Shout at the Devil - A Jack Shannon Mystery

<p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Propulsive atmospheric spot-on in its period detail</span></p><p><em style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Shout at the Devil</em><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> reads like a lost manuscript from</span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>the Golden Age of L.A. noir.</span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>--Malcolm Brooks author of </span><em style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Painted Horses and Cloudmaker</em></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> </span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Hollywood 1951. Jack Shannon-hobo rising star wounded vet studio publicist-is in exile. Blackballed by the majors for his unauthorized effort to solve the mystery of a sexpot actress' disappearance he's now a stuntman-a drug-store cowboy working from Tinseltown's Poverty Row where the budgets are tight and the jobs scarce.</span></p><p></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>As the work dries up Jack is in danger of losing his home but salvation arrives in the figure of Karen Scott a star who needs help as much as Jack needs money. Years ago she found herself homeless in Hollywood. In her desperation she agreed to appear in a stag film and now someone has mailed her a snippet of that long-forgotten film. She expects a blackmail demand to follow and she's come to Jack for help. He handled this sort of thing as a publicist at Titanic Pictures and she's willing to pay him big bugs.</span></p><p></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Jack has barely begun his investigation when the blackmail demand arrives: $50000 in exchange for the negative. He reluctantly agrees to handle the pay-off for Karen but when he arrives at the appointed spot he finds a dead man seated behind the wheel of a car and is himself knocked out from behind. When he comes to consciousness he discovers the blackmail money gone no sign of the negative and himself the major suspect in the murder.</span></p><p></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>The very definition of a page-turner</span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>-Jameson Parker recovering actor (</span><em style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Simon and Simon</em><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>) working writer (</span><em style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Dancing with the Dead</em><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>)</span></p><p></p>