September 16, 2019
At the start of Early’s clever third mystery featuring PI Earl Marcus (after 2018’s In the Valley of the Devil), Marcus returns one night to his home in rural Georgia to find a shooting victim, an unidentified young man, in his yard. Marcus embarks on a surreptitious quest, aided by his best friend, Rufus Gribble, to uncover who committed the killing and why. A cellphone in the victim’s car leads to the Harden School, an isolated institution whose purpose is gay conversion therapy for troubled teenage boys. Complicating the investigation is the school’s connection to Jeb Walsh, a corrupt local politician, white supremacist, and old antagonist of Marcus. The past hangs heavily over the characters, especially Rufus, whose own history becomes entangled with the puzzle, adding depth to a story heavy on psychological introspection. The action builds to the obligatory violent confrontation, but in the end, it’s the characters that the reader will remember. Early does a fine job blending crime and the Southern gothic. Agent: Alec Shane, Writers House.
September 15, 2019
A private investigator fights inner demons and evildoers alike in a tortuous case whose roots go back many years. Earl Marcus has recently lost the sheriff's election to Preston Argent, a corrupt and feckless puppet of the even more corrupt white supremacist Jeb Walsh. So when he finds a dead man on his lawn, he's certain that calling the police will be a bad idea. In the absence of his girlfriend, Atlanta cop Mary Hawkins, who's off in Nevada helping with family problems, Earl's boosted his drinking to a degree that alarms even his closest friends, Rufus, who's blind, and the loyal Ronnie, who's just gotten out of jail for his role in helping Earl in his last case (In the Valley of the Devil, 2018). The one hint of the dead man's identity is a cryptic letter he's carrying addressed to Joe by Dr. Blevins. Earl goes to great pains to hide both the body and the car Joe arrived in, but his conscience forces him to investigate. Earl gets a librarian friend to research Blevins, a teacher who now works at the Harden School for young men with problems. When Earl and Ronnie visit the school pretending to be relatives of a troubled boy, they're turned away but sneak off to investigate further. Earl stumbles upon a nearby waterfall that's inspired legends of a utopia on the other side for anyone who can jump over it. He's not the only one tempted by an alternative to his real life. Rufus also has a troubled past going back to his days working at the Harden School, where gay boys are subjected to conversion therapy. Past and present collide as Earl crisscrosses a North Georgia mountain area that harbors many a secret. A flawed, likable protagonist uses violent methods to solve a complex, compulsively readable case.
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November 15, 2019
Earl Marcus, underemployed Georgia PI, comes home from an evening at his favorite watering hole and finds a dead man on his front lawn, a bullet hole in the neck. The corpse has three dollars in its pocket, along with a mysterious and vaguely threatening letter? Rebellion only works when it is righteous. Does Earl call the police? No. They hate him and would happily pin the murder on him. Not too wisely, he decides to bury the body himself and then investigate. He learns the corpse had been a therapist and science teacher at a nearby reform school that specializes in conversion therapy for "young men who lose their way and require discipline." Creepy enough, and there's more: hints that kids fleeing the harsh school died leaping into nearby Two Indian Falls. The story proceeds with touches of southern gothic, wrapped in a boozy haze. Earl speaks of his long love affair with the bottle. Whiskey, like a woman, is salve but not salvation. The mood is palpable, but it never gets in the way of the brisk pace in this well-told, irresistible story.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)