We’re dealing here with a book I got as a free sample (not an uncommon thing). Madison P.I. is the third book in a series by Brian Clements starring Joe Bamberg, a former local news reporter in his home town of Madison, Alabama. Having solved a couple crimes in previous books, he’s now set up as a private eye.

The first client to come to his office is an eighteen-year-old girl named Riley Evans. Riley is concerned about her mother, who’s been missing for three days. Turns out the woman is a degenerate gambler with a drinking problem, and Riley has been more or less mothering her mother. She came to Joe because her mother told her she’d dated him briefly as a young woman. This is true, but it doesn’t make Joe any more comfortable.

Things get puzzling when the local sheriff, instead of cooperating or even giving him the cold shoulder, actually bars Joe from having any contact with the police. Joe will have to intrude on some of the seediest locations in the area in order to find Riley’s mother. And the girl insists on accompanying him most of the time. Surprisingly, she’s actually helpful sometimes.

The writing in Madison P.I. wasn’t bad. The plotting was a little rough, but also not bad. I did have trouble with some moments when Joe seems to act out of character, as when he subdues a professional thug with a few moves learned in a self-defense course.

Still, this wasn’t a bad book. I probably won’t read any more in the series, due to the author’s somewhat sanctimonious liberalism, as when he repeatedly denigrates the Second Amendment, yet has his hero save his life more than once with a concealed carry weapon. Also, I disliked Joe’s opinion that it’s always okay to steal from insurance companies.

Oh yes — it ends in a cliffhanger, which annoys me.

But Madison P.I. isn’t bad at all for a self-published mystery.