Created by Robert S. Levinson
(1936-2018)
JOSH WAINWRIGHT is an ex-LAPD officer obsessed with proving that eccentric music producer Clyde “Mr. Magic” Davenport is somehow responsible for the death of his wife, superstar singer Katie Sunshine, shot by a sniper while participating in a local telethon years ago.
And, as the current co-owner of International Celebrity Services, a security service for the rich and famous, he’s in a good position to do something about it in In the Key of Death, a 2008 novel by Robert S. Levinson.
But things become decidedly more perverse and twisted when Mr. Magic himself becomes a suspect in the death of a Vegas showgirl and hires Josh to clear him, fully aware Josh would rather string him up.
I tell ya, Mr. Magic makes Phil Spector look like John Boy Walton.
Levinson, who worked for years in the music industry, gets right under the skin of it and roots around with glee, making this one of the rare books I can recall that gets the rock’n’roll biz right.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Robert S. Levinson (1936-2018) was the best-selling author of the Neil Gulliver and Stevie Marriner series, as well as several other thrillers (including one featuring 1930s Hollywood fixer Chris Blanchard), while his short stories appeared regularly in Ellery Queen and Alfred Hitchcock mystery magazines. He was a Derringer Award winner, won the Ellery Queen Readers Award recognition three times, a frequent Shamus finalist (and one-time winner), and was regularly included in “year’s best” anthologies. He resided in Los Angeles with his wife, Sandra, and Rosie, a “loving Besenji mix.”
He was a tireless promoter of the Southern California chapter of the Mystery Writers of America, a ray of sunshine at many a mystery convention and just a fun and generous guy. I’ll miss him.
NOVELS
- In the Key of Death (2008) | Buy this book
Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.
