Murder at the Red Dog

Rating:
Summary: A great plot and lots of dash and swagger
Review: A native of Berkeley, California, John Herrmann earned his MFA in writing from the University of Iowa Writer's Workshop and went on to direct the MFA program at the University of Montana in Missoula. He has published several short stories and has over twenty years of teaching experience at the college level.

In Murder At The Red Dog we meet up with Drew Moore, a semi-retired journalist who fled the high pressure journalism game out East for the friendlier skies of Montana. Brew's main love and commitment is to his border collie Jessie, who accompanies him on his exploits. But when Brew's friends Gil and Beth Owen are found murdered in their offices at the rear of the Red Dog, he pulls himself out of his reverie of non-commitment long enough to investigate a case the local police would like to pin on the local American-Indian, Dennis O'Brien. When the F.B.I. appear suddenly out of nowhere, Brew knows it's time to start snooping:

"'Another thing,' I said, 'why are the federales in on this? I'll tell you why. It's because there was something going on before the crimes. The FBI doesn't get into the act on mere homicide. Serial murder, yes. But there's nothing on the surface here to indicate an FBI investigation. Also, Agent Pace arrived here mere hours after the bodies are found--here in this remote location, a hundred miles from the honest-to-god airport. I say the FBI was here all along, maybe doing something else, and only coincidentally were around when the murders were committed. They've been working on something here, whatever it is, a log longer than two days.'"

Hermann is a first-rate writer, with a special facility for great dialogue. His characters come across as three-dimensional, and appeal to the reader's thirst for entertainment. Brew Moore is a wise man with a lot of charisma. He doesn't pull any punches with any of the many characters with their own agendas, and it is refreshing to see someone who can work their way through a chain of enormous injustice. Brew's dog Jessie is a rare personality herself, who adds another dimension to the story; sort of a pressure release for the reader. All in all, Murder At The Red Dog is a well-written story with a great plot and lots of dash and swagger.
Rating:
Summary: A literary mystery
Review: The writer of Murder at the Reddog is a serious writer, a humorist, and seems to me to be in the company of other contemporary novelists like Kurt Vonnegut, and especially John Irving. John Herrman is new to me and I can't wait for the next one.

Rating:
Summary: City Boy Goes Country ...
Review: There's much to admire in this highly readable mystery novel by John Herrmann, foremost his characters. They're fully realized individuals -- characters! -- who are a joy to get to know simply because they're so exquisitely rendered. From the moment that we're introduced to them in the no-nonsense voice of journalist Drew Moore, narrator, they're infused with local color, delightful zingers and much else that is truly genuine and thus arresting. It's great small-town stuff writ large, lifelike, real in the sophisticated voice of a city boy who has gone country. I've often found mysteries to be kind of hokey, what with the requisite crisis at the outset to ensure plot dynamic and the salting of clues -- Who dunnit!? -- and red herrings, so on. But Herrmann's masterful ability, moreover, to bring originality to his characterizations saves his people from enslavement to mystery/thriller plot. Consider this fine detailing of the town moneybags/land-owner/gossip, a woman everyone calls by her last name, one Stenopolis: "She was the size of a post-menopausal mountain, draped in layers of silk shawls. Perhaps beneath the reds and greens, peacock blues and fringes there was a kind of muu-muu. No one I know has ever seen her feet. ... her wraps and shawls trailed on the carpet beneath and behind as she would glide like a ghost through the antique-cluttered living room." Then there are the equally colorful Letwilig brothers, "camo" guys who reside on "a kind of militia playground, equipped with rifle range, and broken-down old army tank sans cannon, a jeep-like armored personnel carrier, and laundry hanging on the line always." A more menacing fellow thinks he owns a certain street and actually runs people off it with his van. Further, we get to know western men, those stoical guys who live Out West -- opposed to Back East -- and respond to jokes with a straight face and exclamation: "Now that's funny!" Herrmann's funny! Or rather witty, especially in dialogue which, when it's a fun kind of snappy patter, brings a smile to the reader -- this reader's -- face and to my mind the reassurance that I'm in good hands, under the spell of a sure voice.
The machinations of a small-town rag on which the protagonist labors are also refreshingly transcribed, as is the kindling of relationship between the young and beautiful Amy Kroll and the cantankerous journalist/leading man Drew Moore whose love interests include an old flame back East who gives good phone, the cub-reporter Kroll with her wonderful blush of femininity and Moore's sheep dog Jessie. So, yup, yup, or yip, yip, the pup as co-heroine is another literary touch that Herrmann so successfully smuggles into genre. Not just the dog, mind you, but the man's love for his dog serves to refresh plot at those rare times when it seems, well, too plotty.
Another crucial dimension of story is setting. I like, from the get-go, how Herrmann evokes place, the small Montana town and the wilderness surrounding it. I knew I was in for a good ride when I read, right at the beginning, how the train, the Burlington-Northern, "grinds slowly through, and out, and then curls east ... a two-mile long ghostly arm moving beneath the white blankets of a bed." Fog and avalanches, wildlife and weather - the writer knows his turf. In reality, he lives there, in northwest Montana, and from what I gather does his drinking at an actual saloon called the Red Dog. In fictional reality, you can't find a better guide than John Herrmann to show you around today's wild western town -- while introducing you to all its wacky characters. Murder at the Red Dog is a fine novel. Instead of making the easy reach to Grisham, read Herrmann. He gives better bang for the buck. #