by Martin Solares
Published: 2018
Publisher: Grove Press, Black Cat
Paperback: 442
Rating: 5
Mystery, Crime, Mexico | Goodreads
First sentence(s):
He told them there was someone who could find the girl: an ex-cop.
Zombie sighting:
He pictured a small, smelly bathroom; a cheap blanket; nights spent on a cot, catching a few winks here and there—always at the beck and call of the residents and their stuck-up kids, afraid some burglar might take advantage if he nodded off—that zombie state where you can't think clearly, which steals one day after another until the end.
-page 247
From a writer whose work has been praised by Junot Diaz as "Latin American fiction at its pulpy phantasmagorical finest," Don't Send Flowers is a riveting novel centered on Carlos Trevino, a retired police detective in northern Mexico who has to go up against the corruption and widespread violence that caused him to leave the force, when he's hired by a wealthy businessman to find his missing daughter.
A seventeen-year-old girl has disappeared after a fight with her boyfriend that was interrupted by armed men, leaving the boyfriend on life support and the girl an apparent kidnap victim. It's a common occurrence in the region—prime narco territory—but the girl's parents are rich and powerful, and determined to find their daughter at any cost. When they call upon Carlos Trevino, he tracks the missing heiress north to the town of La Eternidad, on the Gulf of Mexico not far from the U.S. border—all while constantly attempting to evade detection by La Eternidad's chief of police, Commander Margarito Gonzalez, who is in the pockets of the cartels and has a score to settle with Trevino.
My two-bits:
Sketchy characters, corruption and loyalties. And yet, one who gets the job done despite the pickles he finds himself in.
* part of Books, Inc. Foreign Intrigue Book Club (here)
* part of Summertime time (schedule)
