Customer Reviews

First of State (CJ Floyd Mystery Series)

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It is autumn 1971, and 20 year-old CJ Floyd has returned home to Denver after serving two tours of duty in Vietnam. Home is a longstanding Victorian house on Denver's Bail Bondman's Row, where CJ lives with life-wise Uncle Ike, who is the sole black bail bondsman in Denver. As CJ takes baby steps back to righting his life to normalcy, he decides to follow-up on a mission that he did not complete before shipping out to Vietnam, the retrieval of a rare antique license plate from a secret hiding place. While CJ finds that the hiding place no longer exists, he does meet Wiley Ames, a World War II veteran, who recognizes the same pain in CJ's eyes that he had for many years before someone befriended him. As the two unlikely friends bond over their common war experiences and love for collecting rare and valuable western memorabilia, Uncle Ike begins teaching CJ the business of being a bail bondsman and bounty hunter. But just as the fog is beginning to lift off CJ, Ames is murdered, throwing CJ back into the throes of depression. How will CJ be able to solve this murder if the police do not even have a clue? Will CJ be able to push the demons aside long enough to live in the present, and forge a future that will honor him and those in his past?

A good mystery series needs a hero with a style of their own. I found this in CJ Floyd driving around town in his signature 1957 Chevy Bel Air, wearing an outfit that always included a Stetson, a gambler's vest and cowboy boots. This book will take you through several years before the Ames murder is fully solved, but the secondary storylines will keep you turning the page. I enjoy mysteries, where clues are well placed and you can solve the mystery along with the characters. The characters were well-developed with colorful personalities. Uncle Ike, with his practical approach to life, was one of my favorites. The author did a wonderful job of making the location, Denver, and the time period, the 1970s, an integrated part of the storyline. I enjoyed the information about the black Five Points neighborhood, and the migration of blacks from the different parts of the country to Denver, and how they blended their old traditions with their new ones. All of these features explains why this series has many loyal fans.

First of State is a prequel to the existing CJ Floyd mystery series, and is a good place for a reader new to the series to start, and for fans to understand how it all started. I recommend this book to mystery readers and readers who enjoy stories with a western locale.

This book was provided by the publisher for review purposes.

Reviewed by Beverly
APOOO BookClub

In 1971 twenty-something C.J. Floyd returns home after serving two tours in Vietnam as a Navy gunner. He suffers from undiagnosed battle fatigue and has trouble readjusting to civilian life in Denver. His Uncle Ike owns a bail bondsman business, takes his nephew into his home and thinks the best thing for CJ is to go to work.

Bounty hunter CJ goes to GI Joe's pawn shop where he had secreted antique license plates that are no longer there. He meets World War II veteran and amputee Wiley Ames who has turned his life around after bouts of alcoholism and depression. The two vets feel connected with their love of memorabilia and become friends. When Ames and his Chinese partner are gunned down in what looks like a professional hit, CJ vows to bring the culprits to justice. It takes him five years working on and off the Ames murder before he finds his first clue at the Mile High Flea market where a vendor is selling antique license plates including some from the Ames collection. Even with this lead, CJ has years of inquiries to go before he begins to focus on a culprit ready to kill him.

First of State is a prequel to the CJ Floyd mysteries (see Blackwell Farewell) as fans see what happened to the hero that has led to what he is in the present. He works some cases as a bail bondsman bounty hunter, but also is insecure especially about relationships as he struggles to cope as a young man with what he saw and did in Nam and watching a friend murdered doing surveillance in Denver. Robert Greer has written a great Floyd mystery that fans will thoroughly enjoy.

Harriet Klausner

CJ Floyd is twenty years old, just returning from a back to back tour in Vietnam Nam. Before he left for war though, he stashed an antique porcelain license plate behind the wall in a local pawn shop. CJ collects old memorabilia, and although his collections will probably never be complete, he'd sure like that license plate back.


When he goes to the pawn shop, he heads directly to the wall where he had stashed the plate a few years ago. But the wall is new, and covered with faded photographs. He meets Wiley Ames, a veteran of WWII who came home with half of his arm lost. He runs the pawn shop now, and recalls the plate that CJ is looking for. He knows there's a connection between him and CJ, he just can't quite put his finger on it.


CJ is having problems sleeping and night sweats and asks Ames for advice. The two strike up a friendship, so when Ames and his buddy Chin are found murdered, CJ's already fragile world is turned upside down. He tries to find his friends killer but hits a break wall everytime. So, to try and overcome his depression, he joins his uncles bail bondsman business and becomes a bounty hunter.


When a license plate shows up at a flea market five years later, CJ knows it had to be one in Ames collection. It triggers the murders all over again and this time CJ is ready to investigate. Filled with twists and turns, compelling and likeable characters and a solid plot, First of State is a engaging mystery that will keep you on the edge of your seat. I have not read the CJ Floyd mystery series, so I did not know these characters. Fans of the series though, will enjoy reading of them when they were younger and how they all met. Thumbs up!!

With the world crumbling around him, CJ's Floyd's own sanity may rely on finding the truth. "First of State" follows Vietnam veteran CJ Floyd as his world crumbles as he returns from the battlefield and finds his life in shambles. His only hope for a bit of reserve is to find out whose responsible for a murder he stumbles upon and find some justice in a dark world. A riveting thriller that will be hard to put down, "First of State" is an excellent read and very highly recommended.

Robert Greer is the writer of the critically acclaimed C.J. Floyd mysteries, and has won many awards for his work. First of State, recently published in October 2010, is a prequel to the C.J. Floyd series, and serves as a fine introduction to an intriguing world of fascinating characters. I haven't yet read the other books, but I'll certainly look out for them.

The book opens with C.J. Floyd's return from Vietnam. He comes back to his hometown, to the room where he grew up in his uncle's home, and to a growing depression fueled by post-traumatic stress. At twenty-two, he has no idea what he's going to do with his life, living instead a day at a time, following unfocussed impulses and treading carefully in the paths of old dreams.

C.J. used to collect things. Specifically, he used to collect antique license plates, and that urge leads him back to the old G.I. Joe's pawn store, where he meets World War II veteran Wiley Ames. Wiley's instant recognition and friendship, coupled with wise advice, offer a ray of light. But soon the safe world of hometown peace has left two corpses lying in the street, and C.J. grapples with single-minded determination to find out what happened.

C.J.'s uncle is the first black bail-bondsman and bounty hunter in the area--successful, wily, and wise. Soon C.J. is working for him, learning the ropes, training his investigative thoughts `til they might be called skills, making mistakes, and getting out of scrapes. His friends help him. Strangers either hinder or help. And violence lurks still too close to the surface for comfort as his temper is tested. There's the murderer of a friend's son to be found, a cheating salesman putting pressure on another friend's father, and behind it all, as years begin to pass, there's C.J.'s longing to solve that first mystery that welcomed him home. If he could just do this, and control his temper, and improve his self-esteem, and feel like he deserved the girl of his dreams...

Dialog and voice are pitch-perfect. The world of the 70s is evocatively drawn. Characters are filled with down-to-earth humor and kindness and common sense. And the plot twists keep C.J. and reader guessing right to the end. First of State is an intriguing character-driven mystery with a fascinating view of post-Vietnam America, curious insights on the worlds of flea-market and bail, and richly drawn settings in an African American neighborhood of 1970s Denver.



Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from Caitlin Hamilton Marketing and Publicity LLC in exchange for an unbiased review.