Turnpike Flameout

Publishers Weekly

In Dezenhall's mildly diverting fourth mystery (after 2004's Shakedown Beach), Jonah Eastman, grandson of a late Atlantic City Mafia bigwig, agrees to assist a public relations colleague handling Turnpike Bobby Chin, one-time child star turned '80s rock star ("For a fleeting moment Bobby had become Jersey's second-favorite rocker after Springsteen"). Chin, who's trying for a second comeback, has somehow survived a private plane crash and become the lead suspect in the disappearance-and possible murder-of a local sculptor. Eastman, simultaneously repelled and fascinated by Chin's near-pathological narcissism, soon realizes that his new client is his own worst enemy, though Chin is ably assisted by investigative music journalists after his scalp as well as the not-especially-bright star's own supporters and hangers-on. While the author's narrative skill suffices to keep the plot rolling and tumbling, his would-be colorful characters come off as rejects from one of Elmore Leonard's lesser novels, and their snappy patter sags more often than it snaps. (Jan.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Pollster Jonah Eastman (Shakedown Beach, 2004, etc.) gets a job kissing a comeback king's backside. Bobby Chin was a child star and then a rock idol in the '80s, but he can't buy an audience for his latest act despite the efforts of his crack management team, former porn star Tic and disgraced proctologist Kadaborah. Media consultant Cindi Handler wants Bobby's name and image bandied about 24/7. So when he can't fill the little Golden Prospect Casino, gangster Mickey Price's old stomping ground in Atlantic City, and rumors circulate that he's died in a plane crash in the Pine Barrens, the public and the ACPD smell a publicity stunt. The scent grows stronger when Bobby reappears and is sequestered in his hotel suite. Through an outrageous misunderstanding, he hires Jonah, Mickey's grandson, to find out what became of a vanished sculptor who'd been casting him in bronze. Despite allies like Chief Willie Thundercloud, stripper-turned-psychotherapist Mustang Sally and his elderly gangster pals, Jonah gets kidnapped twice, mugged once and lied to continually. When Bobby's pushed off the tabloid pages by the Kaylee Hopewell abduction, Jonah can salvage his job only with lies and misgivings. Bobby will get his full-color spread but won't live long enough to savor it. A couple of suspect plot twists, but the jabs are first-rate. And who could resist one gangster named Doo-Wop and another operating out of an ice cream truck?