By John Stacy
Publisher: Evarhart Press
The book starts with a young Asian guy, named Tommy, coming home from college who is a typical American heavily consumed with the swing era. On his way home, he is confronted by angry protesters and their rage, hate, and prejudice is obvious. Poor Tommy must pass through this large screaming mob of men yelling racial slurs to get home. In order to avoid the chaos, he speeds up and heads into Barstow. Once there he checks into a hotel. Eventually, as the night progresses, he is beaten badly and left to die. Then Tommy disappears and a body is found. Who was this person? Was it Tommy, and if so, who committed this murder? As the story progresses, four major friends from Barstow will become major players in the Murder Mystery: EL, Buzz, Hap and Midge. The author has done a clever job of weaving the crime and characters into the plot.
Fast forward into the 1980’s after the murder has been hidden for nearly 40 years and the evidence resurfaces again. Now, some of those friends must work endlessly to conceal their past, especially due to the fact that many of them are prominent citizens of Barstow. The situation becomes extremely complicated once we learn that two key players have the power to cover this heinous crime. One is the police chief and the other is a wealthy businessman. But the bigger question is, “Who is going to bring the person or persons who committed the crime to justice?”
This leads us to other main characters: Andy, an Hispanic detective; his wife Amanda who is a paraplegic; and a young reporter by the name of Espy. Their fight to solve the mystery is nail biting and riveting to say the least. But it gets more complicated, a woman by the name of Patsy, a police officer, is love obsessed with the chief and will stop at nothing to help cover up the past crime, even if that means murder!
Though I’ve left many of the details out to ensure this review is not a spoiler, I can assure you it’s a great read. The plot moves along nicely and the characters are well developed. The ending is a shocker and not at all what you expected. I’ll leave it at that!
I only have one criticism. There were times when the book, especially towards the end, where the author broke the intensity of the action by describing the characters’ surroundings and this could have been left out as this took away from the power of the scene. It slowed the book down a bit. The action alone was enough to propel the story forward; but that being said, it is minor when you add all the other wonderful details of the book.
The characters were enjoyable and the author did a great job in getting you vested into the story. John Stacy does a great job of developing their personalities and making them work together throughout the book – they were interwoven magically. There are many fascinating angles to Barstow Bones that include love, egotism, murder, racism, and mystery and the book was an easy read. I would recommend sitting down on a cozy couch, get your cup of tea or coffee, and let this page turner take you for a wild ride. It will not disappoint you! Trust me.
Source: Book was provided by publisher for review. It was reviewed by Corina Martinez Chaudhry.
