Created by Dietrich Kalteis
FITCH HENRY HAUT isn’t a P.I., but he should be.
And maybe he would be, if he could hang around for more than one book. But that doesn’t seem likely.
The prognosis for Fitch is grim. When we meet him in his one and likely only appearance, 2022’s noirish action thriller Nobody from Somewhere, he’s long retired from the police and knocking on heaven’s door, living in “The Happy Camper,” a battered and decrepit Winnebago somewhere in British Columbia, coughing up blood and being nagged about seeing a doctor by his wife, Annie.
His dead wife Annie.
It’s not dark yet, but it’s getting there…
And then, while working his way through the meatloaf special at a local diner (a highlight of his week), he spots Wren, a fifteen-year-old runaway being forced by two thugs into their car. But somehow the old ex-cop gets her away and they take off in his Winnebago.
And the chase is on… and Fitch and Wren, who’s fleeing from an abusive foster parent, are tangling with everything from low-level car thieves and scam artists with big dreams to the Chinese Triad.
Kalteis has that direct, no-frills way of writing about people who may not always be the most brightest Crayolas in the box, portraying them with empathy and even compassion–not always a given in noir fiction, where smug condescension and mockery too often rule. Elmore Leonard had that gift, and so does Kalteis, and he employs it with a wallop here.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Novelist and short story writer Dietrich Kalteis’ debut, Ride the Lightning, has been called one of the best Vancouver crime novels, and his other crime fiction is well worth investigating as well. He lives on in Vancouver, British Columbia, and spends as much time as possible in California.
UNDER OATH
- “A brisk pace and sharp attention to character help propel this lean story of chance encounters amid a battle for survival. Fans of gritty crime fiction will be gratified.”
— Publishers Weekly
NOVELS
- Nobody from Somewhere (2022) | Buy this book | Buy the audio | Kindle it!
