
The "Nameless Detective" and Sharon McCone join forces at a San Diego private detective convention to investigate a case involving multiple murder, a crime ring dealing in smuggled fugitives, and bizarre, kinky lifestyles
294 pages, Hardcover
First published October 1, 1984
About the author
Bill Pronzini
564 books226 followersMystery Writers of America Awards "Grand Master" 2008
Shamus Awards Best Novel winner (1999) for Boobytrap
Edgar Awards Best Novel nominee (1998) for A Wasteland of Strangers
Shamus Awards Best Novel nominee (1997) for Sentinels
Shamus Awards "The Eye" (Lifetime achievment award) 1987
Shamus Awards Best Novel winner (1982) for Hoodwink
Married to author Marcia Muller.
Pseudonyms:
Robert Hart Davis (collaboration with Jeffrey M. Wallmann)
Jack Foxx
William Jeffrey (collaboration with Jeffrey M. Wallmann)
Alex Saxon
Shamus Awards Best Novel winner (1999) for Boobytrap
Edgar Awards Best Novel nominee (1998) for A Wasteland of Strangers
Shamus Awards Best Novel nominee (1997) for Sentinels
Shamus Awards "The Eye" (Lifetime achievment award) 1987
Shamus Awards Best Novel winner (1982) for Hoodwink
Married to author Marcia Muller.
Pseudonyms:
Robert Hart Davis (collaboration with Jeffrey M. Wallmann)
Jack Foxx
William Jeffrey (collaboration with Jeffrey M. Wallmann)
Alex Saxon
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 45 reviews
August 23, 2020
“Double” by Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini is told in alternating chapters by their best known series characters, Bill Pronzini’s “Nameless” detective (could be counted as number 13 in the ‘Nameless” series) and Marcia Muller’s Sharon McCone (between book 5 an 6) . They’re both attending a private investigators’ convention in San Diego, when they come across several suspicious events, including the supposed suicide,(by jumping), of a former mentor of McCone’s.
Neither of them has a client, but neither can either of them can sit back and let the police have all the fun. And reading this book is fun, with many a chapter ending as a cliffhanger, with the other character immediately taking over, totally unaware of what situation the previous author had left his or her fellow investigator.
This is a book that was fun, but, there must have been challenges the authors had to face and overcome to make it work as well as it does., while neither character spends much time at the PI convention, they do see in passing there a female PI based in Santa Teresa (i.e.: Kinsey Millhone (Sue Grafton)), plus a couple of gents named Brock Callahan ( a detective Created by William Campbell Gault (1910-97)) , and also Miles Jacoby (from (Robert J. Randisi's character series). I love this cross over stuff.
Here is a list of all the books (in order) Happy Reading.
1971 The Snatch Random House
1973 The Vanished Random House
1973 Undercurrents Random House
1977 Blowback Ramdom House
1978 Twospot Putman
1980 Laybrinth St. Martin's Press
1980 A Killing In Xanadu Waves Press
1981 Hoodwinked St. Martin's Press
1982 Scattershot St. Martin's Press
1982 Dragonfire St. Martin's Press
1983 Bindlestiff St. Martin's Press
1983 Casefile St. Martin's Press
1984 Quicksilver St. Martin's Press
1984 Nightshades St. Martin's Press
1984 Double St. Martin's Press
1985 Bones St. Martin's Press
1985 Grave Yard Plots St. Martin's Press
1886 Dreadfall St. Martin's Press
1988 Shackles St. Martin's Press
1988 Small Fellonies St. Martin's Press
1990 Jackpot Delacorte
1991 Breakdown Delacorte
1992 Quarry Delacorte
1992 Epitaths Delacorte
1993 Demons Delacorte
1995 Hardcase Delacorte
1996 Spadework Crippen & Landru
1996 Sentinels Carroll & Graf
1997 Illusions Carroll & Graf
1998 Boobytrap Carroll & Graf
1999 Sluths Five Star
1999 Duo Five Star
2000 Crazybones Carroll & Graf
2002 Bleeders Carroll & Graf
2003 Spook Carroll & Graf
2003 Scenarios Five Star
2005 Nightcrawlers Forge
2006 Mourners Forge
2007 Savages Forge
2008 Feaver Forge
2009 Schemers Forge
2010 Betrayers Forge
2011 Camouflage Forge
2012 Hellbox Forge
2012 Kinsmen Cemetery Dance
2012 Femme Cemetery Dance
2013 Nemesis Forge
Neither of them has a client, but neither can either of them can sit back and let the police have all the fun. And reading this book is fun, with many a chapter ending as a cliffhanger, with the other character immediately taking over, totally unaware of what situation the previous author had left his or her fellow investigator.
This is a book that was fun, but, there must have been challenges the authors had to face and overcome to make it work as well as it does., while neither character spends much time at the PI convention, they do see in passing there a female PI based in Santa Teresa (i.e.: Kinsey Millhone (Sue Grafton)), plus a couple of gents named Brock Callahan ( a detective Created by William Campbell Gault (1910-97)) , and also Miles Jacoby (from (Robert J. Randisi's character series). I love this cross over stuff.
Here is a list of all the books (in order) Happy Reading.
1971 The Snatch Random House
1973 The Vanished Random House
1973 Undercurrents Random House
1977 Blowback Ramdom House
1978 Twospot Putman
1980 Laybrinth St. Martin's Press
1980 A Killing In Xanadu Waves Press
1981 Hoodwinked St. Martin's Press
1982 Scattershot St. Martin's Press
1982 Dragonfire St. Martin's Press
1983 Bindlestiff St. Martin's Press
1983 Casefile St. Martin's Press
1984 Quicksilver St. Martin's Press
1984 Nightshades St. Martin's Press
1984 Double St. Martin's Press
1985 Bones St. Martin's Press
1985 Grave Yard Plots St. Martin's Press
1886 Dreadfall St. Martin's Press
1988 Shackles St. Martin's Press
1988 Small Fellonies St. Martin's Press
1990 Jackpot Delacorte
1991 Breakdown Delacorte
1992 Quarry Delacorte
1992 Epitaths Delacorte
1993 Demons Delacorte
1995 Hardcase Delacorte
1996 Spadework Crippen & Landru
1996 Sentinels Carroll & Graf
1997 Illusions Carroll & Graf
1998 Boobytrap Carroll & Graf
1999 Sluths Five Star
1999 Duo Five Star
2000 Crazybones Carroll & Graf
2002 Bleeders Carroll & Graf
2003 Spook Carroll & Graf
2003 Scenarios Five Star
2005 Nightcrawlers Forge
2006 Mourners Forge
2007 Savages Forge
2008 Feaver Forge
2009 Schemers Forge
2010 Betrayers Forge
2011 Camouflage Forge
2012 Hellbox Forge
2012 Kinsmen Cemetery Dance
2012 Femme Cemetery Dance
2013 Nemesis Forge
June 8, 2019
I read this mystery because I’ve vowed to complete every book in the “Nameless Detective Series,” but this novel is significant for another reason, and the title—Double—offers a clue. This book is the first collaboration between the husband-and-wife team Bill Pronzini (creator of “The Nameless Detective) and Marcia Muller (creator of Sharon McCone).
There’s a picture of the two of them on the back of the book, and they are very cute together, in a sort of dorky writer way. I don’t much like collaborations (I prefer the magic woven by one single voice), but this yarn kept me entertained and I’m glad to have met Ms. Muller’s Sharon McCone.
The story takes place at a private investigators’ convention, held in McCone’s hometown of San Diego at the old gothic Casa Del Rey hotel. The convention seems to be going okay—although neither McCone or “Wolf” (McCone’s nickname for Nameless)—seem interested in the technological displays or the helpful series of lectures. It becomes obvious, though, that something is just not right at the hotel. McCone’s can see that her old friend and mentor, Elaine Picard, Casa del Rey’s chief of security, is worried about something, and “Wolf” discovers that a woman and her little boy—installed in a bungalow on the hotel grounds—have since disappeared, and the staff refuse to acknowledge the two were ever guests of the hotel.
Of course, before too long, there is a murder, and “Wolf” and McCone’s join forces to uncover the mystery of the Casa Del Rey.
Forgettable, but enjoyable while it lasted. And the two detectives—like their authorial counterparts—are very cute together, in a sort of dorky private eye way.
August 18, 2023
This story is told in alternating chapters by their best known series characters, Pronzini’s “Nameless Detective” PI and Muller’s Sharon McCone. The 2 are attending a private investigators’ convention in San Diego, when they come across several suspicious events, including the supposed suicide of a former mentor of McCone’s.
Since they don’t have current clients, they decide to tackle this one – despite the police not wanting them to get involved. (Of course!)
Each chapter is left with a cliffhanger…
And…
Each character is unaware of what the other investigator has done. Thus, leaving readers the only one with the clues.
Will they eventually solve the case…
Together?
Fun. Cozy. Who-dunit.
November 14, 2012
This is an exciting thriller! The National Society of Investigators is conferencing in Sharon McCone's hometown, San Diego. Her family lives there, and McCone discovers that her mother is still trying to arrange a marriage for her, her father has taken up singing dirty songs, and her brother is getting a divorce. Attending the conference at the Casa del Rey Hotel is only slightly better, but the horribly boring seminars, panels, lectures and films make it a toss up. Fortunately for McCone, she meets an old detective she likes very much, the fatherly Wolf, as well as some other friends. However, before too many chapters are written, someone falls - or is pushed - off of a fourth story balcony and dies.
Wolf and McCone were already suspicious of a child and a woman who were living in one of the hotel's more private detached rooms. Wolf noticed the little boy, but after a strange conversation with him, Wolf wondered if the boy was safe. He goes to the front desk and asks questions of the clerk, but the clerk tells him no one is checked into that room. Returning to the bungalow, he finds the maid cleaning it up and she informs him that no one had been living there for a week. Hmmmm.
Then McCone notices that her favorite boss from her first job at a department store, Elaine Picard, who has taken the job of head of security at the hotel, is distracted, thin and worn, completely unlike herself. But before McCone has had the chance to learn what is going on, guess who ends up falling off a balcony?
Wolf and McCone get that tingle that tells them something very rotten is going on at the Casa del Rey Hotel.
Without question, the most exciting in the series so far. Bullets, car chases, and dead bodies everywhere. AND two detectives for the price of one, working together, alternating chapters with cliff hanger breaks throughout the book.
But what I want to know is where did McCone's Catholic father learn such funny dirty songs?
Wolf and McCone were already suspicious of a child and a woman who were living in one of the hotel's more private detached rooms. Wolf noticed the little boy, but after a strange conversation with him, Wolf wondered if the boy was safe. He goes to the front desk and asks questions of the clerk, but the clerk tells him no one is checked into that room. Returning to the bungalow, he finds the maid cleaning it up and she informs him that no one had been living there for a week. Hmmmm.
Then McCone notices that her favorite boss from her first job at a department store, Elaine Picard, who has taken the job of head of security at the hotel, is distracted, thin and worn, completely unlike herself. But before McCone has had the chance to learn what is going on, guess who ends up falling off a balcony?
Wolf and McCone get that tingle that tells them something very rotten is going on at the Casa del Rey Hotel.
Without question, the most exciting in the series so far. Bullets, car chases, and dead bodies everywhere. AND two detectives for the price of one, working together, alternating chapters with cliff hanger breaks throughout the book.
But what I want to know is where did McCone's Catholic father learn such funny dirty songs?
January 31, 2017
Another fun, page turning adventure with McCone and Nameless Detective. DOUBLE starts out at a private detective convention. Sharon is home to see her family and the dynamics are wonderfully drawn by the Queen of hardboiled crime. Muller exceeds my expectations with every book. I love the way she writes and tells a good story.
Bill Pronzini's Nameless Detective is back and in full force. His character, endearingly named "Wolf" by hard-hitting McCone, is utterly engrossing. The two main PIs are roped into a case involving kinky sex and multiple murders.
Read it. Enjoy it. This is fun escape reading at its enthralling best. See how the masters of the mystery genre tell a fascinating, memorable story. I can never get enough of these two wonderful authors. Recommended.
Bill Pronzini's Nameless Detective is back and in full force. His character, endearingly named "Wolf" by hard-hitting McCone, is utterly engrossing. The two main PIs are roped into a case involving kinky sex and multiple murders.
Read it. Enjoy it. This is fun escape reading at its enthralling best. See how the masters of the mystery genre tell a fascinating, memorable story. I can never get enough of these two wonderful authors. Recommended.
January 6, 2008
This book is a lot of fun for Sharon McCone fans, as she investigates a mystery together with the Nameless Detective, hero of a series of books written by Marcia Muller's husband, Bill Pronzini. I enjoyed the Muller sections more than the Pronzini ones, but really liked the book in general, with its setting at a convention for private eyes. It also fits into the McCone series well, with a lot of material about her family and a bit about her love life - this is one where she is going out with Don the radio DJ.
October 31, 2018
Second star only for the beginning, which had interesting puzzles. I was very interested in how they’d wrap it up, with such intricate crimes, but making just about everyone a murderer, and offering lots of shaming and judgeyness about sex practices, plus being weird about people’s sexuality (theirs or a partner’s) driving them to murder, was not what I was hoping for. The characterization suffers with two authors, as none of the supporting cast were well defined or even consistent.
The only good part of this read is that I won’t have missed any of the McCone series, I guess.
The only good part of this read is that I won’t have missed any of the McCone series, I guess.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 9, 2021
Another of the "half written by one author about their detective character, and half by another" type deals. This is the first book in the series I've rated less that 4-stars, and only because I wasn't very gripped by the non-Nameless portions. Still a pretty darn good story, though.
March 29, 2013
Double is a very fun book because it's a crossover between Pronzini's Nameless Detective and Muller's Sharon McCone. There's actually a detective convention, and so a few other named folks make cameos as well. I recognized Kinsey Millhone, who is from the alphabet series of detective of books. In any case, the crossover is fun, and you wish these two would get together again (though I don't think they do, despite the fact that the two authors were a married couple who may well still be together today).
The use of the two detectives is quite well done. Chapters alternate between their two points of view, and they're constantly following different threads of the same case, neither one ever seeing the whole picture (although the reader does). I was impressed by how adroitly the authors carried this off.
I also enjoyed seeing the contrast between the two characters. I've noted before how Nameless follows the law much more closely than any other detective I've read about, and that was pointedly mentioned here, as both Sharon and Nameless reflect that she does things that he wouldn't.
The structure of the book itself felt much more like Proznini than Muller, as it involved multiple cases all tightly intertwined so that they looked like the same mystery. It's a structure that he's used in the past.
The use of the two detectives is quite well done. Chapters alternate between their two points of view, and they're constantly following different threads of the same case, neither one ever seeing the whole picture (although the reader does). I was impressed by how adroitly the authors carried this off.
I also enjoyed seeing the contrast between the two characters. I've noted before how Nameless follows the law much more closely than any other detective I've read about, and that was pointedly mentioned here, as both Sharon and Nameless reflect that she does things that he wouldn't.
The structure of the book itself felt much more like Proznini than Muller, as it involved multiple cases all tightly intertwined so that they looked like the same mystery. It's a structure that he's used in the past.
July 25, 2017
One of the earlier books in the Sharon McCone series, Double is a cross-over with Bill Pronzini's Nameless Detective. Both are at an investigator’s conference in San Diego, when a friend of Sharon's - and organizer of the conference - falls to her death.
This was neat, as the writing styles and descriptions interleave - alternating chapters feature McCone and Wolf (the Nameless Detective). Seeing the two styles juxtaposed was interesting, especially with a few chapters covering the same scene from the two detective’s perspectives.
(Interesting aside: this 1995 Mysterious Press edition has Charlene's husband as Nicky, rather than Ricky. Threw me for a bit, as I was realizing the name wasn't right, but couldn't recall Ricky’s name off the top of my head while I was reading. Unsure if he was mentioned in any earlier books.)
This was neat, as the writing styles and descriptions interleave - alternating chapters feature McCone and Wolf (the Nameless Detective). Seeing the two styles juxtaposed was interesting, especially with a few chapters covering the same scene from the two detective’s perspectives.
(Interesting aside: this 1995 Mysterious Press edition has Charlene's husband as Nicky, rather than Ricky. Threw me for a bit, as I was realizing the name wasn't right, but couldn't recall Ricky’s name off the top of my head while I was reading. Unsure if he was mentioned in any earlier books.)
August 16, 2012
A meeting of Marcia Muller's Sharon McCone and Bill Pronzini's "Nameless Detective".
In 1984 when the novel was written, Muller and Pronzini were about to collaberate on 1001 Midnights: The Aficionado’s Guide to Mystery and Detective Fiction (1986). Apparently the collaberation worked, the couple are now married.
Sharon McCone & The Nameless Detective - Sharon McCone has come home to her warm, troubled family, to San Diego and a convention of private detectives in a posh seaside hotel. For Sharon it's a chance to catch up with old friends--all except for the one who fell four stories from one of the hotel spires. Now, Sharon is determined to find out why her friend died. Her tale alternates with that of "Nameless", who Sharon refers to as "Wolf".
In 1984 when the novel was written, Muller and Pronzini were about to collaberate on 1001 Midnights: The Aficionado’s Guide to Mystery and Detective Fiction (1986). Apparently the collaberation worked, the couple are now married.
Sharon McCone & The Nameless Detective - Sharon McCone has come home to her warm, troubled family, to San Diego and a convention of private detectives in a posh seaside hotel. For Sharon it's a chance to catch up with old friends--all except for the one who fell four stories from one of the hotel spires. Now, Sharon is determined to find out why her friend died. Her tale alternates with that of "Nameless", who Sharon refers to as "Wolf".
February 13, 2010
This collaboration between Marcia Muller and her husband Bill Pronzini didn't work for me the way the rest of the Sharon McCone series does.
Normally the continuous Sharon viewpoint plunges me into her feelings and relationships and doesn't give me a moment to resurface. With the chapter-by-chapter viewpoint tradeoff, between Marcia Muller's Sharon and Bill Pronzini's Unnamed Detective aka "Wolf," at the halfway point I still hadn't gotten particularly involved with any of the characters. I even paused in DOUBLE to reread two favorites. By the end, as the mysteries converged, the momentum picked up and I finished it in one reading.
Normally the continuous Sharon viewpoint plunges me into her feelings and relationships and doesn't give me a moment to resurface. With the chapter-by-chapter viewpoint tradeoff, between Marcia Muller's Sharon and Bill Pronzini's Unnamed Detective aka "Wolf," at the halfway point I still hadn't gotten particularly involved with any of the characters. I even paused in DOUBLE to reread two favorites. By the end, as the mysteries converged, the momentum picked up and I finished it in one reading.
July 25, 2012
Written with his wife, each takes a chapter for their character and they alternate. Muller's P.I., McCone, meets Nameless at a PI Convention in San Diego near the Hotel Del Coronado. The back and forth switching was annoying and frequently I found myself attributing action to the wrong PI. Couldn't keep track of who was detecting what. Started out slow and then got pretty good as many seemingly related events went off on independent tracks but a growing death count gave the appearance of a grand conspiracy.
January 27, 2012
Sharon McCone has gone home to San Diego to attend a convention of private investigators and to sort out some family business. She runs in to the “Nameless Detective,” another P.I. from San Francisco, whom Sharon calls Wolf. When a friend of Sharon’s dies at the convention hotel by falling from a high story balcony, Sharon and Wolf team up to investigate. The other team for this book is Marcia Muller and her author husband, Bill Pronzini. Great job.
March 4, 2011
I think this pairing worked well overall, but it might have been a little clunky. I had never read the nameless detective series, and found the character, who Sharon McCone calls Wolf, attractive. The two meet up at a dttective's convention and embark together on solving a steamy mystery involving kidnapping, adventerous sex, and zoo animals.
May 24, 2015
Good story. Entertaining; exciting; suspenseful
Sharon McCone has come home to her warm, troubled family, to San Diego and a convention of private detectives in a posh seaside hotel. For Sharon it's a chance to catch up with old friends--all except for the one who fell four stories from one of the hotel spires. Now, Sharon is determined to find out why her friend died.
Sharon McCone has come home to her warm, troubled family, to San Diego and a convention of private detectives in a posh seaside hotel. For Sharon it's a chance to catch up with old friends--all except for the one who fell four stories from one of the hotel spires. Now, Sharon is determined to find out why her friend died.
April 21, 2008
Marcia Muller and her husband worked on this novel with two interlining stories with Sharon and Wolf, the nameless narrator in Pronzini's novels. I think his wolf is interesting and worth looking in to in the future for myself. But this is a great mystery.
November 29, 2014
When a friend is murdered Sharon McCone starts to investigate. When she is arrested the "Nameless Detective" who was investigating a missing boy at the same location comes to her aid in Casa del Rey in Mexico.
February 24, 2014
Enjoyable .. the format was set up to go back and forth from Nameless's point-of-view to Sharon McCone's point-of-view. They sort of work together to solve 3 mysteries and Nameless comes to the rescue...well, I'll let you read about it yourself.
May 3, 2015
Someone falls to her death in the middle of a private eye convention, and the only attendees who care are the two main characters? Not a great story idea, but Pronzini and Muller somehow make it work.
March 29, 2016
Not fond of this one. The mystery was Ok, although the story was somewhat distasteful. The back and forth narration was definitely confusing. Sometimes the dialog was so vague I'd need to go back to the chapter heading to see which narrator I was reading. Just so-so.
March 2, 2017
A good book, although a little tedious to read with the alternating perspectives between McCone and Wolf.
April 7, 2020
I would classify this book as a detective mystery; and here, you get two for the price of one. The book was written by the husband and wife team of Marcia Muller who writes the Sharon McCone series and Bill Pronzini who writes the Nameless Detective series. Each chapter alternates between Sharon McCone and the Nameless Detective aka Wolf. They each write in first person with their point of view of the investigation. This was a satisfying collaboration! The chapters written about Wolf have a noir feel about them. There are lots of snappy dialogue, descriptive details, and a climax that contains plenty of action and suspense.
Private Investigator, Sharon McCone, has returned to her hometown of San Diego to attend the National Society of Investigators. It is being held at the Casa del Rey Hotel which is a cross between gothic and Spanish architecture. She will be staying with her parents, but she is excited to meet old friends - "it was going to be a great weekend". One of those friends is another detective she has nicknamed Wolf and represents a fatherly figure to her. We never learn his real name, but he is the classic private eye who is totally into detective work and really has no other life. He's also very honest. She meets another old friend named Elaine Picard who was her supervisor and mentor when she worked in security for Huston's Department Store 10 years previously. Elaine is now head of security at the hotel. She appears haggard, thin, agitated, distracted, and tired looking.
Later Wolf sees a woman falling over a balcony of a four story tower at the hotel. It turns out to be Sharon's friend Elaine. Was she pushed off, committed suicide, or accidently fell off? Fearing the police will stop at suicide and not look any further, and being dedicated detectives who need an answer, Sharon and Wolf take off and do some sleuthing of their own. They report back to each otherperiodically, compare notes, and head off again on separate leads. There are, of course, plenty of suspects.
Subplots include:
- Sharon is staying at her family home during the conference. Her mother is continually trying to marry her off, and her retired father has lately been singing ribald Irish pub songs at the top of his voice. Her brother John is getting a divorce, wants sole custody of his kids, and has no job or place to live. Everyone wants Sharon to talk to him and change his mind.
- Taking a walk to the beach, Wolf encounters a little boy named Timmy Ferguson who is sitting outside bungalow 6 at the hotel. Timmy says he doesn't like his mother who makes him afraid and that his father lives in Mexico in a town with monkeys in it. A woman comes out to retrieve Timmy, and Wolf assumes that she is his mother. Wolf leaves but the scenario bothers him; and when he inquires about the woman and little boy at the front desk, the staff insist the bungalow has been empty for a couple of weeks. Was Timmy kidnapped? Where did he disappear to? Wolf's conscience declares he must look into this situation. This leads to other secret guests that the staff claim don't exist. He travels down to Mexico on a hunch to find Timmy.
- Another lead has Sharon confronting a man named Rich Woodall who has a small illegal zoo in his back yard. Sharon thought Rick and Elaine were seeing each other, but Rick tells her a story that sounds very fishy. Elaine was really seeing Henry Nyland, a politician running for public office.
- Several more murders happen including Rich Woodall , Jim Lauterbach who was a dishonest alcoholic P.I. who might have been blackmailing several people, Lloyd Beddoes who was manager of the Casa del Rey - did Elaine find out something shady he and Victor Ibarcena (assistant manager at the hotel) were involving the hotel in?, and Karyn Sugarman, a psychotherapist who was in love with Elaine. Victor Ibarcena later disappears.
- A kinky sex club out in the desert at Borrego Springs named Les Club is where the climax of the investigation takes place and Sharon finds another dead body and almost loses her life. Wolf arrives in the nick of time and rescues Sharon.
This was a satisfying convoluted story with an ending that tied the story threads up. "Everything was like a chain reaction, with one catalyst setting off three separate but connected personal explosions...all these people with all their little scams that they didn't want exposed..." Lots of twists and turns and a red herring or two. Highly recommended.
Private Investigator, Sharon McCone, has returned to her hometown of San Diego to attend the National Society of Investigators. It is being held at the Casa del Rey Hotel which is a cross between gothic and Spanish architecture. She will be staying with her parents, but she is excited to meet old friends - "it was going to be a great weekend". One of those friends is another detective she has nicknamed Wolf and represents a fatherly figure to her. We never learn his real name, but he is the classic private eye who is totally into detective work and really has no other life. He's also very honest. She meets another old friend named Elaine Picard who was her supervisor and mentor when she worked in security for Huston's Department Store 10 years previously. Elaine is now head of security at the hotel. She appears haggard, thin, agitated, distracted, and tired looking.
Later Wolf sees a woman falling over a balcony of a four story tower at the hotel. It turns out to be Sharon's friend Elaine. Was she pushed off, committed suicide, or accidently fell off? Fearing the police will stop at suicide and not look any further, and being dedicated detectives who need an answer, Sharon and Wolf take off and do some sleuthing of their own. They report back to each otherperiodically, compare notes, and head off again on separate leads. There are, of course, plenty of suspects.
Subplots include:
- Sharon is staying at her family home during the conference. Her mother is continually trying to marry her off, and her retired father has lately been singing ribald Irish pub songs at the top of his voice. Her brother John is getting a divorce, wants sole custody of his kids, and has no job or place to live. Everyone wants Sharon to talk to him and change his mind.
- Taking a walk to the beach, Wolf encounters a little boy named Timmy Ferguson who is sitting outside bungalow 6 at the hotel. Timmy says he doesn't like his mother who makes him afraid and that his father lives in Mexico in a town with monkeys in it. A woman comes out to retrieve Timmy, and Wolf assumes that she is his mother. Wolf leaves but the scenario bothers him; and when he inquires about the woman and little boy at the front desk, the staff insist the bungalow has been empty for a couple of weeks. Was Timmy kidnapped? Where did he disappear to? Wolf's conscience declares he must look into this situation. This leads to other secret guests that the staff claim don't exist. He travels down to Mexico on a hunch to find Timmy.
- Another lead has Sharon confronting a man named Rich Woodall who has a small illegal zoo in his back yard. Sharon thought Rick and Elaine were seeing each other, but Rick tells her a story that sounds very fishy. Elaine was really seeing Henry Nyland, a politician running for public office.
- Several more murders happen including Rich Woodall , Jim Lauterbach who was a dishonest alcoholic P.I. who might have been blackmailing several people, Lloyd Beddoes who was manager of the Casa del Rey - did Elaine find out something shady he and Victor Ibarcena (assistant manager at the hotel) were involving the hotel in?, and Karyn Sugarman, a psychotherapist who was in love with Elaine. Victor Ibarcena later disappears.
- A kinky sex club out in the desert at Borrego Springs named Les Club is where the climax of the investigation takes place and Sharon finds another dead body and almost loses her life. Wolf arrives in the nick of time and rescues Sharon.
This was a satisfying convoluted story with an ending that tied the story threads up. "Everything was like a chain reaction, with one catalyst setting off three separate but connected personal explosions...all these people with all their little scams that they didn't want exposed..." Lots of twists and turns and a red herring or two. Highly recommended.
April 30, 2019
I've been fairly consistent in my feeling that Marcia Muller is slowly becoming a better writer as she has moved along with her Sharon McCone series, but I didn't particularly like this effort with her husband, Bill Pronzini. I may have assumed that he — who has been a good editor of several anthologies I've read — would bring up the story line and dialogue. Maybe I just don't like this format but whatever it was, I thought that this was a simple, bit silly effort.
McCone and Pronzini's character, the 'nameless' detective, both travel to San Diego to take part in a private detectives conference — already too unrealistic for my taste. Both characters don't really want to be there and they mostly missed all of it. But McCone knows the head of security at the hotel where the conference is being held, so that seems to be one of her goals being there.
Only thing -- the woman is working and is apparently very busy as well as distracted by something. And she soon ends up dead.
Nameless doesn't even have that for why he is there, so he seems to glum onto another odd ball detective and McCone for some interest. And he tends to wander around the hotel — a lot.
Such is the situation as you hear it first from one and then the other in alternative chapters. It makes for slow reading. And for quite a bit of the book not much happens other than missed calls, hunting for each other and the 'suspects.' So .... rather slow reading for me. And not much suspense.
This book was written in the 1980s, so I'll give them some space for the simpleness but considering some of the really outstanding mystery writers out there, I'm not sure why I continued to the end ... other than having a box of Muller and Pronzini books that a neighbor gave me. So I have them — just don't think I'll be raving about the quality any time soon.
McCone and Pronzini's character, the 'nameless' detective, both travel to San Diego to take part in a private detectives conference — already too unrealistic for my taste. Both characters don't really want to be there and they mostly missed all of it. But McCone knows the head of security at the hotel where the conference is being held, so that seems to be one of her goals being there.
Only thing -- the woman is working and is apparently very busy as well as distracted by something. And she soon ends up dead.
Nameless doesn't even have that for why he is there, so he seems to glum onto another odd ball detective and McCone for some interest. And he tends to wander around the hotel — a lot.
Such is the situation as you hear it first from one and then the other in alternative chapters. It makes for slow reading. And for quite a bit of the book not much happens other than missed calls, hunting for each other and the 'suspects.' So .... rather slow reading for me. And not much suspense.
This book was written in the 1980s, so I'll give them some space for the simpleness but considering some of the really outstanding mystery writers out there, I'm not sure why I continued to the end ... other than having a box of Muller and Pronzini books that a neighbor gave me. So I have them — just don't think I'll be raving about the quality any time soon.
April 18, 2022
My first dip into both the Sharon McCone and Man with no name Murder mysteries is the crossover novel written by husband and wife. While I think the dual perspective and their different methods worked well together, in a 270 page book not getting into the case until near page 100 gave it some real pacing issues, though some of that may have been not reading any previous novels from these authors or characters. There’s some good turns to the case, and it does a great job weaving all the potential red herrings into a convincing conclusion.
September 3, 2024
I had a hard time with this one, through no fault of the writers. The chapters go back and forth in first person narrative between the two detectives, and it hangs together as a whole very nicely. There is plenty of action and deduction - and I kept reading one chapter and putting it down before the next change of narrator, as if I was reading a series of short stories instead of a cohesive narrative novel (which it is!). The story is very complicated, and the solution more so - many schemes cross paths simultaneously - but overall enjoyable.
March 18, 2019
Somehow I had missed this Sharon McCone mystery. It was a fun book written by Muller and her husband, told from two perspectives: Sharon's and "Wolf", the unnamed detective, also from San Francisco. The two meet up at a Detective's Convention in San Diego and end up working related cases of a murder and a missing boy. THIS is the book where Sharon gets shot in the rear--an incident she refers to while on other cases. It was a fun read.
October 18, 2022
At a Detective Convention in her home town of San Diego, Sharon doubles up with the Nameless Dectective (Bill Pronzini, author) to solve a string of mysteries involving murder, kidnapping and kinky lifestyles. They make a good pair!
October 15, 2017
Another good yarn from Muller, although the plot was a bit more over the top and the violence more than I prefer.
April 12, 2019
A joint book by Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini.
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