Dirty Fire

Rating:
Summary: Hard-Charging, Straight-Ahead Mystery!
Review: Finally we have a new book from Chicagoan Earl Merkel (best-selling author of Final Epidemic).

Dirty Fire (Signet, $6.99 paper) is a straight-ahead mystery about an ex-cop who was set up on bribery charges and run off the force.

Now he's back as an acting fire marshal, helping an old colleague investigate the suspicious death of a wealthy art collector who burned to death in his opulent North Shore mansion.

Merkel isn't trying to do anything fancy here; he just tells a solid mystery story with interesting characters and an involving plot. What more could one ask for?

D. Montgomery

Rating:
Summary: Very highly recommended
Review: Flames destroy the evidence, and only ex-police officer John Davey's persistence ties the death of innocents to a labyrinth of corruption. His career ended with his own tie to the corruption, and only inadmissible evidence saves John from serving time in prison. With the threat of the prosecution finding admissible evidence forever haunting him, John struggles to survive.

A convict's tip and the certainty of arson lead to John's second chance when he joins the investigation. Soon his inquires lead to billions of dollars in artwork that disappeared during the holocaust. The Russians do not even admit to the all of the works of art they hide even as they pledge their cooperation to return of the art that could be proven to have belonged to holocaust victims.

From the fires of the holocaust to the flames of arson, missing art leads to international horror. Through a plot filled with intricacy and surprises, Earl Merkel's second novel, DIRTY FIRE exceeds expectations. The powerfully render protagonist desperately fights to out run his personal demons even as he struggles with his father's dishonesty and betrayal by his department. Gristly murders, international intrigue and conflicting interests combine for a suspense filled novel impossible to put down. Once again Merkel has the ability to make a complex plot and fascination characterizations bristle with authenticity. DIRTY FIRE comes very highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Fast-Paced, Gripping Suspense-Mystery
Review: The prologue to DIRTY FIRE, Earl Merkel's second book, starts with a holocaust of flames and continues with the finding of two dead bodies-- prominent art lovers-- within their burned-out Chicago mansion.

From there, Merkel proceeds with a gripping beginning to the mystery, flitting from one to another seemingly unconnected scene in the first few chapters. But he has the ability to add depth to his characters and make his readers quickly care about them. 

His protagonist, ex-police officer John Davey, haunted by his father's dishonesty and then framed by his own crooked superiors, works his way through a maze of conflicting interests and international intrigue to uncover the truth, as the victims of grisly murders multiply. He gets a second chance to vindicate himself, acting on behalf of the fire department, to pursue the puzzle through a labyrinth of corrupt Chicago police, American criminals, and Russian agents. He uncovers crime upon crime, stemming from the original German holocaust and its plunder of Jewish art, in turn captured and hidden by the Russians, and now being "liberated" again.

All the while he battles his personal demons, within and without, dropping some interesting historical and philosophical tidbits along the way. Example: "It is a fact of the human condition that as mortals we are subject to what the Greeks call hubris. Roughly translated, it means an overweening pride-- a frequently fatal flaw that blinds us to our own peril. The hunter is stalked, the biter bitten. Few of us ever consider the reality that we are not in control-- that someone else, a little more paranoid or maybe a little less sane, has turned the tables on us." 

Fans of Merkel's first book, "Final Epidemic," will enjoy this one, if they keep their wits about them while weaving their way through this convoluted tale's intricate plot, with its myriad characters, to a very satisfying conclusion.
--JRiley