Book Review: Dark End of the Street

Reviewed By: Jennifer Jordan

Dark End of the Street     Amazon US PB Amazon US HC Amazon US MSReader eBook Amazon Canada PB Amazon Canada HC
Ace Atkins
Class/Genre:   Mystery   Private Investigator
Series: Nick Travers # 3
November 2002, William Morrow 336 pages/ $23.95 price

Our story begins when Eddie Porter’s ends. It seems like an all too common tale of a man messin’ with another man’s woman. Until Eddie walks past the wronged man, blues singer Clyde James, huddled on the floor of an abandoned car, and into his fate. He and Clyde’s wife die, and die badly. Clyde disappears into the Memphis night.

Thirty some years later and we’re in the French Quarter, at a funeral of sorts. The mourners JoJo Jackson, Randy Sexton, Sun, Oz and Nick Travers. Nick is called outside by JoJo’s wife, Loretta. She’s got a favor to ask. She needs Nick to find her maybe dead brother, Clyde. Clyde James. What Nick finds is a world of trouble.

Meet Perfect Leigh. Perfect is a beautiful, intelligent psycho. She’s gunning for a young girl whose parents were murdered a few weeks before. And she gets her. Abby had time to grab some things from her Daddy’s safe before Perfect sinks her claws into her. But Perfect isn’t having a perfect day. As our stories converge, Nick gets Abby and Perfect gets mad.

This is only the entrance to a maze that takes everyone across state lines and to the brink of death. Throw into the mix a pill popping Elvis zealot assassin, crooked politicians, the neo-Confederacy and a dash of the Dixie Mafia and you’ve got a mess. And Nick and Abby are in the middle of it.

This book was a joy read and has some of the best one-liners I’ve come across since Rick Riordan. The characters are larger than life, the story hits your system like a cold beer on a hot night and if you like the blues, you’ll love Nick. If you hate the blues, he’ll still get on your good side.

Buy the book. Read the book.

Jennifer Jordan

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Jennifer Jordan