BLOOD THIRSTY by Marshall Karp

He did it again.


He knocked another one out of the ballpark.


He being Marshall Karp, author of THE RABBIT FACTORY. (Click here for my review.)


BLOOD THIRSTY is the second book featuring L.A.P.D. detectives Mike Lomax and Terry Biggs who are now suffering the limelight of cracking a case of epic tabloid proportions. Wise-cracking Terry is eager to land the movie deal while Mike puts up with harmless harassment from fellow officers. After all, he just wants to do his job.

But just when they are lined up to meet a Hollywood bigwig who might produce that movie about their previous case, the guy gets himself whacked. It's one of those quirky Life-Imitates-Art-Imitates-Life scenarios. You know the kind--the mad scramble to produce a book or movie on the heels of a sensational crime and/or tragedy. Only this time, the movie mogul cashing in on the crime ends up cashing in . . . literally. . . as a victim himself.

That is just the FIRST twist. There are many more.

As a resident of LA-LA land myself, I know this crisscrossing of characters and real life is actually this bizarre.

What I love, too, is that Marshall comes from this background, so he knows exactly how to write it.

Speaking of that, Marshall was a writer on Jason Alexander's pre-Seinfeld sitcom, Everything's Relative. His movie Just Looking was directed by Jason after Seinfeld. Keep that in mind while reading BLOOD THIRSTY. He's got some great stuff in there for TV trivia nuts.


But it was all over too soon. This second installment of Lomax and Biggs is shorter than the first. Somewhere I read a critic (perhaps on Amazon.com) complaining that THE RABBIT FACTORY was too long. I totally disagree.


I realize that's probably not the reason Marshall trimmed the page count. These days, it's more likely the editor/publisher trying to keep the paper costs down. I'm not joking! Having said that, I would have liked more time with all those great secondary characters. They deserve to be brought out and shown off.


What was also over far too soon was my enjoyable meeting with Marshall Karp when he stopped by the Mystery Bookstore to sign copies of BLOOD THIRSTY. He's every bit as warm and fun as I expected.

I learned that he's in the middle of writing Book Three with a new publisher. I hope his house knows what a gem they have in their midst!