Tag Archives: Mack August

Fiction, Reviews

‘To Have Everything,’ by Alan Lee

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The heavens were purpling when I reached Washington, DC. The sun had disappeared beyond the simple Federal-style architecture found in Georgetown as I drove through, and beyond into Spring Valley, a spacious, secluded neighborhood inside the city with grand estates and private yards. If you were rich, you couldn’t live here. These residents looked down on the rich. These residents blew their nose with the rich.

I think I’ve now caught up with Alan Lee’s delightful Mackenzie August series, about an upbeat Raleigh, NC private eye who lives in a house with several family and friends, because he believes in community. I haven’t read all of the Manny Martinez books, though, so there’s always that.

To Have Everything features two main plot threads. First there’s a rich old woman who wants Mack to surveille her three grandchildren. She wants to leave extra money to the one who’s most responsible, but Mack suspects she’s already made her mind up – possibly very badly.

Then there’s the problem with Sheriff Stackhouse, Mack’s father’s girlfriend. She’s running for mayor, and a shoo-in – if she lives. Unfortunately, people keep trying to kill her (which Mack, of course, has to stop). Mack has contacts (some surprisingly friendly) in organized crime, but nobody seems to know who put out the contract. Mack will have to get proactive. Fortunately, as he confidently asserts, he can handle anything.

Lots of fun, as usual. I think To Have Everything was one of my favorites in the series. My only quibble is that (possibly due to an autocorrect mistake) the word “diffusion” keeps appearing where what’s wanted is “defusing” (as in a bomb).

Otherwise, great. Cautions for language and violence.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Old Guns,’ by Alan Lee

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[W]hat bothered me about Islam was that the Quran and its rules seemed to undo all the new covenant changes bought by Christ on the cross. The Quran took its followers back to the Old Testament.

What bothered me about Christianity was, I sucked at it. I kept shooting people.

I’m catching up on a couple books I missed in Alan Lee’s Mackenzie August series, about an upbeat Roanoke, VA private eye.

I’ve often expressed (tediously, no doubt) my idea that the average fictional male PI character is a masculine wish fulfillment figure. What man juggling a marriage, a mortgage, and rambunctious kids does not, now and then, imagine how nice it would be to live like Philip Marlowe or Travis McGee, having adventures, seeing a series of attractive women, no responsibilities except to one’s personal code?

Mackenzie August is a different kind of fantasy figure altogether. He’s the man we aspire to be. Big, buff, brave. Women hit on him all the time, but he brushes them aside easily, because he’s married to a gorgeous woman who’s all he ever wants. He lives, not alone, but in an extended family, featuring his wife, his toddler son (who doesn’t seem to ever age), his father and his girlfriend (who’s the county sheriff), his buddy, the hyper-patriotic US Marshal Manny Martinez, and (now and then), Manny’s partner Noelle.

Mack August does not agonize over futility. He is optimistic and happy. For him, being a detective is a calling, a way to help people.

In Old Guns, Mack begins to suspect that his generous nature is being taken advantage of. A woman accountant who has hired him before asks him to take her son Elijah as an apprentice. Elijah already has a license (which he got without studying), but it’s been confiscated, because he didn’t know the rules of surveillance and was arrested for breaking and entering. Mack is not interested at all, until the boy’s father, an illegal gun dealer, makes the same appeal, offering Mack a lot of money plus a bazooka, a weapon Mack has always wanted.

Elijah is a nightmare to work with. He’s lazy, he’s unmotivated, he’s always on his phone and he thinks he can lie because objective truth doesn’t exist. But gradually, Mack begins to care about the kid, who’s been dismally raised and desperately needs a male role model.

Then people start trying to kill Elijah. It turns out there’s a hit out on him, at an exorbitant price that’s bringing top assassins in from all over the world. What could this feckless kid have done to deserve that? And can Mack keep him alive long enough to find out?

Old Guns was, like all the Mack August books, a lot of fun. Not exactly a Christian novel, but Christian-adjacent, and full of interesting characters and plenty of action. Highly recommended, with cautions for language.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Common Tragedy,’ by Alan Lee

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I never hesitate about buying one of Alan Lee’s Mackenzie August books (though apparently I’ve missed a couple in the series. I’ll have to remedy that). Common Tragedy is 15th in sequence. Mack August stands in the hardboiled tradition, but he’s taken Robert B. Parker’s sunnier approach and turned the dial up to “cheery.” If Raymond Chandler is “Noir,” Alan Lee has to be described as “Blanc.” Mack August is a big, strong, happy man who loves his life, loves his wife and kid, and enjoys company so much that he lives in a house with his father, his father’s girlfriend (the sheriff), his US Marshal friend Mannie Rodriguez and Mannie’s girlfriend Noelle, his own wife, and his dog, and they take an “it takes a village” approach to raising the kid.

They live in a house in a nice neighborhood, complete with a Home Owner’s Association. One evening, the HOA president hosts a meeting/picnic for the board in his yard, next door to Vickie Plemmons, the past president, a woman with a drinking problem and a rebellious, drug addict daughter. When Vickie disappears inside her house and doesn’t return, a neighbor woman goes inside to check on her. She finds Vickie and her daughter both dead of drug overdose.

It looks like a double suicide. The police want it to be a double suicide. But Mack is dubious. For one thing, it’s unclear how the drugs were administered. Working without a client, just out of a sense of community obligation, Mack starts asking questions. And it’s clear that a lot of his neighbors have things to hide.

Mack’s work is both hindered and helped by another neighbor, a crime podcaster, who has been secretly filming and recording his neighbors for some time, and soon starts racking up followers for his viral podcast.

On top of that, it turns out that Mannie’s girlfriend Noelle is pregnant, and she’s reluctant to tell Manny about it.

Common Tragedy is a fast-moving, amusing, and tragic story with a deeper message. I think the author may be a Christian, though his characters don’t always act like it. Highly recommended, with cautions, mostly for language.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Broken Symphony,’ by Alan Lee

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“I’m angry. I’m furious.” I bent forward on my chair to look at the floorboards, hands in my coat pockets. I looked at the floorboards and through them to the solid earth below. “I’m furious with Doyle. But also at myself. At men. And women. At the 1960s and moral relativism and Atlanta.”

I’ve been liking Alan Lee’s Mack August books right along, but Broken Symphony is my favorite by far. But that’s probably because it echoes my beliefs so well, so your mileage may vary.

Mackenzie August, Roanoke, Virginia private eye and former extreme martial arts fighter, is lying on his office floor one day (to relieve sciatica) when a young woman comes in to ask for help – with plumbing. She’s one of a group of ex-prostitutes who live in a building owned by Mack’s lawyer wife, Ronnie. She says the drains aren’t working and the caretaker is useless. Not being busy just now, Mack goes with her.

But when Mack gets there, there’s no drain problem. Instead, there’s a gangster from Boston named Doyle, with a thug for backup. Doyle is looking for a girl called Lemonade, who has run away. He also seems to think the girls are now working for him. So Mack throws him down the stairs, along with the thug.

Not long after, Doyle shows up at Mack’s office. He says he doesn’t want to fight with him. He’s going to kill Mack’s gangster friend Marcus, he says, but that’s just business; he doesn’t want Mack involved. In fact, he’d like to hire Mack to find Lemonade for him. Mack refuses, they fight, and Doyle breaks Mack’s little finger.

Then Lemonade’s parents show up. They also want to hire him to find the girl. Mack accepts the job from them and starts hunting for her. What he finds is a baby, Lemonade’s baby, abandoned. Further investigation will lead him to a final confrontation with the ruthless, psychopathic Doyle.

And I’ve got to say, that final confrontation was just splendid. It wasn’t what I expected at all, and it was delightful.

But what I liked best was Mack’s personal meditations as the story proceeds. In the midst of all the sordid details of the lives of addicts and prostitutes and traffickers, he ponders the societal ills brought on by our abandonment of family and of traditional sexual roles (although his own household is scarcely a traditional one). I suppose people on the other side of the cultural divide may find Broken Symphony preachy – I reveled in it.

Highly recommended. Cautions for language and mature themes.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Dirty Deals,’ by Alan Lee

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She twisted in her seat to reach her shopping bags, from which she produced a black Gucci purse. She twitched a check from it and laid it on my desk. The check was blank and hopeful, like the women’s eyes.

There’s a lot to like in Alan Lee’s Mackenzie August novels. Their relentless optimism is perhaps the best part – these are no noirs; when Mack or his buddy Manny Rodriguez, US marshal, start feeling down, they do something about it – and they’re more likely to work out than get drunk. There’s a lot of Robert B. Parker’s Spenser here, without the creeping wokeness that spoiled that great series for me.

I like some of the books better than others, but I think Dirty Deals may be my favorite in the series to date.

Mack is visited  in his office by a group of wealthy, middle-aged ladies from a Baptist Sunday School in Lynchburg (Kentucky? Tennessee? I was never sure). By some obscure reasoning, she believes she can score heavily against her hated rivals in the Presbyterian Sunday School by hiring Mack to find the fugitive convict Caleb James. Caleb was convicted of murdering a Lynchburg police officer and crippling another while under the influence of crystal meth. But he managed to escape from a high security prison and has dropped out of sight.

Mack takes the case, discovering a story that doesn’t make a lot of sense. Why was a cop killer only convicted of second degree murder? Why do the Lynchburg cops – even the retired one whom Caleb crippled – want the whole business forgotten? Why do the descriptions of the crime make so little logical sense? As is his wont, Mack will stray from the narrow confines of his job description, determined to figure out the real story and to see that true justice is done. Which will force a very difficult decision on him.

Dirty Deals was well plotted and moved right along. The mystery was engaging, and the solution involved a surprise I really didn’t see coming.

The best part, though, was a moment in a sub-plot when Mack’s wife Ronnie delivers an impassioned defense of marital fidelity that will have social conservatives standing up and cheering.

Great fun. Cautions for language. Recommended.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Fool for a Client,’ by Alan Lee

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Number ten in the amusing Mackenzie August private eye series is Fool for a Client. Business is good for Mack, a private eye in Roanoke, Virginia. Better than he’d like, actually. His last case got written up in a national magazine and now he’s a celebrity sleuth, turning business away. His home life is also going well – he’s still living with his father along with his own wife (lawyer Ronnie) and their small son. Also his best friend, Manny Rodriguez the federal marshal, who likes to sleep on the floor.

Then two cops arrive to ask a few questions “just to eliminate you as a suspect.” Ronnie knows what that means and cautions Mack not to tell them anything. Turns out two men have been murdered, and Mack’s DNA has been found under their fingernails. Also, Mack’s DNA has been found in another woman’s bed. Mack hasn’t murdered anybody, and he hasn’t been having an affair. He has to assume he has an implacable enemy out there, one with considerable resources. He’ll have to find that person to clear himself.

Which will be tough after he’s arrested and put in jail. He’s got Ronnie for an attorney, but can she trust him now?

The Mack August books are light and fun. They’re marginally Christian too. Fool for a Client is another of the same. I enjoyed it.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Dead Stop,’ by Alan Lee

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When I’ve read too many dark, gritty mysteries it’s always nice to pick up a Mackenzie August book by Alan Lee. They’re strong on tough, fairly clever dialogue, and it’s nice to follow a detective with a positive attitude and faith in God. So we have come to a Dead Stop, book nine in the series.

Roanoke, Virginia PI Mack August is married to Veronica, a beautiful lawyer. She surprises him by making him the gift of a trip on a luxury private train, Chicago to San Francisco. Mack has always wanted to take such a journey, in the spirit of the old Golden Age mysteries, and jokingly remarks that he hopes they’re attacked by bandits. That won’t happen, but what does happen will be about as bad. Fortunately, their friend Manny Rodriguez, a US Marshal, comes along too – though he’s disappointed to be stood up by his girlfriend.

Their quarters on the train are luxurious, the views are majestic, and the service is excellent. The main irritant is that some of the other passengers are annoying – especially a Republican couple and a Democrat couple who can’t stop sniping at each other. There also seems to be a fair amount of sexual hijinks going on.

Then one of the conductors disappears. And one by one, other members of the train’s crew vanish as well, to be found in the snow with bullet holes in their heads. Manny declares “marshal law” and they try to keep the other passengers calm (and away from each others’ throats) while doing their best to identify the murderer in their midst.

Dead Stop is a story with a message, and it’s not exactly subtle. Mack and Manny constantly try to remind their fellow passengers that they’re all on the same train and need each other, while those passengers are consumed with mutual hatreds – political, social, racial and international. The conservatives and liberals are about equally caricatured, so I don’t think anyone should take offense.

There’s a civility lesson I’m not sure I entirely agree with in the final solution to the crime. But all in all, the book was pleasant enough, and more positive than not in its (relatively heavy-handed) teaching moments.

As usual, author Lee could use a better proofreader. A particularly odd word error is when he tells us someone is wearing a “toboggan” on his head. Is there a piece of headwear known as a toboggan? Did he mean “toque?” Another mystery, this one unsolved.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Bad Aim,’ by Alan Lee

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Working on catching up with Alan Lee’s eccentric and entertaining Mackenzie August series of action mysteries. So I read a second one in a row, Bad Aim.

Mack, an intrepid private eye with very good hair, lives with his fiancée (technically his wife; it’s complicated) “Ronnie” in Roanoke, Virginia, with his toddler son (from a previous marriage), “Kix.” Also resident in their house is his father and his best friend Manny Rodriguez, a US Marshal. Life is good for their odd little household. Mack’s friend, Liz Ferguson, a former federal agent and now a private eye, asks him to help her with a personal protection job. Her client is Roland Wallace, a rich, elderly man who fears that someone is trying to murder him. Poison has been found in his medications, so it’s not his imagination. Their job will be not only to protect him but to identify the killer – Roland says he wants to kill them himself.

Mack has no intention of helping anybody to kill anybody, but the mystery turns out satisfyingly complex. Only a few people have access to Roland’s house, and it’s hard to see what motive any of them might have. None of them seems in a position to profit from his death, or to have reason to hate him.

The story proceeds in the breezy manner characteristic of this series, Mack narrating and speaking in a light sort of variation on classic hard-boiled diction. I’ve disparaged the author’s attempts at erudition in the past, but I must admit he threw out a word – “Illeism,” which means speaking about oneself in the third person – that I had to look up. So he gets a point there.

Bad Aim is fun, and the references to Christianity are positive. The author seems to feel strongly about the rights of illegal immigrants, so I suppose he must be happy with our current open borders situation. And I thought the final showdown a little contrived. But other than that I have no objections to this amusing mystery.

Fiction, Reviews

‘These Mortals,’ by Alan Lee

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For a while now I’ve had the unsettling feeling that there was a series of thriller novels I’d been following in the past that I’d forgotten about. The other day I was looking at some of my old reviews and I realized it was Alan Lee’s Mackenzie August series. So I picked it up again with These Mortals after a long delay (turns out the book itself was delayed in publication, so my delay wasn’t so bad).

I needed to get up to speed with the characters and ongoing story, of course. Mackenzie August is a former cage fighter, now a private eye. His best friends are a drug dealer (who goes to the same church as he) and Mannie Martinez, a US Marshal and super-patriot. Mack is now married to the love of his life, Veronica “Ronnie,” a stunningly beautiful lawyer and former prostitute. They have a small boy, known as Kix.

As These Mortals begins, Mack is starting his day. Suddenly his worst enemy, Darren Robbins, a corrupt former government official who has faked his death, breaks into their home, accompanied by a gigantic Hispanic who is pointing a shotgun at a captive Ronnie.

Darren explains that he’s about to disappear forever, but before he goes he wants to see his wife and son, who are in the federal witness protection program. Mack has until Thursday to locate them and arrange a meeting, or else the thug will kill Ronnie (who happens to be Darren’s former mistress).

Mack is not one to despair. He confidently concocts a plan, assisted by Mannie and his partner, and by the local sheriff (apparently everybody in the world except Darren loves Mack and Ronnie because they’re both so good-looking). It calls for close coordination and precise timing, so you know everything that can go wrong will go wrong. But anything remains possible with the right attitude.

It must be understood that none of this is meant to be taken too seriously. The atmosphere here is fairly close to that of a comic book. The chief charm is the intellectual tough-guy cross-talk between Mack and Mannie. There are here (as I’ve mentioned before) echoes of Robert B. Parker’s Spenser and Hawk – except that author Lee isn’t quite as good at the erudition part.

Still, it was fun, and Christian in some sense (there’s no doctrine here, only the fact that likeable characters declare themselves Christians). These Mortals is implausible, lightweight, and entertaining. A few references to the plight of illegal immigrants may or may not be meant to convey a political message.

A fun book.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Only the Details’ and ‘Good Girl,’ by Alan Lee

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He stood taller than me, which isn’t easy, and he was much wider, which is silly.

Two more reviews of Alan Lee’s Mack August novels. Then I’m done for a while. There are a couple more books to date, but they’re a side series starring Mack’s US Marshal friend, Manny. I’ll save them for later.

It’s not every man who suddenly finds himself – to his complete surprise – married to the woman of his dreams, who also happens to be filthy rich. But that’s the situation of Roanoke, Virginia private eye Mack August at the beginning of Only the Details. Which makes it a pretty good day.

Right up until a potential client injects him with a soporific, and he finds himself loaded on a jet headed for Naples, Italy. A disgruntled crime lord has put out a contract on Mack, but that contract has been bought up by a different crime lord, who has a use for him. He wants Mack (who used to be an underground cage fighter) to represent his criminal family in an annual international tournament in Naples. Elimination in this tournament means actual elimination, but the winner becomes a hero in the underworld. Except that, as his captor explains, he’s promised to kill Mack when it’s over, regardless of the results.

To Mack August, such setbacks are only obstacles to be overcome. Half of Only the Details involves Mack’s never-say-die conduct during the tournament. The other involves the efforts of his Virginia friends to rescue him. It’s all preposterous fun.

In Good Girl, the next book (and I realize the fact that there is a next book constitutes an unavoidable spoiler), Mack is asked to work for a man who suffers anteretrograde amnesia – the condition where one remembers the past, but can make no new memories. Ulysses Steinbeck survives by keeping copious notes, depending on the assistance of his housekeeper.

Steinbeck lost his memory in a car accident several years back. One memory he has from the very end has to do with a dog he bought – something even he doesn’t understand, because he doesn’t even like dogs. But the dog is important… for some reason. Can Mack find the dog and figure out the secret?

Mack goes to work, acquiring the dog, a mature and well-behaved Boxer. He learns that someone else is looking for the dog too, and some exercise of his fighting skills will be required before the conclusion, which is a highly satisfying one. Author Lee says in a note that he felt that Only the Details was pretty intense, and it was time for a warmer and fuzzier sequel.

I liked both these books a lot, and recommend them, if you can handle the language (see my previous reviews). The author also needs to work on his vocabulary – he generally does pretty well with Robert B. Parker-esque erudite vocabulary, but now and then he stumbles.

Realism is not strong in this series – I’m thinking particularly about Mack’s relationship with his fiancée/wife “Ronnie,” who seems to me more a figure of male fantasy than a plausible character.

But it’s all a lot of fun anyway.