Concrete Desert: A David Mapstone Mystery

by Jon Talton

Book Overview

"Talton's summer mystery, a first novel, shows how fertile the desert can be as a mystery setting... A stunning debut." --Booklist STARRED review

Having recently lost his job as a history professor, David Mapstone returns to his boyhood home of Phoenix, Arizona, to find the city dramatically changed. It's now a haven for wealthy retirees and a seasonal retreat for West Coast "sophisticates," but pockets of his earlier life--some...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1590583779
• ISBN13: 9781590583777
• Release Date: October 2011
• Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press
• Length: 202 Pages
• Weight: 0.65 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

It begins here in the "Concrete Desert"

David Mapstone is back in Phoenix during the heat of the summer and not exactly all by choice. Not only did he recently lose his teaching job at San Diego State thanks to the tenure committee's decision, he has to do something about his grandparent's house, which he recently inherited. For now, he is living in the house and dealing with the memories it represents and looking for a new teaching position. He is also working for Mike Peralta, his old friend and partner, at the Sheriff's Department where he is consulting on old cases to supplement his bank account and to have something to do. If that wasn't enough to keep him occupied, his old girlfriend, Julie Riding, walks back into his life by showing up at his grandparent's house late one night. Mapstone still loves her, or at least her memory and what they had, and she needs a favor. Her sister, Phaedra Riding, is missing and has been for two weeks. Since Phaedra is 28, she is an adult and with no sign of foul play at all, the police aren't being much help beyond taking a report. Julie wants Mapstone to ask around at the Sheriff's Office while he is doing his consulting thing. He does and before long, he sees a pattern in the case of Phaedra Riding that links it back to a series of murders that occurred forty years ago. Is Phaedra alive or is she a victim of a serial killer who has resurfaced? Or is Mapstone seeing things that aren't really there and unnecessarily bringing havoc, personal and professional, on himself as well as so many other lives? Released in 2001, this novel was the first of a series and features David Mapstone, a conflicted character who isn't happy in his own skin. Almost noirish in style and feel, it does not have the deep dark mentality typically found in books classified as noir. Still, Mapstone, through the slowly developed back-story, clearly has enough guilt and repressed pain to serve for several novels. Added to that is a cast of secondary characters, both friends and foes, all of whom seem to have their own deep issues. Those issues, which result in engaging secondary storylines one could reasonably expect to be carried forward into the subsequent novels of this series, also serve to make this book complex and multi layered. Relationships and the damage they can cause and heal is an important secondary theme of this novel as the human connection becomes more and more important to Mapstone throughout the course of the 212-page novel. The human connection is what drives the main storyline as Mapstone works through the past and present relationship with Julie while working an increasingly murky case. Those twists in the main storyline are woven together with events in the secondary storyline seamlessly and ultimately lead the reader to a violent confrontation that has devastating effects. Complexity in the mystery as well as in the characters along with vivid descriptions of setting, a strong sense of pace as this book does not drag at all, makes this novel one ver

Summer surprise

It's hard to believe Jon Talton is a first-time novelist after sailing through this can't-put-it-down mystery. He handles characterizations of a jobless history professor and a law enforcement professional beautifully, then stirs in his setting in Phoenix and Arizona with equal loving care. The unusual plot, people and place are blended into a winner that, perhaps, can develop into a book series. One easily recognizes that somewhere back in his past Talton had expert tutoring in use of the English language. It shows here in Concrete Desert.

Universal Issues

Talton's first book is a mystery set in Phoenix, AZ but it is of universal interest in the questions it raises in an underlying theme about the place we are rasied, leave and them return to, only to find it changed. It is an intriguing read, both as a mystery and for the larger questions artfully woven into it.

A Very Strong Debut--Hope To See More Mapstone Mysteries!

I read a couple of books over the weekend and had a good time with both, but the real find, for me, was Jon Talton's _Concrete Desert_, the debut of his character David Mapstone. Mapstone holds a PhD in history and is in-between academic jobs, working part-time as a deputy for the sheriff's department in Phoenix. His job is to pull old, unsolved cases from the files and see if he can't put together some new leads. At the same time, he's approached by an old girlfriend, to pull some strings and see if he can find a lead on her missing sister. When his search for the sister begins to entangle itself with a 40-year-old unsolved murder, which might have been the work of a serial killer called "the Creeper," Mapstone begins to receive threats on his life.Talton does a great job with setting here, bringing Phoenix and the 100+ degree summer heat to convincing life. Also, the historical research that his detective must do adds a fascinating touch to the novel and allows for quite a bit of comparison between the old city and the new one, which is growing at the rate of an acre of desert being taken over by development every hour. This historical digging into old cases is a neat idea for a fictional detective/mystery series and should lead to many more interesting future novels. Talton also does a good job of creating some background characters, such as Mapstone's boss/mentor, Chief Deputy Mike Peralta, and a love interest, Lindsay Adams, who works in the records department. Both are characters we want to know more about and will, I hope, feature in future David Mapstone mysteries. A very promising debut!

Exciting police procedural

Because he was politically incorrect, Professor David Mapstone failed to attain tenure at San Diego State or obtain a job at his alma mater Arizona State. He return to his hometown of Phoenix to accept a job at the sheriff's office working cold but open cases. He also teaches an American History course at the local college.Maricopa County Chief Deputy Mike Perralta, David's former partner when he worked as a cop, assigns the professor with the 1959 Rebecca Stokes murder. At the same time, David's first girlfriend Julie Riding, who dumped him twenty years, ago asks for his help in finding her missing sister Phaedra. On the Stokes case, David links the murder with four similar killings. When the police find the corpse of Phaedra, David sees the same pattern as he found in the Stokes inquiry. David wonders if the killer is a three-decade old copycat, the original "Creeper" back on line, or an attempt to hide the homicide within a serial investigation?CONCRETE DESERT is an exciting, very entertaining police procedural with a slight twist in that the main character is not a law enforcement official. The story line is fun as the complex David feels genuine and the law enforcement side of the cast provides further depth to his character. Though Julie and the suspects seem two-dimensional, they do not take away from a wonderful investigative tale.Harriet Klausner