Created by Dick Lochte
Quiet and bookish, recovering alcoholic TERRY MANION is a private eye who’s just been sprung from a New Orleans rehab joint when he discovers that his best friend and mentor J.J. Legendre, a fellow investigator, has committed suicide, in the pulpy, zippy Blue Bayou (1992).
But J.J’s not the only one–seems a rash of suspicious suicides has hit the city. Still mourning the loss of his friend, he teams up with Nadia Wells, an ex-madam who runs a detective agency that used to employ both Terry and J.J., to investigate.
And all hell breaks loose.
Enough hell, in fact, that Terry returned a few years later in a sequel, The Neon Smile (1995), another pulpy romp. Terry’s on the suicide beat again, this time hired to look into the alleged suicide–while in jail–of Tyrone Pano, a Black activist accused of murdering a woman thirty years earlier–a case that J.J. himself had worked.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Author Lochte also writes about Los Angeles private eye Leo Bloodworth, who appears with Terry in Laughing Dog (1988), the second in that series, as well as in the 1997 short story “A Tough Case to Figure.”
His Lucky Dog and Other Tales of Murder (2000), published by Five Star, includes stories featuring Terry, Leo and D.A.’s investigator J.J. Legendre (New Orleans in the Sixties). It also includes a reprint of “Sad-Eyed Blonde,” his excellent entry in the Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowecollection from a few years back.
Lochte is the author of a ton of great crime novels, including Sleeeping Dog (1985), which introduced mismatched sleuths Leo Bloodworth & Serendipity Dahlquist, which was nominated for an Edgar, won the Nero Wolfe award and was named one of the “100 Favorite Mysteries of the Century” by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association. More recently he wrote Blues in the Night (2012), featuring Dave “Mace” Mason.
A past president of the Private Eye Writers of America, Lochte has co-written several mysteries with celebrities such as the Today Show‘s Al Roker and attorney Christopher Darden, written screenplays for such actors as Jodie Foster, Martin Sheen and Roger Moore and knows more about crime and detective movies than just about anyone on the planet. His crime fiction column ran for nearly a decade in the Los Angeles Times and earned him the 2003 Ellen Nehr Award for Excellence in Mystery Reviewing, and he later reviewed audiobooks for Mystery Scene. He lives in Southern California.
UNDER OATH
- “A darkly comedic New Orleans primer–with the food, music, and heat interrupted by bullets. Eccentric characters, rococo plot, and a fast, furious read.”
— Kirkus Reviews on Blue Bayou - “ The Neon Smile is as colorful and entertaining as any police thriller ever inspired by The Big Easy.”
Joseph Wambaugh - “I couldn’t put The Neon Smile down. Terry Manion grabbed me on page one and pulled me deeper and tighter with every passing line! Dick Lochte is an artist, the book is literate, intelligent, funny, loving and a helluva good read.”
— Robert Crais - “Dick Lochte is a superb craftsman . . . The Neon Smile, with its tantalizing blend of past and present, is Lochte at his best.”
— Sue Grafton - “Over a dozen richly drawn characters . . . Chockful of dark humor, wordplay and subtle clues, the novel is rich enough to reward multiple readings.”
–Publisher’s Weekly on The Neon Smile (starred review)
NOVELS
- Blue Bayou (1992) | Buy this book | Kindle it!
- The Neon Smile (1995) | Buy this book | Kindle it!
SHORT STORIES
- “A Tough Case to Figure” (March 1997, EQMM)
- “Get The Message” (1998, Louisiana Literature)
COLLECTIONS
- Lucky Dog and Other Tales of Murder (2000) | Buy this book
FURTHER INVESTIGATION
Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.
