I'm a big fan of two Bill S. Ballinger books, Portrait in Smoke and The Tooth and the Nail. The Body Beautiful isn't like either of those. It's a hard-boiled p.i. novel, sort of, but it has elements of the cozy, too.The p.i. on the case is Barr Breed, and the murder is of a beautiful chorus girl whom Breed has been dating. Someone throws a knife and kills her during the performance of a show. There's a knife thrower in the show, and one of his knives is missing. I don't think it's a spoiler to say that he's not the killer. Later someone else is also killed with one of his knives. He should have kept them in a more secure place.
Breed naturally tangles with the cops, as most private-eyes do, and he's really under pressure to get the case solved. It's pretty complicated, and the solution takes a good many pages to explain. It involves a gathering of all the suspects and a staged explanation from Breed. I was surprised at a couple of things, though, which was fun. Another good thing about the book is the authenticity of all the show business material, and there's quite a bit of it. This won't ever be my favorite Ballinger book, but it's worth a look.
6 comments:
I'm a fan of Bill S. Ballinger novels, too. I have a copy of THE BODY BEAUTIFUL. I'll have to find time to read it after enjoying your fine review.
I've read a few Ballingers (not this, of course). I remember a paperback series he did with CIA agent Joaquin Hawks, half Spanish and half Nex Perce Indian, featuring exotic Far Eastern locales, as in (the one I remember) THE SPY AT ANGKOR WAT.
I have this one and the Joseph Hawke novels, and love them. I've been meaning to find his other books, but just overwhelmed with books to review the last few years I haven't had a chance to find anything else.
Nez, obviously.
Not surprisingly, I guess, OP in the US. The used copies (ABE) all suggest that the copies available are in bad shape (e.g., "loose pages"). But there is a German edition available for Kindle...
I remember liking THE BODY IN THE BED that also stars Barr Breed. The Joaquin Hawks books I didn't much care for, though I read them in Finnish translation which might've been bad.
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