The Man Everyone Was Afraid Of

The Dave Brandstetter Mysteries, Book 4

By: Joseph Hansen

Narrated by: Keith Szarabajka

In the small town of La Caleta, Dave Brandstetter investigates the murder of a very unpopular cop.

When Ben Orton's head is found bludgeoned by a heavy flower pot, the people of La Caleta are stunned - not because their police chief has been murdered, but because no one thought to do it sooner. A bruising, violent man, Ben had a commitment to order that did not always take the law into account. But as insurance investigator Dave Brandstetter is about to find out, the corruption in Ben's police force did not die with him.

By the time Dave arrives in the fading fishing town, a young activist has already been arrested for the murder. Only Dave seems to care that the evidence against the accused is laughably thin. As the people of La Caleta try their best to thwart his investigation, Dave must do whatever it takes to catch Ben's killer.

©2019 Joseph Hansen (P)2019 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Great work.

I love these books. The reader is outstanding!!

The story turns and turns you never know who did it until the end. When I think I know who did it. I am wrong. Not to the very end.

Love the book

My download kept skipping

If the story has continuity problems, check that it didn't skip ahead several minutes. I tried deleting and reloading the book but it didn't help. There's a lot of character names to keep track of and I didn't remember who the ultimate killer was in the story. It's explained but the name didn't spark instant recognition. I'm used to being able to figure out "who did it" but the author seems to like throwing several red herrings in at the end before the reveal. The reader is hard-pressed to deduce the culprit or motivation from the available information. The hardcover edition was dated 1978 in Amazon and the book has many of the racial and relationship issues I think of during the 1960s. Prejudice, sexism, crooked cops, and disdain towards homosexuality factor heavily into the narrative. Prices are mentioned a lot. Some seem reasonable, $1.50 for a loaf of bread, and others not so much. I used the web's inflation calculator more than once. Keith's performance was very good. His gritty, noir style suited the material well.

Tightly written, well narrated

Too often LGBTQ fiction is poorly written and uses graphic sex as a plot filler, or traps itself with flat characters in predictable storylines. I started this book suspicious of the “gay” detective angle, but quickly found the story filled with interesting characters, a window on the gay experience in the late 70’s and twist and turn filled who-done-it.

Without a doubt this book was written in a very different time and there are several instances in the story that feel tone deaf when dealing with race. Anyone who has watched Good Times or All in the Family will recognize some of the attitudes on display.