Tell me, isn’t that a killer and that is only the first page?

Soultown is stone classic.

Here’s the narrator.

Dressed in a tight red skirt and purple spandex bustier, LUPE RAMOS EMERGES FROM THE LA JAILHOUSE.................. ready to begin the first day of her life.

Lupe is looking for her son.

And with her friend WHITNEY, they begin and yeah, it’s not going to be pretty; with a sinking heart, they find among other items, a dead body and worse in the middle of an armed robbery.

The writing is so in your face............ you are truly there... you don’t want to be............ who would, and you know it’s going to get worse.

But the sheer quality of the writing, the lure of Lupe, you stay for the awful ride.

And on they go, into the very mouth of hell.

Defiant and mouthy all the way.

What’s not to love.

You read SOULTOWN AND................. gasp............... at the sheer cojones of this pure spirit of talent.

Then Dogtown........ where it all started.

What a Novel.

Whitney Logan, lawyer, vaguely successful, the rent is 2 months overdue but who’s counting.

And she is soon involved with beloved Lupe, the attorney and the hooker, allied and instead of any resolution, they find............... a dead body................. and to say all hell breaks loose is one of the great understatements.

And the cast of characters that come down the pike..............would restore your faith in the true underbelly of life in all it’s sordid and touching humanity. Few writers could convey real empathy, true hard won compassion like Mercedes.

Both of these books are among the finest noir, the best mystery you’ll ever read and move you to tears, laughter and the true sense like all her heroines has of................. bring it on.

They did.

And she did.

I don’t have too many regrets, but never having met Mercedes is one of the big ones.

And second............... that she never realized she was/is, one of the major players, not just in noir but in mystery.

She breaks my heart with her beautiful writing.

And smashes it with her life of not knowing.

These 2 books stand as witness to one of the truly greats.

I never knew her and I miss her so.

Ken Bruen

DOGTOWN

A Whitney Logan Mystery

by Mercedes Lambert

To Referee Robert Leventer

Serve the People

“If it’s that delicate,” I said, “maybe you need a lady detective.”

“Goodness, I didn’t know there were any.... But I don’t think a lady detective would do at all. You see, Orrin was living in a very tough neighborhood, Mr. Marlowe. “

—from The Little Sister, by Raymond Chandler

CHAPTER ONE