AND SOMETIMES I WONDER ABOUT YOU by Walter Mosley / Z-View
And Sometimes I Wonder About You by Walter Mosley
Trade Paperback: 288 pages
Publisher: Vintage Crime/Black Lizard; Reprint edition (April 19, 2016)
First sentence…
Taking the local train from Philly to New York’s Penn Station may not be as smooth as the Acela’s ride but it gets the job done for a few dollars less and sometimes, like that Monday afternoon, the car is nearly empty and a man has time to think.
The Overview: Beware of Spoilers…
Leonid McGill is a legitimate tough guy. He’s a former boxer, a full time PI and sometime criminal. While riding the train from Philly, a beautiful woman, Marella Herzog asks McGill to get her safely to a cab. He says he will for a price: if he walks her to the cab and there is no incident, the price is a handshake and kiss on the cheek. If he has to play bodyguard, the price is $1,500.00. Marella asks, “Isn’t that price high? “I couldn’t be trusted for less” is McGill’s response.
McGill has to take action when a man with a knife attacks Marella. McGill leaves the man unconscious with a broken arm and gets Marella to a cab. The attraction between Leonid and Marella is undeniable. She invites him up to her hotel for payment. He agrees to come by later.
As And Sometimes I Wonder About You unfolds, McGill becomes more involved with Marella. She’s beautiful, smart, as lustful as McGill and cannot be trusted. Why are people after her? She has something they want, but what? McGill realizes that she’s everything he could want in a woman (if she doesn’t kill him), but McGill has so much going on…
- There’s his wife who is currently wasting away in a sanitorium.
- Hiram Stent, who yesterday wanted to hire him to find his cousin, was found murdered. Mr. Stent said his cousin was set to inherit a million dollars. McGill felt the case was fishy and declined.
- Then last night McGill’s office was broken into and one of the building’s security guards killed.
- Plus, McGill’s adult son has gotten himself involved with a mysterious “underground” gang that the police have been trying to take down with the only result being more dead bodies.
- Oh, and McGill’s estranged father is about to show up.
If this sounds like too much going on, it is for Leonid McGill, but not the reader. Mosley keeps all plot threads going without any confusion. Don’t think that everything all ties together and is resolved with a bow. A couple of the plot threads are related, but others aren’t. This seems realistic. Too often in detective novels there is one case and nothing else comes up until it is resolved. (If only life would cooperate like that.)
McGill is a tough guy, but he isn’t invincible. He doesn’t have a heart of gold and has done some pretty terrible things in the past. McGill is flawed, but has a (tarnished) code of honor. Walter Mosley has written so many excellent novels. And Sometimes I Wonder About You is one of them. It rates 5 of 5 stars.
Rating:
And Sometimes I Wonder About You Trade Paperback
