Rudolf Sebestyen is missing, and Marianne Smalls is involved in an illicit affair with the shady Jonas Schmitt. Both cases converge when Dora Urban, Rudolf’s beautiful and mysterious half-sister, and Lamont Smalls, Marianne’s suspicious husband, hire Jack Mitchell, a hard-drinking, chain-smoking private investigator. Dora wants Jack to uncover what happened to her brother, while Lamont seeks proof of his wife’s infidelity.
But Dora is a vampire, in a city teeming with creatures of the night.
As Jack dives deeper, he discovers that both cases are linked to vepratoga—a dangerous new drug spreading through Los Angeles. Twice as Dead is brimming with vampires, wizards, zombies and zombie dealers, the Central Avenue jazz scene, an exclusive after-hours club, adultery, a New England ghost who prefers Southern California’s warmer clime, corrupt cops and politicians, spying rats, and a smart-mouthed talking cat.
When Jack’s home is burned to the ground, the strands of his investigations culminate in a showdown at a tire factory, where even the reliefs on the walls are not what they seem. In this unique noirish urban fantasy set in postwar Los Angeles, Jack finds more adventure, danger, and romance than he ever imagined—and learns that success may come at too high a price.
CW/TW – colorism, racism, ethnic terms/slurs of 1940s are used, hero is a light skinned POC who could pass and sometimes chooses to not correct a misapprehension in situations where it could benefit him.
Dear Mr. Turtledove,
I came for the snarky cat but the plot sounded intriguing. I have heard of your name but this is the blurb that got me to try one of your books. It certainly has a lot going for it but sadly by the end of the book it felt like a car whose engine had started off with a roar but was ending with a rattle and wheeze.
Jack Mitchell is a PI, in an alternate universe post World War II Los Angeles. He’s in debt, needs business, drinks far too much Wild Turkey, and has a snarky talking cat named Old Man Mose. Business arrives from three people – a woman looking for her foster brother, a wife looking for her missing husband, and a husband looking to catch his cheating wife. Jack will solve the cases but they’re not all that they appear to be and some of the endings won’t be happy.
Much of the book is the setting and the characters. The noir begins in a snappy manner but pretty soon it’s being laid on with a trowel. Of course Jack cracks sarcastic jokes but after a while those didn’t land as well or make me even smile. There is also a tendency for things to be repeated. In one place, a large angel carries people up and down from a hill. Jack keeps saying the angel has never dropped anyone but there’s always a first time and being carried by the angel makes him nervous. Does anything happen? No. Why did this need repeating? Dunno. A long description about a zombie shows up again almost verbatim and then is paraphrased a third time in case the reader has forgotten.
The blurb hints that all of Jack’s investigations will come together in a final grand climactic battle at a tire factory (based on the real Samson Tire and Rubber Co building). Well, not really. One case never ties in with the other two – or at least I don’t recall that it does but since it’s the only one without a fantasy element, I wasn’t surprised. There is a showdown but much of what went into Jack going to this place and poking around is never really explained. Why was this happening, what did the dark powers involved in it actually do, and why was a missing person kidnapped? The payoff didn’t match the build-up.
An illegal substance that goes back to vague rumors Jack had heard during the war also comes into play. Apparently the (corrupt) cops have put some kind of spell on the word so that anyone who utters it gets overheard and “investigated” (and we know how dirty LA cops “investigate” things). So who is making/using it and why? We’re never really told and that kind of sputters out except for one person who takes it for a reason that is sad but who also had another way out of his problems all along that he didn’t use. So … another let-down. And the case against the corrupt cops? That goes about the same way almost every other aspect of this book does.
Now having written this far, I’ve realized that this is one of those books with more vibe than a plot that winds up making sense. Most of the endings are sort of a let down and in some cases the impetus that’s driving it all isn’t really explained. Jacks’ increasingly awkward delivery of increasingly bad jokes just becomes cringe and, I’m going to ask it again – what were the “beings” at the tire plant doing? My grade has dropped over the course of writing this review so even if this is the start of a series, I won’t be continuing. C- and a lot of that grade is for the cat who I wanted more of.
~Jayne
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Jayne
Another long time reader who read romance novels in her teens, then took a long break before started back again about 25 years ago. She enjoys historical romance/fiction best, likes contemporaries, action- adventure and mysteries, will read suspense if there’s no TSTL characters and is currently reading more fantasy and SciFi.
