Hired Gun in Philadelphia: a different kind of Murder Mystery

ISBN-13: 9781482042863 / Angielski / Miękka / 2013 / 276 str.

Andrea C. Kaluzny

Opis

Hired Gun in Philadelphia - a different kind of murder mystery, that takes the reader on a journey of document review, from Center City half way around the world and back again. Fact based fiction as quirky and contemporary as the city that inspired it. A brownstone collapses in Center City and a corpse is found amidst the rubble. A cockfighting ring is busted in Kensington. A lawyer and a tango teacher go missing. A soldier is lost in Afghanistan. A new sexual enhancement drug is invented. A former spy can't kick old habits. An Iranian bootlegger hides from US justice. A Cuban party clown starts his own capitalist revolution. These events and more come together in Andrea Kaluzny's debut novel, Hired Gun in Philadelphia. A darkly funny tale, full of murder, drugs, and tango, readers are left guessing until the very end as multiple story lines emerge: who is doing the killing-and why? Daria lives an uneventful life as a document review lawyer. Nothing but a contractor or hired gun, overlooked and underappreciated, she is part of the new economy, invisible to those with traditional permanent jobs, temping herself through the legal world on a career path to nowhere. She is one of thousands of contract attorneys, only hired on a short term project basis, to sort through a company's files in preparation for trial. But things are about to change in a big way. While working on a major international pharmaceutical review, Daria's colleague, Sebastian is found murdered. Shortly thereafter, Diego, her former tango teacher, is also found killed. While at first these two homicides don't seem to have much in common, the deaths are soon linked to Batavia, the pharmaceutical company whose files Daria is reviewing. Why would anyone want to kill a two bit coder like Sebastian, a looser too broke to pay for his ex-girlfriend's boob job? How did he suddenly come into money? Did Sebastian blackmail someone, perhaps a Batavia employee or was it voodoo? Why was he interested in a Philadelphia physician, who died in Peru of natural causes? And who would kill Diego, a womanizing tango teacher? Bodies pile up and suspicions mount as Daria discovers that Batavia employees stumbled across an opportunity to develop a sexual enhancement drug. Used for centuries among the Amazonian Indians, this drug is being honed by an elusive Peruvian scientist. The stakes are high and the results of his research could mean money-but could they also mean murder-for all those involved? Readers will follow Daria as her formerly uneventful life changes over night when she finds herself becoming a different kind of hired gun to assist the DA's investigation. They will become deputy document reviewers, privy to the documents she reviews. Clue by clue the audience will piece together motives for murder that a number of people around Daria appear to have. In the process getting to know contemporary Philadelphia, a unique and imperfect but loveable city, moving at the genteel pace of a bygone era only forced to wake from its self-content slumber by pesky outsiders following in Benjamin Franklin's footsteps," Killerdelphia," home of collapsing buildings and WASPs but also of cock fighting rings. A city once at the epicenter of American politics now seeking to reinvent itself with the help of newcomers. The facts are real, the stories are not. A tale where no one is who he seems and only Philly is Philly. Daria is smart, tough, and modern. Her sense of humor sustains her in a world of sweat shop type legal work. Being part of the bottom 99%, trapped in a world of pseudo self-employment has its perks. Political Correctness is out; individuality is in, when one has nothing to lose. Readers are invited to use their imagination, laugh about life, and to think for themselves, about fundamental questions, such as - Whether to buy a home in Cuba? Do divers use a boob job as weights or floatation devices? Can a voodoo candle help one obtain a mortgage in today'