Point
and Shoot
A Lock Tourmaline
Mystery
G. D. Baum
BookSurge (Trade Paperback)
ISBN-10: 1-4196-1981-0 (1419619810)
ISBN-13: 978-1-4196-1981-6 (9781419619816)
Publication Date: September 2006
List Price: $14.95
Synopsis (from
the publisher): Hired as a bodyguard to protect the daughter of a
Korean drug lord during a meeting with the drug lord’s arch
rival, New Jersey
private investigator Lock Tourmaline finds himself betrayed when the
drug lord is assassinated. The hit may or may not have been instigated
by either the latter’s offspring, rival gang members or
corrupt
officers of the Police Department.
One of those officers is dating Lock’s ex-wife. Lock
struggles to
extricate her from a dangerous entanglement with both her corrupt lover
and an addiction to cocaine. In the midst of all this, the woman he now
loves is slowly succumbing to terminal cancer, and her fifteen-year-old
daughter is sinking more deeply into suicidal depression. Moreover,
everyone seems to want a piece of Lock, from Heung’s men, who
are
stalking him, to the cops who seem poised to either help or betray him.
Review:
G. D. Baum's debut novel, Point
and Shoot,
introduces ex-cop, private investigator, and martial arts expert Lothar
"Lock" Tourmaline in an action-packed, though somewhat aimless, mystery
of a high-level Korean mob meeting gone wrong.
In an attempt to solidify their power and political influence in
northern New Jersey, two powerful Korean mob families agree to meet to
discuss joining ranks. Neither side trusts the other, and insists that
bodyguards of their own choosing be present. Lock and his ex-cop
partner Henry Cho are hired to specifically protect Susan, daughter of
the patriarch of the Heung family, all of whom are meeting with their
primary rival, Cousin Bodacious. Midway through their discussions, Lock
and Cho are dispatched to deal with a police presence outside during
which time Susan's father is assasinated. Did the killers take
advantage of Lock's absense to strike, or were the police a clever
diversion intended to get Lock out of the way?
There are a lot of action sequences in Point and Shoot,
all of which are meticulously written and feature carefully
choreographed martial arts moves with details on the execution of the
move and what is expected to be accomplished as a result. And
characters are defined more by their martial arts abilities than
anything else; the "Grandfather" character is god-like and seems to
have supernatural powers. But there isn't much of a plot to link
everything together. It's as if Baum made a list of martial arts moves
and characters that could perform them, and then came up with a series
of vignettes in which he could incorporate both. There are several
stories here of which only one could be termed a mystery: who killed
Mr. Heung. But while most of the various storylines have some sort of
resolution, including the "and, oh, by the way, it's a book about a man
who loves a woman who's dying of cancer", the mystery does not. Who did
kill Mr. Heung?
As a mystery, Point and
Shoot
is a disappointment made more so since Baum could have easily written a
proper conclusion without being unreasonably ambiguous. As a martial
arts action, adventure fantasy, it works well: no plot required. As a
love story, the jury is still out.
Special thanks to Author Marketing Expert for providing a copy of Point and Shoot for this review.
Review Copyright © 2007 — Hidden Staircase Mystery Books — All Rights Reserved.
Omnimystery keywords for Point and Shoot ...
Location(s) referenced: New Jersey.
