Perhaps, and just perhaps or just by chance or just by good fortune, your sometimes mellow MesaZona blogger gets really over-excited and way beyond-thrilled to the bone and marrow to connect with the mysterious fictional hero David Mapstone, created in words published on pulp paper for inquisitive and curious minds who love to read local stories firsthand, removed at a distance from hard-to-face realities that
connect the past to the present to obliterate the convenient group amnesia that takes over too many chapters in Arizona's murky history.
Talton celebrates investigative reporting and deplores the real-estate development that has damaged Phoenix as he delves into the dirty past and politics of the city.
Jon Talton Official Author Website http://www.jontalton.com/news.html
The real-life subject of Jon Talton's most recent adult fiction novel is a reporter whose professional life and car gets blown-up in-the-line of duty to report the news. At the same time some people have said he was an undercover FBI agent on a mission to uncover foul play in Phoenix - an assignment that forever ended his life.That might have been the end of the story back then for those who never caught killing a news reporter.
Not now though: It's an open case for those curious enough to bust through an attack on the media killing the messenger with no potential catastrophic consequences to punish the perpetrators. Let's get into it
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Talton's new mystery work of fiction is readily adaptable to the big screen if any industrious media agent wants to option the rights from the author.
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Coming in May:
The Bomb Shelter, The 9th David Mapstone Mystery
"Forty years ago, a Phoenix reporter was killed by a car bomb in one of America’s most notorious crimes. Three men went to prison but was the assassination ever really solved? Did the kingpin who ordered the hit get away with it? It’s a case custom-made for David Mapstone, the historian-turned-sheriff’s deputy. But the past never rests easy in Arizona and when Mapstone’s boss, Sheriff Mike Peralta, promises to reopen the investigation, new murders commence.
The crimes are reenactments of Phoenix’s mob-riddled past, where gangsters rubbed elbows with the city’s elite amid crosscurrents of corrupt cops, political payoffs, gambling, prostitution, and murder cloaked by the sunshine of a resort city. But who is committing them now? A former soldier who is an explosives expert and deadly with a knife? A woman with screen-siren looks and extraordinary computer skills? Or someone out of Phoenix’s seamy, swinging 1970s with secrets to keep?
Mapstone will need all the help he can get. He enlists a Ph.D. candidate and Black Lives Matter activist to help him comb through secret archives of the original bombing. Mapstone's wife Lindsey, a top hacker, rejoins the Sheriff’s Office and plays a dangerous cat-and-mouse game — one that goes from the digital to the real and risky world. In the house of mirrors from the 1970s killing, they must find the key that connects the past to the present.
The crimes are reenactments of Phoenix’s mob-riddled past, where gangsters rubbed elbows with the city’s elite amid crosscurrents of corrupt cops, political payoffs, gambling, prostitution, and murder cloaked by the sunshine of a resort city. But who is committing them now? A former soldier who is an explosives expert and deadly with a knife? A woman with screen-siren looks and extraordinary computer skills? Or someone out of Phoenix’s seamy, swinging 1970s with secrets to keep?
Mapstone will need all the help he can get. He enlists a Ph.D. candidate and Black Lives Matter activist to help him comb through secret archives of the original bombing. Mapstone's wife Lindsey, a top hacker, rejoins the Sheriff’s Office and plays a dangerous cat-and-mouse game — one that goes from the digital to the real and risky world. In the house of mirrors from the 1970s killing, they must find the key that connects the past to the present.
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Meet Jon Talton here in Mesa live and in-person:Explore Arizona StoryFest
1 p.m. Saturday May 12th
Mesa Convention Center
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In this swiftly-paced, compelling novel, a big city is trying to keep its darkest history off limits.
Through Mapstone’s wryly witty first-person narrative, Talton expresses his genuine love of Phoenix as it once was, as well as his exasperated but tolerant attachment to the city as it is today. Clear writing, an intricate plot, and credible characters make this entry a winner.— Publishers Weekly
Through Mapstone’s wryly witty first-person narrative, Talton expresses his genuine love of Phoenix as it once was, as well as his exasperated but tolerant attachment to the city as it is today. Clear writing, an intricate plot, and credible characters make this entry a winner.— Publishers Weekly
"Mapstone is hampered by records still under seal but is helped by his hacker wife, Lindsey, and PhD candidate Malik Jones as he pursues the case more as cop than historian. Talton celebrates investigative reporting and deplores the real-estate development that has damaged Phoenix as he delves into the dirty past and politics of the city. The ninth entry in a justly praised series."
— Booklist
— Booklist
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