Death in North Beach

December 7, 2009
San Francisco PIs Carly Paladino and Noah Lang, who teamed in Tierney's Death in Pacific Heights
(2009), try to solve the murder of aging novelist Whitney Warfield, ironically slain by a fountain pen, in this lackluster follow-up. Gigolo William Blake, who was seen arguing with Warfield the night the writer was killed, hires Paladino and Lang to clear his name. Blake provides a list of 12 people who might have feared the revelations Warfield planned to make in a tell-all book, including, besides Warfield's son, wife, and mistress, a number of artistic types with ties to North Beach's beat past. Alibis and unnatural deaths narrow the suspect list. In the end, Paladino orchestrates a clumsy and contrived showdown of suspects and police in a restaurant back room to expose the guilty. Tierney makes good use of North Beach's rich history, but it's not enough to redeem this pedestrian effort.

January 1, 2010
A tell-all book gets its author silenced.

Everyone in San Francisco's North Beach seems to know about the book Whitney Warfield is writing, but only a dozen or so have sweaty palms. These chosen few have cause to be certain that in the forthcoming opus their names will be writ large, accompanied by combustible secrets. So when the cranky novelist is found dead, stabbed to death with a Mont Blanc pen, a tailor-made suspect list is readily available. At the top stands William Blake, also known as Sweet William, male escort to the rich and infamous. It would be self-delusion, he acknowledges to Carly Palladino, to deny his serious need for professional help. Carly, partnered by laid-back Noah Lang in their newly minted private eye firm, agrees that their angry public squabble on the day of the late unlamented's death has probably come to the SFPD's attention. The agency will have to track down the real murderer in order to keep Sweet William out of harm's way. Carly and Lang divide the suspect list between them, hoping that high-pressure interviews will cause the guilty someone to crack. Additional corpses and the requisite red herrings intervene, but at length the partners, in a protracted, Agatha Christie–like denouement, put the case to rest.

Tierney (Death in Pacific Heights, 2009, etc.) places a pair of bright, appealing protagonists in a dim, derivative story even they can't rescue.

(COPYRIGHT (2010) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

December 1, 2009
Tierney, author of the fine Deets Shanahan series, introduces a pair of San Francisco PIs, Carly Paladino and Noah Lang, who are investigating the murder of Whitney Warfield, a celebrated Beat-generation novelist. Carly is initially approached by debonair William Blake, who claims he is a world-class gigolo as well as a longtime friend of Warfield. Not only was he with Warfield only hours before the man was murdered, but the two had a loud, heated argument in front of dozens of witnesses, which means the police will likely see Blake as a person of interest. But Blake wants to preempt their investigation and provides Carly with a list of alternative suspects. All of the people on the list, he claims, had good reason to hate Warfield because he was threatening to publish a book exposing their darkest secrets. As Carly and Noah investigate, they realize that solving the case will mean unraveling a Byzantine web of half-truths, long-forgotten indiscretions, and simmering jealousy. This is a witty, very engaging entry in what promises to be a thoroughly entertaining new series.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)