Customer Reviews

Bad Bird: A Mystery

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Maybe this would read better if I had read the first book in the series. I'd probably read it all the way thru if I was on a desert island with no other reading material, but since I'm not, I skipped a biggish chunk in the last third of the book due to lack of interest.

Chris Knopf is known for the Hamptons Mystery series featuring (and narrated by) ex-boxer, MIT grad, engineer, executive, beach bum Sam Aquillio.

Now Knopf gives us another terrific amateur detective, Jackie Swaitkoski. She's smart, tough (to a point), dogged. She likes retails therapy. Her legal practice in the exclusive enclave of the Hamptons mixes real estate, civil and criminal for decent losers and anything else she can scrape up.

Knopf is known for his humor, gained from compassionate observation of the human condition and he's in good form here. Here's Jackie on her new, fancy, office, "My office...was my favorite place on earth. First off, is was a real office I have to drive to like an adult, not stagger into wearing pajamas like I did when I worked out of my house." The touches, to me, put Knopf a notch above many writers.

Jackie is fun, the stakes are high, the plot is twisty. Get this book and enjoy.

When Jackie sees the plane struggling to stay in the air, they lock eyes and the the pilot tosses a case which proves to contain all the secrets that someone doesn't want uncovered. With Jackie's tenacious style and uncanny knack at getting the answer, this enthralling mystery will keep you on your toes.

Southampton. Long Island attorney Jackie Swaitkowski leans on a fence watching show horses run around in a field when she notices a small plane out of control. She calls 911 as a metal camera case flies out of the pilot's door. The plane crashes moments later. Jackie retrieves the case and removes a memory card from it as if the pilot was tossing that to her. First responders from around the Hamptons arrive at the scene, but the Cessna female pilot is dead.

Having met a man claiming to be the husband of the pilot before he fled the crash scene, Jackie Googles for names of female local pilots and finds Eugenie Birkson owner of a Cessna taxi service; her husband Ed is a mechanic. The memory card contains strange photos in which she recognizes some of the people in them including a few to close to home. Ed hires Jackie to defend him when the National Transportation Safety Board ill mannered agent investigates. Jackie soon learns the near fatal way that someone wants that memory card destroyed and is willing to kill again to achieve that objective.

The latest Swaitkowski thriller (see Short Squeeze) is an engaging tale that starts off with quite a bang and never slows down. Once again (as Police officer Sullivan knows from his experiences with her) Jackie ignores the law when she takes the memory card. Fast-paced throughout, readers who enjoy their lawyers to be different will appreciate the pot smoking and hard drinking Swaitkowski.

Harriet Klausner