Web e-books
Category:
Crime
Publisher: web e-books
ISBN-10: 1495166333
Type: Fiction
Pages: 315
Copyright: 2015
ISBN-13: 9781495166334
Price: $5.95 (eBook)
PI novel set in Manhattan during the 1980s when art galleries and model agencies were the two most glamorous businesses in the world. Dangerously well written.
Read Chapter 1 here: https://www.lit4u.com/art-and-beauty-chapter-1/
Literary Titan says, “The fascinating and complex characters are highly entertaining, especially in the well-drawn and alluring backdrop of New York City’s world of glamour and modeling.”
Kindle Edition on Amazon, $5.75 ebook/dp/B0H2FGNX46
(Web-E-Books has shut down... Editor there gave best review so far: "Bruce Deitrick Price puts a new spin on the all-American, sexy, fast-talking detective story by creating a truly fresh crime-fighter personality and placing his original P.I. character, Jon Dak, among movers and shakers in the NYC art and fashion world."
Mensa Bulletin says: “Art and Beauty follows private detective Jon Dak (Call me Dak.) who becomes embroiled in the domestic and business problems of Elaine and Greg Sutton and their teenage son Jason. What starts out as a messy and vindictive divorce proceeding segues into a series of grisly murders. Dak is dragged into a wheels-within-wheels situation that may kill him if he doesn’t solve the murders.”
Art and Beauty answers the question, what would Raymond Chandler have done with Manhattan
Ebook only. 5.95.
NOTE: web-e-books. no longer exists!...Now, Art & Beauty is: Kindle Edition on Amazon, $5.75 ebook/dp/B0H2FGNX46
When PI Jon Dak provides security for a chi-chi art opening, he meets Elaine Sutton, the high-strung owner of the prestigious Pinnacle Gallery. Toward the end of the party, husband Greg Sutton swaggers in with his new girlfriend, a supermodel named Cindi.
As the parents squabble, Dak meets the family’s third member, 16-year-old Jason, a cool and bossy young man. For one embarrassing moment, each parent grabs an arm as if they will rip the child apart.
A week later Miss Babbage, the elderly owner of a model agency, interviews Dak on behalf of a friend. Very likely that friend would be Greg Sutton, also a leader in the model agency business. A few days later, Elaine Sutton calls to discuss her divorce; she might want to hire Jon Dak to find dirt on her husband. In short order, both husband and wife hire Dak and give him a retainer. But then each demands that he NOT work for the other. Lawyers call and threaten him. The checks end up in escrow.
Frustrated and angry, Dak needs to figure what makes these people so obnoxious. More to the point, he wants to find a way to make money from all this craaziness. Elaine Sutton seems to have had an affair with a famous artist, who died two years earlier. What happened to his estate? Then a contact tells Dak that one of the women in Craig Sutton’s business empire was brutally mutilated four years before. Who did it?
Meanwhile, Dak’s inquiries trigger an alarm. Returning to his building, he find two well-dressed goons hanging around. There is a subtle threat waiting when he reaches his office.
Then the girlfriend is murdered, the beautiful Cindi.
At this point Jon Dak has far more mysteries than answers. The only thing he knows for sure is that he needs to solve these mysteries before they sweep him away. It’s time to go to war.
Jon Dak is a tough guy, often charming, sometimes witty. The story doesn’t turn so much on violence and clues as on Dak’s ability to read people and situations. He’s New York City shrewd. Whether you are the hunter or the hunted, you have to know what the other animals are thinking.
“Art and Beauty” is a big complex story that sprawls over the city's neighborhoods and social strata.
PS: The starting point for this book was the question: what would Raymond Chandler do with Manhattan?
See sample (Chapter 1).
Excerpt
This e-book is available only on web-e-books. http://www.web-e-books.com/artandbeauty/default.php
Live dangerously: Take a trip into Manhattan’s dark canyons. Money, status, fame, success, sex,, These are big priorities for the big players.
Manhattan is an elegant jungle where the most talented and ambitious people go to strut their stuff. if you don’t have an A-game, don’t move to Manhattan. You’ll end up waiting tables or driving a cab. And those are the good options.
Everything moves fast. People are making deals all the time. They scheme and dream at a high-level. they take big chances.
A JON DAK ADVENTURE
"What God abandoned, these defended,
and saved the sum of things for pay."
A . E. Housman
Chapter 1
Dak saunters through the vast white gallery. It’s at the exact center of Soho. The rent must be scary. By the righthand wall, two men are setting up a bar. The paintings all around him are huge and jarring, also very colorful. They have words on them. LIFE IS NOT WHAT YOU EXPECTED TO EXPERIENCE.
Dak frowns. Not happy about being here, about taking a guard job for extra money. The things you do when business is slow. What the hell. Let's get it done.
Halfway back on the left is a curved counter, sort of a command post. A young man stands behind the counter, watchfully. Dak wanders over, smiles at the young man. "Looking for Mrs. Sutton."
The man, wearing a white shirt and a blank expression, squints at Dak, some kind of appraisal. "I'm Charles,” as if Dak would welcome the chance to speak with him.
"Hello, Charles. Where's Mrs. Sutton?"
Faintly annoyed, Charles points to a half-open door further back along the right side. A small sign says: PRIVATE.
Dak walks over, knocks, goes in. He finds a dark-haired woman at a desk. Expensively dressed in deep blues and burgundy. She looks up sharply, giving Dak the same squinty appraisal. Very in charge, Dak decides, except perhaps where it matters.
"Yes?"
"I'm Jon Dak.”
"What? Oh, security." She stands up, comes from behind the desk, giving Dak a closer look, frowning. "I distinctly said blue blazer, white shirt, and gray trousers."
Dak gives her his caught-in-the-act smile. Standing there in his Harris tweed jacket 42-long, Oxford blue shirt open at the neck, dark slacks, black Reeboks. "Gee, I'm real sorry," he says finally. "I took this last minute."
Elaine Sutton puts her hands on her hips and hyperventilates a little. She's a sleek, elegant sort, late thirties, hair pulled back, shrewd eyes. "I distinctly said," she repeats dramatically.
Dak tries out the slightly dangerous smile. "You think I look like somebody here to buy art?"
Mrs. Sutton drops her hands, even manages a smile. "Well, perhaps not."
A nice trim figure, Dak thinks. Lots of aerobics probably. Something tense and high-strung about her. Worried, Dak thinks, about something besides him.
"Mrs. Sutton ...how about this?" Dak stands like a cop at an intersection, shoulders squared, hands clasped behind his back, staring resolutely at the horizon.
"Yes, I see what you mean."
"What's the problem anyway? Somebody puts one of these billboards under his coat?"
Mrs. Sutton gives him another sharp look. No jokes about the art, please.
Dak stares pleasantly.
She shrugs. "People mustn't touch. And a guard adds to the tone."
"Oh, I get it," Dak says gamely. "I'm window dressing. Don't you worry. They'll know why I'm here."
"Yes, yes. I suppose so." More squinty looks. "You do have a certain....menace."
"They touch the things," Dak says deadpan, "I shoot them or what?"
"Oh my goodness! No, of course not."
"Just checking." Dak gives her a lazy smile.
She studies him carefully for a moment. Reassessing perhaps. A look Dak has seen many times. "Fine," she says. "Just stand around like that."
"Any particular place?"
Mrs. Sutton starts to tell him, changes her mind. "Whatever you think best." A faint smile....
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The free sample is Chapter 1 in its entirety.
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