Mike Garrity

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Created by Thomas B. Cavanagh

“I have a tumor in my head. I call it Bob . . .”

When we first come across him in the appropriately titled Head Games (2007), things aren’t looking so hot for retired Orlando homicide dick MIKE GARRITY.

He’s in his early forties, twice divorced, and has a teenage daughter, Jennifer, who despises him. He’s more or less unemployed, his P.I. license still in the works. His battered old Ford pickup is making strange sounds, and he’s living in a dump of an apartment. And he’s got a brain tumor that will most likely kill him in a few months.

So… fun times.

Mike’s determined to face his “close, personal relationship with the Grim Reaper” with quiet resignation, and grim humor. He calls the tumor Bob, and pictures him building a house, remodeling his brain.

“The doc says I can’t actually feel the tumor. I’m imagining it. It’s all in my head. I told him “No shit.”

But Christ you know it ain’t easy. Even the Twinkies aren’t helping.

So when a fellow retired cop, George Neuheisel, now working as security for a big shot local talent agency, calls him up, offering him a job, Mike realizes he could sure use the distraction. And the money.

George wants Mike to find TJ Sommerset, the missing lead singer of the super-popular, platinum-selling boy band Boyz Klub, who are about to go on a world tour. Coincidentally Jennifer’s favorite band, Mike takes there job, figuring it for a slam dunk, hoping he’ll score enough to at least leave Jennifer a little nest egg, and maybe, just maybe, make her think more kindly of him when he’s gone.

Maybe.

But the hunt turns out to be far from simple, and Mike soon finds himself in over his head in the fetid swamp of the Orlando underworld most Disney World-bound tourists never get to see, full of gonzo reprobates and severed body parts. Carl Hiaasen fans should feel right at home.

Head Games was a solid read, a promising shot across the bow with the author earning a lot of praise (and a Shamus nomination) for his nailing of the swampy Florida milieu, and the surprising amount of heart and heat he brought to Mike’s predicament. Likewise, kudos for Mike’s snappy first-person narration that fans of Chandler will appreciate. But as the first of a proposed series?

A sequel, Prodigal Son, was published the following year, but how long can you milk a dying dick? The solution was that Mike isn’t dying anymore–he’s  undergone surgery, and he’s in remission. Which is great news for Mike, except that he’s blown through his life savings, and now, reluctantly, he actually has to get back to work. Oh, and Jennifer still hates him.

It’s a solid enough P.I. tale, and once again Cavanagh handles things like a pro, even keeping Bob (or at least his ghost) around, as Mikegets romantically involved with Debbie Watson, a member of his cancer support group whose future doesn’t seem so bright. Which leads to her asking Mike to hunt down the son she gave up for adoption a couple of decades ago. 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Television writer (he’s worked for Disney) and novelist Thomas B. Cavanagh also writes about another couple of Orlando private eyes, Sandy Corrigan and Kevin Lonnegan. The author lives in Central Florida with his family.

UNDER OATH

  • “Cavanagh infuses the classic private-eye novel with a bit of dark humor, realistic dialogue, and a clear vision of central Florida.”
    –South Florida Sun Sentinel on Head Games
  • “Cavanagh’s ambitious debut has a terrific premise and many appealing touches, including an unbeatable cliffhanger.”
    — Kirkus ReviewsonHead Games
  • “Head Games is a sharp and convincing new take on the private-eye novel, underscored with the sobering tang of mortality.”
    — Wallace Stroby
  • “Head Games is a next generation hard-boiled detective novel with a Travis McGee–styled hero whose sidekick is a brain-tumor named Bob. Flat-out funny, smart, and refreshingly humane, this Florida thriller is set in the whacked-out pre-fab world of Orlando, between Sea World and Disney, where money talks, boy bands rule, and asking too many questions could get a dying man killed. This is a nail-biter with a heart.”
    –N. M. Kelby on Prodigal Son
  • “[A] thriller that reads like a high-speed theme park ride . . . with dark humor so sharp it’ll make you bleed.”
    — Brian Freeman    “Fans of the classic PI novel will hope to see more of this wonderfully crotchety protagonist—with or without Bob. ”
    — Publishers Weekly on Prodigal Son

NOVELS

RIYL

  • Tumor by Joshua Hale Fialkov & Noel Tuazon

FURTHER INVESTIGATION

Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.

Published

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