Tagged for Murder

February 1, 2018
Who killed the man found atop a boxcar in a Chicago rail siding? The question hardly has a chance to come up, let alone get answered, in private investigator Dek Elstrom's seventh case.As usual, Dek's between paying gigs, so he eagerly accepts small-time business realtor Herb Sunheim's offer of $500 to snap some photographs of the murder scene. Even after Dek's satisfied himself that the corpse reached its final resting place when it was pushed out a window of the abandoned Central State Electric Works building, he can't help wondering who the dead man was; why an anonymous graffiti artist tagged the place twice--once outside, once inside--to direct attention to the fact that it's a crime scene; why normally tightfisted Herbie Sunshine was willing to offer serious money, and pay double the amount he offered, for pictures he could easily have downloaded from the internet; and why Herbie isn't taking his calls. The identification of the victim as ambulance-chasing lawyer Rickey Means raises even more questions for both Dek (Hidden Graves, 2017, etc.) and Detectives Bruno Kopek and Henry Jacks of the Chicago PD. What secrets is Walter Dace, whose firm manages the property for Triple Time Partners, concealing? What secrets was the Central Works building hiding that made it necessary for someone to burn it to the ground? Who can possibly be behind the mounting body count when all the most likely suspects are getting killed? And how much longer does Dek have to live if he persists in an investigation whose cast seems limited to a series of dead losers?As usual in Fredrickson's odes to the seamy side of the Windy City, the answers are less gripping than the questions. As for whodunit, that's the least interesting revelation of all.

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March 12, 2018
The discovery of a man’s lifeless body on top of a boxcar in a little-used railway siding drives Fredrickson’s well-crafted seventh mystery featuring wily, wise-cracking Chicago PI Dek Elstrom (after 2017’s Hidden Graves). Clues to the dead man’s identity are contradictory: he’s wearing an expensive suit, but his teeth are rotting and his skin has the appearance of someone who has been living on the street. Well-known cheapskate and small-time realtor Herb Sunheim offers Dek $500 to take photos of the crime scene. Unclear on why Sunheim would pay for something already done by the police, Dek nonetheless accepts the task in order to earn some much-needed cash. Soon he is caught up in several tangled skeins of corruption, and, one by one, people connected with the case disappear or turn up dead. Will Dek be the next to meet his maker? Elements of farce, including a pack of geriatric dames in 1950s poodle skirts, enliven the proceedings. This entry is sure to garner new fans for this delightfully eccentric detective series. Agent: John Silbersack, Trident Media Group.