A Dangerous Road [Mass Market Paperback]

Kris Nelscott (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 18, 2001

It's February 1968, and tense race relations in Memphis are beginning to build into real conflict. The sanitation workers' strike has been going on for almost three weeks, and marches are beginning to turn into riots.

African-American P.I. Smokey Dalton is hired by Laura Hathaway, a young white woman from up north, to look into her mother's reasons for remembering Smokey generously in her will. Smokey reluctantly takes the case, as much to satisfy his own curiosity about these people he never knew as because he needs the work. What he uncovers is a thirty-year-old secret so powerful it will shatter both their lives.

Furthermore, this turning point couldn't come at a worse time for Smokey. As February turns to March, then April, Smokey must watch his city crumble around him and deals with the approaching visit of his childhood friend, now estranged from him, Martin Luther King, Jr. - a visit that turns out to be the very destiny of both men, and the city itself.

This wonderful novel launches a unique and atmospheric series, introducing an appealing character in Smokey Dalton and an equally compelling time period in our history.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

It's Memphis, Tennessee, 1968, and PI (or, in his words, odd-jobs man) Smokey Dalton has had problems. The oldest dates back to 1939, when 10-year-old Smokey hid in a closet while a mob abducted, tortured, and lynched his parents. Presently, the Memphis sanitation workers' strike is dragging on, protests are fast becoming riots, and talk of an appearance by Martin Luther King Jr., Smokey's boyhood friend, is fanning both hopes and fears. His latest problem, however, is Laura Hathaway, a young, rich, white woman who's just delivered the news that Smokey's a beneficiary in her mother's will, and she'd like to know why.

"I'm obligated to make sure you get your cash." Her eyes clouded for a moment. It was beginning to look like disposing of Momma's assets had become a tricky and uncomfortable proposition.

"You know," I said, "sometimes people should be allowed their secrets."

"Do you think so, Mr. Dalton?" she asked, and this time there was no condescension in her voice. "Do you really think so? A man like you who takes odd jobs? Do you allow people their secrets, or do you just want to hang onto yours?"

Then she let herself out, closing the wooden door gently behind her. Her shadow moved across the frosted glass, and she was gone.

But not for long, because Smokey and Laura soon join forces to find the answers, uncover the secrets, and to weather together--and separately--one of the darkest times in recent American history.

With A Dangerous Road, Kris Nelscott (also known as Kristine Kathryn Rusch, the award-winning and prolific science fiction author) delivers an intricately plotted, historically resonant, first-person narrative that, while not hard-boiled, echoes faintly nonetheless of Chandler and Hammett. A Smokey Dalton series? 'Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished. --Michael Hudson --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

African-American P.I. Smokey Dalton faces a very personal rendezvous with history when his childhood friend from whom he's been estranged for years, Martin Luther King Jr., is scheduled to speak at a Memphis church in April 1968. This impressive debut novel steeped in the turmoil of the civil rights era. For a long time, for his own reasons, Smokey has been keeping a low profile. Then Chicago heiress Laura Hathaway, a white woman, informs him that he's a beneficiary of her mother's will, and she wants him to find out why. Despite reservations, he agrees to accept the case, curious to learn something about his own past, which seems to be linked in some way to Laura's family. Neither he nor Laura is prepared for the startling and dangerous secret that Smokey unearths during a visit to Atlanta, where he and his old friend Martin grew up. At the same time, Smokey must look after his young friend Jimmy, who is equally in danger and in need of his help. By the end, Smokey, Jimmy and Laura are swept up in events far greater than themselves. Nelscott conveys the feelings of her characters and the anxiety of the times with the vividness of an actual observer. More than just offering a puzzle, this novel encourages self-examination about identity, responsibility and the consequences of choices. Smokey proves himself a man of conscience able to make tough choices. His return will be cause for celebration. (July)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks; 1st edition (June 18, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312976437
• ISBN-13: 978-0312976439
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,332,926 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It's Smokey In Memphis, September 3, 2001

By 

Untouchable (Sydney, NSW Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Dangerous Road (Mass Market Paperback)

This mystery introduces us to Smokey Dalton, a black private investigator living in troubled Memphis in 1968. Due to the colour of Smokey's skin and the period this is set, the racial issues dealt with are bordering on explosive. This is a remarkable work of fiction that integrates a factual event, that being the days leading up to the assassination of Martin Luther King, jr. It captures the tensions of the day with remarkable clarity and gives us an insight into how the black community of Memphis may have been affected.

The actual mystery part of the story involves a white woman, Laura Hathaway, who walks into Smokey's office one day, demanding to know why her mother would leave Smokey a bequest of $10,000 in her will. Although Smokey doesn't know her or her mother, he has always wondered about a mysterious benefactor who anonymously donated the same amount of money to him ten years ago. Laura decides to hire Smokey to find out about her family background, what secrets they were hiding and how he is involved in it. The results are shocking for the two of them.

This is a private investigator story with a difference; thanks to the time it is set and the fact that the protagonist is black. These two unique factors presents hurdles not faced by the majority of private investigators we read about these days. It's a powerful debut novel that has introduced us to a particularly likable, ethical character. Nelscott told us a great deal about the background of Smokey Dalton, making us sympathetic to his feelings and reactions, yet when I finished the book, I felt as though I wanted to learn more.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ditto, December 10, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: A Dangerous Road (Mass Market Paperback)

(...)I just want to urge you to find "A Dangerous Road" and read it. You'll be convinced that Kris Nelscott has debuted with a winner. More than "just" a detective/mystery novel, Nelscott has given us real literature about a tragic and heroic figure. If you are tired of waiting for the next, long-overdue installment in Walter Mosley's Easy Rawlins series, this is the book that will distract you from your misery.

I'm lucky. I learned of Kris Nelscott and this book only recently, so when I finished I was ecstatic to learn that the second installment, "Smoke Filled Rooms" was out in hardback.

Let me give you a clue as to how much I enjoyed this book: After reading "A Dangerous Road" in paperback, I immediately ordered the hardback edition for my library and then ordered "Smoke Filled Rooms" in hardback, too. Most of you devoted readers will understand that such a gesture is high praise indeed. Now I have Smoky Dalton's continuing adventures in my bag, just waiting for the moment I open it and read that first sentence.

All I need now is a visit by Nelscott to a local book store so that I can have my already treasured copies of the product of her art autographed and given a place of honor next to Mr. Mosley's novels (in hardback).

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Read, June 28, 2000

By 

S. L. Hofsommer (St Cloud, MN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Dangerous Road (Hardcover)

Set in Memphis in 1968, Nelscott's novel takes place during the sanitation workers' strike culminating with Martin Luther King's assassination. Private detective Smokey Dalton, the protagonist, and King were childhood friends in Atlanta. Dalton left the city after his parents were lynched in 1939, a few days after the grand opening of the film "Gone With the Wind."

While Dalton fits the characteristics of the hard-boiled detective--a loner with a strong set of ethics--he is much more. Dalton lives in the black community but carefully keeps from participating in any way that would force him to commit to active involvement in the black movements of the time. Taking care that Jimmy, a young ten year old whose mother is a prostitute, remains in school is as far as Dalton will go.

Then Laura Hathaway, a wealthy young white woman from Chicago, enters his life. Hathaway's mother has just died and left $10,000 to Dalton. She wants to know why. When Dalton takes her case he will solve "the central mystery of [his] life, and in so doing, forfeit everything [he] holds dear."

"A Dangerous Road" is much more than the typical private-eye novel. Nelscott has created well-developed characters we care about. Smokey, sensitive and filled with anger over the unexplained lynching of is parents, finds himself caring for Laura. Laura is all of us from the North who have never experienced what life must be like for blacks living in a white-dominated society. We are also given glimpses of the private Dr.King behind the now-idealized public orator who moved the nation, black and white, into a new era or race relations.

Nelscott's story gains tension as Smokey realizes that Laura's life and his are inextricably woven together. He must deal with his growing attraction to Laura as well as the part her parents had in his own parents' deaths. The plot intricately follows the solving of the $10,000 bequest along with the still controversial events leading to King's murder.

Nelscott puts readers into a time when Americans were pushed into recognizing that life was not equal for all. Unlike so may shoot-em-up, violent novels in which the detective justifies his own killing of the "bad guys," Nelscott puts her characters into real-life situations that demand real-life reactions. By the end, we want to know more about Smokey and his life. If we are lucky, Kris Nelscott has a second Smokey Dalton novel in preparation.