Award-winning author Warren C. Easley lives in Oregon where he writes fiction and tutors GED students. Easley is the author of the Cal Claxton Oregon Mysteries. For more, visit WarrenEasley.com.
A do-gooder lawyer wants to track down the sole witness to the
murder of a friend's fiancee before the friend takes matters into
his own hands. Now that he's developed the reputation as a lawyer
who's willing to help the common man—even if that man is still a
boy—Cal Claxton feels responsible for his unofficial office hours
at Portland's Caffeine Central. In his latest murder case, though,
he can't just sit and wait for a presumed eyewitness to come to him
because the murdered woman, Claudia, was recently betrothed to his
closest friend, Hernando Mendoza. Cal wants to help more than
anything, not only because he's worried what Nando might do to
Claudia's ex-husband before the real killer is found, but also
because he's pretty certain the witness is firmly within his
wheelhouse of troubled youth. The person who saw the crime seems to
be a local graffiti artist going by the moniker "K209" whose
distinctive tags appear to defy gravity. Kelly Spence, meanwhile,
is worried that her identity as K209 will be found out, and she
knows the killers saw her hanging above them the night of the
crime. The placement of her tags is a tribute to her father, who
taught her climbing skills before he died in an accident several
years ago. Kelly can't go to the police with what she knows because
she doesn't want to get in trouble for her city artwork. Will she
connect with Cal, the one person who might be on her side, or will
she be too afraid to tell anyone the truth as she hides from
danger? Alternating between Cal's first-person narrative and the
third-person story of Kelly, Easley (Dead Float, 2014, etc.) keeps
the story simple and easy to unravel while engaging readers in more
long-term relationships with the characters.
*Kirkus*
Easley’s well-paced third Cal Claxton mystery (after 2014’s Dead
Float) finds the Oregon lawyer doing pro bono work for Portland’s
disadvantaged at his office in what he calls the Caffeine Central
building in the city’s Old Town. Cal also looks out for the
building’s landlord, Hernando Mendoza. When Hernando’s fiancée is
shot dead in Old Town late one night, high school student Kelly
Spence, the tagger (graffiti artist) known as K209, witnesses the
murder while spray painting an image on a nearby building and
escapes only after the killer takes several shots at her shadowy
figure. The killer, who leaves a bloody trail in his wake, and Cal
race to find her, but Kelly avoids them both, not knowing whom she
can trust. When Cal and Kelly do connect, they make a formidable
and unlikely team as they try to find justice for the killer’s
victims. Cal’s name is on the title page, but plucky and
resourceful Kelly steals this tense adventure.
*Publisher's Weekly*
Former prosecutor Cal Claxton left Los Angeles for the wine country
of Oregon. He defends people living on the streets in Portland such
as 16-year-old graffiti artist Kelly Strand, who witnessed a murder
while tagging a downtown building. The dead woman was the fiancée
of Cal’s best friend Hernando Mendez. Nando needs Cal’s help to
figure out who would want to kill Claudia Borrego. Meanwhile, Kelly
is on the run and Cal is the only person who can help her.
Shenanigans by the feds complicate Cal’s
case. VERDICT Lawyer Cal is an appealing knight in rusty
armor, seeking justice for the most vulnerable. His latest case
(after Dead Float) is complicated but holds the reader’s
interest. Easley exquisitely captures Portland’s flavor, and his
portrayal of street life is spot-on. Readers of John Hart and Kate
Wilhelm will delight in trying a new author.
*Library Journal*
Cal Claxton used to work as a prosecutor down in stressful Los
Angeles. Now he is a widower living in rural Oregon, where he
divides his time between small-town lawyering, providing pro bono
legal advice to the down-and-outs of Portland, and enjoying the
landscape of the great Northwest. It's a pretty good way to spend
one's days -- especially when you can share it with a devoted
Australian shepherd named Archie.~~~Portland has city code
ordinances against graffiti vandalism. This doesn't stop some young
people and amateur artists from arming themselves with cans of
spray paint and filling what they see as blank canvases all around
them. One teenager named Kelly has taken the art to a whole new
level -- literally -- as she combines her love of mountain climbing
with her slightly illegal love of tagging. Cal doesn't know it yet,
but the artwork he suddenly spots halfway up the side of his
downtown office building (Caffeine Central) was created by
Kelly.~~~The trouble is, when you're out and about during the
darkest hours of the city, you may see things you'd be better off
not seeing. Kelly is perched high above a street one night when she
witnesses a deadly shooting that takes place below her. She
scrambles out of the killer's sight, she thinks, and is injured in
the process. Now she has to make sure that no one discovers that
she is "K209." Her life may depend on this. And she can hardly go
to the police to share what she saw, even after two more men (and
one, a friend) are killed. In spite of the danger, though, she's
curious enough to start figuring out on her own the identity of the
killer she thinks of as "Macho Dude." What is really happening in
Portland?~~~Cal also has connections to this murder. The victim was
Claudia Borrego, the fiance of Cal's office landlord and friend,
Hernando Mendoza. Nando asks Cal for support and for help in
learning about the reasons and the responsible parties behind
Claudia's death. Cal is eager to lend an investigative hand, while
he tries at the same time not to interfere with the efforts of the
local police force. By now he already has history with some of its
members. He too begins to track down the primary players in this
tragic tri-fold drama....The chapters alternate between the
first-person narrative of main character Cal and the third-person
story of young artist Kelly. As you may expect, the separate paths
of the lawyer-investigator and the teenage painter begin to narrow
as both of them start following similar leads. This is a great
tension-building technique chosen by the author. And by the halfway
point of the book, we don't want to leave either character. We keep
reading and turning pages, hoping against hope that the two will
soon come together and team up against the evil parties. We also
want Cal to be able to help Kelly out of whatever trouble she may
find herself in (or vice versa), because this incident is obviously
bigger than just the untimely death of one woman and two men....The
trail unfortunately seems to stop at a city gun shop. And too many
guns are involved. Still, we expect justice to be served to the
killer(s) in the end....Never Look Down is the third episode in
this compelling and worthwhile mystery series. If you already read
the first book, Matters of Doubt, you may be pleased to know that
its character Picasso, a young mural painter, makes a few
appearances in this one. You can also read a review of the second
episode, Dead Float, here. Be apprised that this current book
doesn't contain as many fly-fishing scenes as the second one did,
being more urban than rural. Since the city is where the murders
take place, it's also where the investigations have to be
done....I'm pleased to have the chance to gleefully recommend
reading this installment and the entire Cal Claxton series. Once
you reach the midway point of any one of these books, you won't
want to stop. And I can't wait to see what will happen next in this
man's corner of the world.
*Rambles*
Former Los Angeles prosecutor Cal Claxton enjoys his pro bono work
offering legal aid out of his Old Town office to Portland, Oregon's
poorest. Someone shoots and murders Claudia Borrego, the fiancee of
Cal's landlord, Hernando "Nando" Mendoza in the early predawn
hours. High school student and spray paint tagger Kelly "K209"
Spence witnesses the homicide from her perch four stories above the
crime scene. Noticing Kelly high above, the killer fires at her,
but she escapes....Realizing a graffiti artist probably saw the
homicide; the cops, feeling for his grieving friend Nando Cal, and
a bloody predator search for K209. Trusting no one especially after
the person she turned to is mutilated; staying above the fray Kelly
eludes the police, the lawyer and the psychopath until desperate
she turns to the least likely to betray her: Cal....The third Cal
Claxton Oregon mystery (see Dead Float) returns the hero to
Portland's street artist world (see Matters of Doubt) in which
another young tagger (to the delight of the audience) affirms WC
Fields' mantra: "Never work with animals or children" as they own
the story. Fast-paced with twin senses of pending doom and deadly
confrontation, readers will adore spunky Kelly as she deploys her
mountain-climbing skills in an urban jungle to stay alive.
*Midwest Book Review*
Easley's Oregon lawyer Cal Claxton (Matters of Doubt, 2013) divides
his time between Portland and a small Willamette Valley
wine-country town, mixing private practice with pro bono work. He's
in Portland this time, working to protect a teenager with a talent
for climbing tall buildings and tagging them. Kelly Spence, the
young tagger, is a student at an alternative high school who lives
with her dead father's addict girlfriend. One night, while at work
atop a building, she looks down and witnesses the murder of a
woman. Unfortunately, the killer also sees her, so Kelly's life is
in danger. Wanting to do the right thing while remaining anonymous,
Kelly asks one of her street friends for help, but the friend also
ends up dead. Cal, investigating the murder at the behest of his
landlord, teams with Kelly to find the killer. Claxton makes an
amiable, low-key lawyer hero, reminiscent of William G. Tapply's
Brady Coyne, and Easley vividly evokes Portland's street
culture.
*Booklist*
From four stories up the side of a building, a young graffiti
artist "a runaway teenager" witnesses a murder, and then finds
herself in the killer's sights. Oregon attorney Cal Claxton teams
up with the young artist to identify the killer and uncover a
smuggling racket, along the way working with Portland's homeless
and helping members of the Cuban-American community whose lives
were affected by the murder. The Portland city-scape is as much a
character as are the colorful graffiti artist and the lawyer who
walks Portland's streets with his dog, Archie.
*EQMM*
|
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
|
