It's the eve of 1953, and Aloysius Archer is in Los Angeles to ring in the New Year with an old friend, aspiring actress Liberty Callahan, when their evening is interrupted by an acquaintance of Callahan's: Eleanor Lamb, a screenwriter in dire straits.
After a series of increasingly chilling events—mysterious phone calls, the same blue car loitering outside her house, and a bloody knife left in her sink—Eleanor fears that her life is in danger, and she wants to hire Archer to look into the matter. Archer suspects that Eleanor knows more than she's saying, but before he can officially take on her case, a dead body turns up inside of Eleanor's home . . . and Eleanor herself disappears.
Missing client or not, Archer is dead set on finding both the murderer and Eleanor. With the help of Callahan and his partner Willie Dash, he launches an investigation that will take him from mob-ridden Las Vegas to the glamorous world of Hollywood to the darkest corners of Los Angeles—a city in which beautiful faces are attached to cutthroat schemers, where the cops can be more corrupt than the criminals . . . and where the powerful people responsible for his client's disappearance will kill without a moment's hesitation if they catch Archer on their trail.
It's the eve of 1953, and Aloysius Archer is in Los Angeles to ring in the New Year with an old friend, aspiring actress Liberty Callahan, when their evening is interrupted by an acquaintance of Callahan's: Eleanor Lamb, a screenwriter in dire straits.
After a series of increasingly chilling events—mysterious phone calls, the same blue car loitering outside her house, and a bloody knife left in her sink—Eleanor fears that her life is in danger, and she wants to hire Archer to look into the matter. Archer suspects that Eleanor knows more than she's saying, but before he can officially take on her case, a dead body turns up inside of Eleanor's home . . . and Eleanor herself disappears.
Missing client or not, Archer is dead set on finding both the murderer and Eleanor. With the help of Callahan and his partner Willie Dash, he launches an investigation that will take him from mob-ridden Las Vegas to the glamorous world of Hollywood to the darkest corners of Los Angeles—a city in which beautiful faces are attached to cutthroat schemers, where the cops can be more corrupt than the criminals . . . and where the powerful people responsible for his client's disappearance will kill without a moment's hesitation if they catch Archer on their trail.
Critiques-
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February 28, 2022
Bestseller Baldacci’s welcome third outing for PI Aloysius Archer (after 2021’s A Gambling Man) takes Archer, a decorated WWII vet who works for a detective agency in Bay Town, Calif., to Los Angeles to celebrate New Year’s Eve 1952 with actress and love interest Liberty Callahan. That evening, at a restaurant frequented by such stars as Frank Sinatra and Groucho Marx, Callahan introduces Archer to her friend Eleanor Lamb, a screenwriter working on a script for Bette Davis. After Lamb learns of Archer’s profession, she seeks to hire him because she’s gotten middle-of-the-night–hang-up calls, and someone entered her Malibu home and left a bloody knife in her kitchen sink. Lamb’s fears for her life seem justified when she disappears. Right after Archer finds an unknown man shot to death in her house, someone bludgeons the gumshoe into unconsciousness. The tension rises as his subsequent investigation places his own life in danger. Baldacci can be a bit overfond of similes and metaphors (ocean breakers hurl “their sound tentacles”), but otherwise solid prose nicely evokes the traditional hard-boiled whodunit. Raymond Chandler fans will be entertained. Agent: Aaron Priest, Aaron M. Priest Literary. -
Narrator Edoardo Ballerini's confident, masculine voice is well suited to narrate this 1950s murder whodunit featuring private eye Aloysius Archer. Visiting an aspiring actress friend in Los Angeles, Archer is approached by a screenwriter who fears for her life, and then disappears. His investigation leads him beyond glamorous Hollywood to Chinatown and the surrounding desert, where he crosses paths with dangerous criminals. Brittany Pressley delivers the dialogue of all the female characters. She employs stereotypical bombshell voices for most of them, falling short of the opportunity to portray depth in some multilayered women, including Archer's sharp-witted friend, Liberty. Nevertheless, this is an enjoyable listen for noir fans. N.M.C. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine
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April 13, 2022
In the third Aloysius Archer mystery (after A Gambling Man, 2021), it's the early 1950s. A movie writer thinks someone is planning to kill her, and she wants to hire Archer, a private eye, to protect her. But before Archer can even come up with a game plan, his prospective client vanishes. Has she been murdered? Someone close to the missing woman hires Aloysius to find out. But what seems like a relatively straightforward missing-person case soon gets considerably more complicated, not to mention deadly. Baldacci's bibliography is sort of a mixed bag, with some really good books and some that read like imitations of other people's hits. With the Aloysius Archer books, though, he's found himself a winning series. Archer is a WWII veteran who spent time behind bars for a crime he didn't commit; he's a guy trying to get by in a hard world. The author mostly writes stories set in the present day, but in the Archer series, he proves a natural at handling the postwar setting. Baldacci's fans should be lining up for this one.COPYRIGHT(2022) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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June 1, 2022
It's New Year's Eve, 1952. Private Detective Aloysius Archer and his friend and budding actress Liberty Callahan are attending a Hollywood party where she can see and be seen. They are greeted by Liberty's friend Ellie Lamb. When Lamb learns Archer is a P.I., she immediately hires him to find out who is trying to kill her. The very next day Lamb goes missing and a dead man is found in her home. As Archer investigates, he uncovers problems much bigger than the missing Lamb: smuggling, heroin, human trafficking, and the Chinese mafia are only a few of the obstacles Archer must overcome, while narrowly escaping death several times. His relentless investigation brings down the house of cards and sets him on a new footing as a private investigator. Baldacci delights with accurate descriptive details about the politics, social mores, and technology of the 1950s. Audie-winner Edoardo Ballerini and Earphones Award--winner Brittany Pressley expertly offer a wide variety of voices that animate the large cast of male and female characters/suspects. VERDICT Readers of period crime stories and Baldacci fans will enjoy this third installment in the "Archer" series.--Joanna M. Burkhardt
Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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Starred review from March 1, 2022
An old-fashioned gumshoe yarn about Hollywood dreams and dead bodies. Private investigator Aloysius Archer celebrates New Year's Eve 1952 in LA with his gorgeous lady friend and aspiring actress Liberty Callahan. Screenwriter Eleanor Lamb shows up and offers to hire him because "someone might be trying to kill me." "I'm fifty a day plus expenses," he replies, but money's no obstacle. Later, he sneaks into Lamb's house and stumbles upon a body, then gets knocked out by an unseen assailant. Archer takes plenty of physical abuse in the story, but at least he doesn't get a bullet between the eyes like the guy he trips over. A 30-year-old World War II combat veteran, Archer is a righteous and brave hero. Luck and grit keep him alive in both Vegas and the City of Angels, which is rife with gangsters and crooked cops. Not rich at all, his one luxury is the blood-red 1939 Delahaye he likes to drive with the top down. He'd bought it with his gambling winnings in Reno, and only a bullet hole in the windscreen post mars its perfection. Liberty loves Archer, but will she put up with the daily danger of losing him? Why doesn't he get a safe job, maybe playing one of LA's finest on the hit TV show Dragnet? Instead, he's a tough and principled idealist who wants to make the world a better place. Either that or he's simply a "pavement-pounding PI on a slow dance to maybe nowhere." And if some goon doesn't do him in sooner, his Lucky Strikes will probably do him in later. Baldacci paints a vivid picture of the not-so-distant era when everybody smoked, Joe McCarthy hunted commies, and Marilyn Monroe stirred men's loins. The 1950s weren't the fabled good old days, but they're fodder for gritty crime stories of high ideals and lowlifes, of longing and disappointment, and all the trouble a PI can handle. Well-done crime fiction. Baldacci nails the noir.COPYRIGHT(2022) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
