Jack Fredrickson Author

Jack Fredrickson has become one of my favorite authors.  He also is an email buddy.  I wish now I had saved those emails, they are funny, clever, and rather sweet. 

I have read three of Jack’s books.:  A Safe Place for Dying,  Honestly Dearest, you are Dead, and his newest book  Hunting for Sweetie Rose.  I have written a blog about one of them.  The books stand alone.  But I suggest, if you haven’t read them that you read them in order to better understand on-going feuds and friendships.  So get out there and buy those first two books.

The latest book comes out February 12, 2012.  Jack graciously sent me an advance copy in October.  I loved reading Hunting Sweetie Rose. 

Hunting Sweetie Rose begins with the death of a clown, a clown who was dancing on the edge of a building. Was it an accident, suicide, or murder? Our protagonist, Dek Elstrom, is hired to find out. From this one incident the story grows into many victims, several villains, and a mysterious client. Who is Sweetie Rose? Why does she care about a clown she doesn’t know.  Is that Velveeta on her dining room table?

Dek’s everyday life is interesting. He is rebuilding his grandfather’s turret and battling with the city for permits. Dek is divorced but friendly with his ex. He meets a TV reporter, Jennifer Gale, who seems interested in him, his life, and his investigation.  Dek and Jennifer work together on the clown’s death.

In the middle of this investigation, you have town clerk Elvis and the town awash in scandal.  Parking issues that will make you laugh out loud.  Then there is the friendship of Dek and Leo.  Closer than brothers, lots of one upmanship between them.  Leo’s mother and friends add a lot of humor and horror to the book.  Imagine old old ladies, porn, and stripper poles.

This book peels like an onion.  You have deaths, you have a missing socialite.  And then more deaths, backgrounds are not what you believed. Some of the victims are innocent.  Some, as we say in the South, needed killing.  Multiple candidates to be the killer.  How can so many people be so cruel and evil?

The plot is well done. You can follow it, believe it, and not guess ahead of the story.  Characters are really well drawn.  I can see them, hear them.  I like some really a lot dislike others.  I also can picture everywhere in this book.  Trailers, turret, apartments, basement, and graveyard, I can see them clearly.

Go to your favorite bookstore and get on the list to buy this book when it comes out February 12, 2012.  It is dark with comic relief thrown in to give you a release.  It builds, it peels, it has a very satisfying ending.  Read it and enjoy.