Light Before Day - Hardcover

Christopher Rice

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1401300391 ISBN 13: 9781401300395

Publisher: Miramax, 2005

Synopsis

Abruptly fired while pursuing a career-making story and scarred by a failed relationship, young journalist Adam Murphy is left adrift in West Hollywood, until he encounters mystery novelist James Wilton, with whom he follows a dark and deadly trail of sexual perversion, vengeance, and murder as they investigate the disappearances of a number of young gay men. 150,000 first printing.

About this title

About the Author

Christopher Rice is the author of the New York Times best-selling novels A Density of Souls and The Snow Garden, and writes a regular column for the Advocate. He lives in Los Angeles.

Reviews

A 20-something magazine reporter becomes embroiled in a Hollywood murder mystery in Rice's (The Snow Garden) third, richly developed thriller. It's a blessing in disguise when Adam Murphy is fired from racy fluff rag Glitz, since he'd been chasing a real story involving a closeted Marine helicopter pilot, Daniel Brady, whose association with a pedophilic pimp produced a sordid videotape that led to Daniel's suicide plane crash. But Adam's still reeling from the demise of a heated, three-week affair with hunky but secretive Corey, who'd outgrown Adam's blackout-inducing drunkenness. Adam soon becomes the assistant to sharp, sarcastic straight mystery novelist James Wilton, who instructs Adam to continue researching Daniel Brady. One of Rice's most spirited characters, James consistently counteracts Adam's hyperactive enthusiasm with candor and a sensible "working theory," and when Corey disappears, Adam discovers that three other gay men have inexplicably vanished over the past few years, supposed victims of the West Hollywood Slasher. Armed with a dossier from a trustworthy Hollywood reporter, Adam sets out to solve the crime that swells into blackmail, murder, a child porn ring and a subplot involving a "rogue assassin" who blows up methamphetamine labs. Though this is a step up from the author's previous efforts, Rice has yet to leave behind the sometimes awkward prose and dialogue (which veers between frivolous and woodenly expository) that dampens the narrative tension he cultivates. Agent, Lynn Nesbit. 12-city author tour. (Mar. 16)
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Rice's third novel is a departure from the eerie gothic atmosphere of his first two novels, A Density of Souls (2000) and The Snow Garden (2002). Like the previous ones, this is a mystery--a pure West Coast mystery, set in West Hollywood, where 26-year-old Adam Murphy toils for the fluffy gay men's magazine, Glitz. Adam is desperately in search of a real story that will launch his career, and he thinks he has found his ticket when he learns that Daniel Brady, a marine who died in a helicopter crash, was cruising around with Scott Koffler, a sleazy man who procures teen boys for older gay men, just days before his death. Adam is immediately suspicious--Brady was piloting the helicopter when it crashed, and Adam thinks it may have been suicide. When his investigations into Scott's business cost him his job at Glitz, Adam takes a job as an assistant to thriller- and true-crime-writer James Wilton, who is intrigued by the Brady case as well. But when Adam's ex-boyfriend, Corey, goes missing, Adam begins to learn that both he and Corey are more involved in the case than he first thought. Rice's latest is a complex mystery that should please his many fans. Kristine Huntley
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Miramax
• Publication date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1401300391
• ISBN 13: 9781401300395
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 336