Hell Hole

by Chris Grabenstein

Book Overview

Hell Hole is the fourth book in the mystery series featuring former hardened military PD and current Sea Haven, NJ police officer John Ceepak and his partner, wise-cracking Danny Boyle. In Hell Hole , Ceepak is confronted with his most personal case yet when he must investigate the alleged suicide of a military corporal who recently returned from? Iraq. When it turns out that this "locked stall" rest stop suicide is anything but an open-and-shut case,...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312382308
• ISBN13: 9780312382308
• Release Date: July 2008
• Publisher: Minotaur Books
• Length: 290 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.5" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

#4 in series

Ceepak & Boyle are in deep trying to solve a suicide or murder of a corporal involving an Army platoon. Ceepak lives by the code & is having a hard time with the active military guys that are either lying, covering up or blaming others for the death. Enter in politicians, Ceepak's horrible father, a new partner for Boyle, & pirate thieves & drugs. There's a load of mystery, mayhem, and red herrings. We get a little more information on Ceepak's past and family.

Jersey Shore comic noir

The latest entry in the John Ceepak series is easily the best, building on what was a brilliant series from the get-go. Grabenstein manages to be edgy and darkly realistic while retaining the humorous tone of Danny's narrative that makes this series so notable and successful. Like its predecessors, HELL HOLE follows traditional mystery form but drapes it with a grim authenticity and topicality that should appeal to mystery fans as well as those whose taste leans more to noir and thriller fiction.

Welcome Back Ceepak!

I love this series. Chris Grabenstein outdid himself in this latest installment. Crackling dialogue, smart pacing, nuanced shading to the characters we already adore. It's a winner!!

So Good, You May Have to Visit the Jersey Shore

Another great summer get away to Sea Haven and an excellent adventure for Ceepak and Danny. Replete with taut plotting, humor and the personal touches that bring the characters to life and leave you craving deep fried Oreos®. Or fudge. Or both. Can't wait for the next one.

Best one yet

This is the 4th book in the John Ceepak/Danny Boyle Sea Haven mystery series and I think it's the best one yet. Chris Grabenstein writes great dialog and really knows how to keep me turning the pages. I love that the Bruce Springsteen references are still there! My only regret is that I didn't save this gem for my shore reading!

Grabenstein's coming into his own as a master - Outstanding Mystery

The Jersey Shore portrayed in Chris Grabenstein's Hell Hole isn't exactly the paradise a chamber of commerce would want publicized. Instead, Grabenstein takes us to the world of Sea Haven, New Jersey, where police officers John Ceepak and Danny Boyle deal with the underside of a resort town - the drunken parties, the drugs, the run-down trailer parks. Danny Boyle, who has grown from a part-time summer cop to a twenty-six-year-old full-time officer, guided by his partner's principles, continues to narrate the stories, with his own cock-eyed point of view. Ceepak is off one night, so Danny is partnered with a summer cop, Samantha Starky, when they're sent to the scene of a loud party. It's a drunken group of Airborne soldiers, returned from Iraq, and they're not too happy about dealing with the police, until they receive a phone call that one member of their group has been found dead, a probable suicide, at a reststop. Danny's not going to allow Sergeant Dixon to drive intoxicated, so he takes him to identify the body. That brings Danny to a crime scene that just doesn't look like a suicide, although he can't say why. However, the drugs found on the scene point back to Sea Haven, just the opportunity that Danny and Ceepak need to get involved in the case. Only Ceepak and Boyle would want to stick their noses into this case, one involving a Senator, drugs, the partying soldiers, and Sea Haven's own lowlifes, the Feenyville Pirates. Only Grabenstein could so skillfully use this crime to reveal more about John Ceepak's background. Hell Hole becomes a complicated story that digs deep into Ceepak's emotions, dealing with the returned vets and his own memories, the suicide and his own past, and the story of his parents. This is the darkest of the Ceepak mysteries, the most complicated, and the best. Danny Boyle serves to alleviate that darkness. He's grown in the course of the series, but his wry commentaries are needed in these books. Hell Hole is a complex story, revealing not only how much Danny has changed, but how much it takes for Ceepak to be the man he has become. Grabenstein continues to develop, writing darker, more ambitious stories. He hits his stride with Hell Hole, a dark crime story of politics, drugs, and family. If you've read all of the Ceepak mysteries, you're following the growth of a new master.