Scavenger Hunt

by Robert Ferrigno

Book Overview

Philip Marlow and Lew Archer would recognize a kindred spirit in Jimmy Gage, reporter for SLAP magazine, troublemaker by trade and inclination, and the hero of Robert Ferrigno's sinuous new crime... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0375421734
• ISBN13: 9780375421730
• Release Date: January 2003
• Publisher: Pantheon Books
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.8" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Loved it!

Robert Ferrigno's "Scavenger Hunt" is a subtle, darkly mesmerizing Hollywood tale of murder, ambition, frame-ups, set-ups, double-crosses and clever sleuthing.After serving seven years, Oscar winning producer Garrett Walsh is determined to prove his innocence. His vehicle is what he terms, the "most dangerous screenplay in Hollywood." Walsh wants SLAP magazine's cynical, skeptical, irreverent, high profile reporter Jimmy Gage to publicize the screenplay, before someone attempts to silence him permanently.Jimmy fails to buy in. But, when Walsh is found floating in his koi pond and the screenplay missing, Jimmy doubts it was the accidental death the police claim.No one shares Jimmy's thesis except his nefarious pal Rollo. Together they work their way thru a colorful cast of quirky Hollywood types, and around the cops who consider the case closed.The plot is superb: sophisticated, solid, circuitous and overflowing with scintillating dialogue.Mr. Ferrigno withholds enough info to keep surprises coming and the pages turning. The pace never slackens, and the accelerating danger of the killer keeps the tenseness at a high pitch.A delightful read. Hooray for Hollywood!

A Body in the Pond is no Accident

Looking for an Oscar on a scavanger hunt in L.A. cynical magazine writer Jimmy Gage comes to the door of Garrett Walsh, who had been a boy genius filmmaker. Walsh has just finished serving a prison sentence for killing a teenage girl. He has a new screenplay about a brilliant director framed for murder, what else, and once he finds out who Gage is, he asks for his help.But before Gage can do anything for the director, Walsh is found floating in a carp pond, dead. The police say accident, Gage doesn't think so and he starts investigating. Robert Ferrigno is one of my favorite writers. He writes with wit and style, painting unforgettable characters in wild, wooly, urban Southern California and this book is no exception. We get tough guys who aren't so tough, smart guys who aren't so smart, hustlers and a murderer. And we get one of Ferrigno's best.Review submitted by Captain Katie Osborne

This book will be on my Top Ten Best of 2003 list!

It's just the end of January 2003 as I sit here with snow on the ground and Robin Mink on the CD player, so you have to understand that it's way too early to be making statements like the one I'm going to make. I can't help it, though. I'm going to go ahead and predict that, come December, Robert Ferrigno's novel SCAVENGER HUNT is going to be on my Top Ten Best of 2003 list.I know, I know --- it's tough to make a prediction like that so early in the year. But SCAVENGER HUNT is the book that Ferrigno's legion of followers has been waiting for. It is not merely a great Ferrigno book or even a great mystery. It is a great novel, period. It has all of the elements: tight plotting, memorable prose and characters that leap off of the page and into your world. It's a book that you swim in and maybe drown in, as opposed to wade through. Readable? Hah! Try to stop!SCAVENGER HUNT brings intrepid SLAP reporter Jimmy Gage back for another go-round. SCAVENGER HUNT is not a sequel to FLINCH, where we first met Gage; no, SCAVENGER HUNT stands quite well on its own. Ferrigno fleshes Gage out and goes deeper into his character, making him more three-dimensional and ultimately more likable. This time around, Gage is on a Hollywood party scavenger hunt when he encounters Garrett Walsh, a former movie director flavor-of-the-month whose career abruptly came to an end when he was arrested for the rape and murder of an underage girl. Walsh pled guilty and, under the terms of a plea bargain, spent seven years in prison. Newly released, Walsh feels that Gage is just the ticket to help him clear his name. He plans to refurbish his reputation through Fall Guy, a movie script he is working on and that he swears will tell the story of how he was set up. Just a couple of weeks after they meet, however, Gage finds Walsh dead in a fishpond, apparently having drowned while intoxicated. Gage's reporting instincts immediately kick in --- Walsh's story of being set up has the ring of truth to it and his accidental death, while convenient with his unfortunate drug use, is just a bit too convenient. What Gage doesn't know, however, is that his investigation is attracting the notice of the wrong people and putting him squarely in the crosshairs of danger.Ferrigno does a simply incredible job of misdirection here, yet he plays fair every step of the way. I thought I had SCAVENGER HUNT figured out a number of times and was totally wrong more than once. Ferrigno also does an incredible job of pacing, dropping major and minor bombs throughout SCAVENGER HUNT from the beginning to the end. All of the characters, from the one-page walk-ons to the major players, are interesting and real. And wait until you encounter Sugar. Just wait. This is an unforgettable book, filled with unforgettable characters. --- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub

delightful Hollywood noir

Reporter Jimmy Gage works the Hollywood beat for SLAP magazine, a "tabloid" known for trying to live up to its name. Jimmy interviews Garrett Walsh upon the release of the Oscar-winning director from prison after spending seven years incarcerated for the grim murder of a teenage actress. The most interesting point in the exchange occurs when Walsh, still insisting he is innocent, informs the journalist that he has written the screenplay for a movie about the real incident.Cynical Jimmy assumes that either Garret is in denial or like every other convict just says he is innocent until someone murders Walsh and his screenplay "The Fall Guy" turns up missing. Unable to resist a follow-up story, Jimmy cynically works the underside of the movie industry compelled to learn the truth that he begins to believe never surfaced in the injustice of a courtroom.SCAVENGER HUNT is a Hollywood noir those sub-genre fans will appreciate because of the deep nature of the key players. For instance, the antihero is sort of a modern Sam Spade combining deep-rooted cynicism with a strong moral fiber. The support cast such as his unsure "partner" and a kick butt policewoman provides depth to understanding Jimmy. Ironically the readers will know who did what before the reporter solves the two deaths, but the audience will fully relish the engaging return of this protagonist. (see FLINCH).Harriet Klausner

A Sugar High

Jimmy Gage is back from 'Flinch' still digging up dirt for SLAP magazine. His boss Nino Napitano, a high powered guy who thrives on life at the fringes of propriety, stages a high profile scavenger hunt where the winning team must return with a major Oscar. Jimmy, his hustling computer geek friend Rollo and the Monelli twins meet the challenge after connecting with Garrett Walsh, a flash in the pan director who won two Oscars seven years before. Walsh now lives in a trailer, just out of prison after serving out his plea bargain deal for the rape / murder of fifteen-year-old Heather Grimm.A more subtle connection to the title emerges as Ferrigno writes the rest of the story. In his quest to find out what really happened to Garrett Walsh, Jimmy seems to be on a scavenger hunt of his own finding an array of fascinating bit part players, most only in the picture for one chapter. Characters like: the Monelli twins: bimbos with brains, maybe; the Butcher: a one-on-one basketball maniac; Cheri: an aspiring actress who defines the outer limits of self-absorbion; Trunk: an ex-vice cop dying of cancer who is perfectly out of place on a posh golf course; the man in a wheelchair and Serena the maid whose lives center around a flea bag motel.Just as he is a master at providing a pigeon's eye view of the undercarriage of life in Southern California, Ferrigno also creates tension that will jolt his reader to a new level of awareness. Wait until you read the last three words of Chapter 19. Though I hated the ending, I love the way Ferrigno writes and still give 'Scavenger Hunt' a solid five stars. Everything else more than made up for it.