A few months ago I posted my interview with the Renaissance man James Dalessandro, whose talents and scopes of expertise span fiction, film making and music. Today I wanted to share my review of his novel Bohemian Heart, a stylish and innovative thriller set in San Francisco.
Synopsis:
"Peekaboo" Frankie Fagen is a long-haired, leather-jacketed private detective, best known for his unconventional methods and the Norton Commando he rides through his beloved San Francisco. When summoned to a box at the opera, he meets the beautiful Colleen Farragut, due to go on trial the next day for the murder of her husband, the city's richest and most powerful real estate developer and a lifelong Fagen nemesis. A million-dollar bonus is Frankie's if he finds the burglars Colleen claims were the actual killers - but the real prize would be a century's worth of Farragut diaries that document a family tradition of criminal activity and corruption. With evidence and public sentiment stacked against his client, Frankie, motivated by both love and revenge, races against the clock to find the killer and save Colleen.
My thoughts:
Classic noir archetypes get a facelift and a new lease on life in this mystery thriller. What sets this novel apart from the plethora of the genre is the unconventional protagonist/speaker. Frankie Fagen is a compelling hybrid of James Bond and Holden Caufield from "Catcher in the Rye". He is a man of contrasts, combining callousness with aesthetic sensitivity, cynicism with a weakness for beautiful women. Shrewd and sarcastic, he alternates self-deprecation with self-exaltation. As a private detective, he has to engage his logical side, but his heart - and groin - are still open to juvenile infatuation. Despite many grueling cases and countless sexual encounters that should have left him jaded, he still allows himself to get distracted by the beautiful Colleen Farragut, who is accused of murdering her real estate magnate husband. Leggy, green-eyed and drop-dead elegant, Colleen is best described as femme fatale in distress. Thankfully, the author does not confine her to a stock character. She is neither a sniffling ingenue, nor a cold-blooded murderess alone the lines of Milady in "The Three Musketeers", nor a conventional whore with a heart of gold trapped in a loveless marriage. Colleen is her own entity. She is the ultimate mystery Frankie Fagen is trying to crack. Now, you can expect some traditional crowd-pleasing genre-specific twists. You can expect the murdered magnate to have specific sexual tastes such as S&M. Seriously, what would a corrupt rich man from a dysfunctional family be without his weekly sessions with a dominatrix? And of course, the said dominatrix must have silicone breasts and a scar on her face. Last but not least, be prepared for a succession of intense courtroom scenes. "Bohemian Heart" is delightful mixture of classic twists and surprises.
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