Blindside

December 5, 2011
Shamus Award–winner Gorman’s absorbing third mystery featuring Dev Conrad (after 2010’s Stranglehold) finds the Illinois political consultant stepping into a congressional match between liberal incumbent Jeff Ward and Ward’s blustery right-wing opponent, Rusty Burkhart. As a favor to Ward’s father, Conrad agrees to spend a couple of days with Ward’s campaign to try to discover a spy within the organization. Conrad doesn’t like either of the candidates—Burkhart because of his stances and Ward because of his arrogance and tomcatting. When the shooting death of one of Ward’s senior advisers threatens to derail the campaign, Conrad discovers that both candidates have secrets that might end their careers. After analyzing the good and the bad—mostly the bad—in current political campaigns, cynical, sharp-witted Conrad concludes, “We still had a country that we could be rightly proud of.” Readers should take that message to heart as the 2012 election cycle heats up. Agent: Dominick Abel.

January 15, 2012
Freelance political consultant Dev Conrad (Stranglehold, 2010, etc.) signs on to help another congressional campaign plagued by murder and other deviltry. When liberal incumbent Jeff Ward's father Tom persuades Dev to spend some time with his son's flailing campaign, Jeff's speechwriter Jim Waters hasn't yet been shot to death. And Tom can't even identify the other problems. But it's clear that trouble is afoot. Someone close to Ward is evidently leaking sensitive information to Rusty Burkhart, his millionaire right-wing challenger. David Nolan, the candidate's lifelong friend and chief of staff, disappears almost the moment Dev first pokes his nose into the campaign tent. And Dev soon learns that Ward is being blackmailed over a steamy videotape starring him and a prostitute. As Burkhart rises in the polls, Sylvia Fordham, high priestess of conservative consultants, crows over Ward's vulnerabilities. Dev quickly realizes that only Jennifer Conners, the Goth teen left to mourn Waters, shows any sign of emotional attachment to any of the leads; everything else, from the two women Ward chooses to flank him at the press conference Dev urges him to call over Waters' death, to the sound bites the candidates hurl at each other during a debate, is delectably synthetic. In such an amoral world, nothing, it seems, can save the Ward campaign--unless of course Dev discovers that his opponent has fallen victim to the same blackmailer too. Perfect. Another caustic indictment of electoral politics at its most American. No wonder it's hard to muster much moral outrage when Dev, efficient as ever, identifies the blackmailer and the killer, who act just like everyone else.

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January 1, 2012

Begrudgingly, political consultant Dev Conrad joins Congressman Jeff Ward's reelection campaign staff as a favor to Jeff's father. Dev needs to see if he can staunch the bleeding from a campaign that is taking the brunt of a bitter fight. Soon Dev learns that the congressman is a sleazeball being blackmailed for sexual indiscretions. Nothing new there. Then Dev picks up a vibe from Jim Waters, Jeff's sad-sack speechwriter, but before they can meet, Waters has been shot dead. Dev despairs of figuring out why Waters had to die, but when he finds a DVD containing scandalous information in Jeff's apartment, he knows things are getting hot. Now it's time to smoke out the killer. VERDICT Painting a bleak landscape with quick strokes, the award-winning and prolific Gorman's third Dev Conrad title (Sleeping Dogs; Stranglehold) captures the cynicism of contemporary U.S. politics. A good matchup with Angela Gerst's political mystery, A Crack in Everything. [See Prepub Alert, 8/2/11.]

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 15, 2011
Jeff Ward is a liberal Illinois politician seeking reelection to the U.S. House of Representatives, and he's in the fight of his career against a millionaire conservative businessman. Ward may be his own worst enemy, what with his massive ego and his barely concealed reputation as a womanizer. As a favor to Ward's father, political consultant Dev Conrad reluctantly joins Ward's staff. Shortly after signing on, Conrad is faced with a campaign worker's worst nightmare: Ward's most trusted adviser and lifelong friend is murdered behind the candidate's headquarters. Of course, the opposition does its best to portray the crime as a byproduct of liberal immorality. Conrad's strategy is simple: find the killer and get in front of the story. In the third Dev Conrad mystery, veteran Shamus Award winner Gorman does what he does best. His characters are never less than fully realized, his dialogue crackles, and the plot is clever and credible. Using his past experience as a political speechwriter, Gorman provides a fascinating glimpse inside a bruising election campaign replete with ambitious staff, odious candidates, and idealistic volunteers.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)