Customer Reviews

Half the Truth

Certain novels have that quality of sliding off the top of the head after being read. Expertly written and plotted, they have nothing more on their mind than entertaining you.

"Half the Truth" is just such a book. Chicago private detective Malachy Foley is a '90s kind of p.i.: hard-boiled but sensitive. He's got a knack for finding trouble, a desire to help and an ex-wife he would like to win back.

In this follow-up to David Walker's Edgar-nominated debut "Fixed in His Folly," Foley must find a college basketball player who went missing shortly after his roommate was drowned while apparently attempting to cross Lake Michigan in his sports car. As his search takes him from downtown Chicago to a Wisconsin military school, Foley encounters several pacifist-challenged men who have the same idea, and the case turns threatening when his client and ex-wife are kidnaped and held for ransom.

"Half the Truth" is a cat-and-mouse game with high stakes, punctuated by tense encounters that threaten to explode at any time. Sometimes, they do.

Walker's sequel was fun to read. Foley's strong desire to see justice done -- a trait common in mystery p.i.'s -- is tempered with unconventional ways of attracting attention from those who don't want to see him, whether tearing up one thug's fake parking ticket or doing exercises in a lawyer's high-toned reception room. If Bill Murray could adopt Foley's mournful demeanor, he'd fit this Second City p.i.'s M.O. to a tee.