Last Lullaby: An Eve Diamond Novel - Softcover

Hamilton, Denise

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1451613334 ISBN 13: 9781451613339

Publisher: Gallery Books, 2011

Synopsis

“Nobody can do multicultural Los Angeles better than Denise Hamilton.” —The Denver Post

Now, the Edgar Award­–nominated author sends reporter Eve Diamond on a suspense-charged investigation of the deadly criminal element in the city as colorful and unpredictable as Eve herself.

Shadowing a customs official for a story, Eve is a witness when gunfire erupts at LAX. A beautiful Asian woman is killed, and her little girl is swept away by the INS. Eve suspects the toddler is being used by smugglers who trade in human lives. With the return of her ex-lover, Eve has everything to lose as she races to protect the child from ruthless armed men -- and may find herself caught in their sights.

About this title

Review:

One of the cardinal draws of Denise Hamilton's series about Los Angeles Times reporter Eve Diamond (The Jasmine Trade, Sugar Skull) has been its at least partial focus on the life and politics inside a big-city newsroom. However, her third novel, Last Lullaby, pretty much abandons that element. Though it's bursting with firepower and duplicity, this tale of lost children, see-no-evil adoptions, and international smuggling sadly blurs the distinctions between Diamond and less sparkling, more conventional private eyes.

While working up a story about the U.S. Customs Service, Diamond is caught in a shootout at the Los Angeles International Airport. By the time lead stops flying, three passengers from an incoming flight out of Beijing are dead and an infant Cambodian girl who'd accompanied them has vanished. Despite her lowly status as a suburban journo, the "flawed and fanciful" young Diamond--who's always had a soft spot for children in trouble--eschews more quotidian assignments in order to concentrate on this rapidly expanding mystery. But solving it could cost her plenty, physically as well as emotionally. It places Diamond in the midst of a tug-of-war between immigration officials (who have taken the little girl into hiding, supposedly for her own protection), profusely armed goons (who'll do almost anything to get her back), and a hero-worshipped immigration attorney with a fondness for robot dogs (who hopes to win political asylum for the toddler). Meanwhile, the reporter must suffer a 10-year-old video-game obsessive with a hate on for the owners of a local cyber café; a former lover who's suddenly stepped back into her life, bringing with him more dangers than delights; and an unexpected pregnancy by Hispanic music promoter Silvio Aguilar. There are so many twists and tensions here, that one can almost hear the credibility stretching as Last Lullaby approaches its fiery culmination.

Hamilton, an ex-Times staffer herself, knows the L.A. scene intimately, and she brings to her fiction a genuine appreciation of it's history, diverse subcultures, and class disparities. Her portrayal of that sun-bleached city as home to illegal immigrants in continual fear of deportation is especially heart-rending. Yet Last Lullaby hits a sour note when it tries to turn Eve Diamond into V.I. Warshawski with a press pass. --J. Kingston Pierce

About the Author:

Denise Hamilton is a writer-journalist whose work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Cosmopolitan, and The New York Times and is the author of five acclaimed Eve Diamond crime novels, Prisoner of Memory, Savage Garden, Last Lullaby, Sugar Skull, and The Jasmine Trade, all of which have been Los Angeles Times bestsellers. She is also the editor of and a contributor to the short story anthology Los Angeles Noir, winner of the Southern California Independent Booksellers Association Award for Best Mystery of 2007. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two young children. Visit her at www.denisehamilton.com.

About this edition

• Publisher: Gallery Books
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 1451613334
• ISBN 13: 9781451613339
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 384