Product Description

My life was ordinary until three years ago when I was thrown out of a downtown hotel window. My name is Robbie Brownlaw, and I am a homicide detective for the city of San Diego. I am twenty-nine years old. I now have synesthesia, a neurological condition where your senses get mixed up. Sometimes when people talk to me, I see their voices as colored shapes provoked by the emotions of the speakers, not by the words themselves. I have what amounts to a primitive lie detector. After three years, I don’t pay a whole lot of attention to the colors and shapes of other people’s feelings, unless they don’t match up with their words. When Garrett Asplundh’s body is found under a San Diego bridge, Robbie Brownlaw and his partner, McKenzie Cortez, are called on to the case. After the tragic death of his child and the dissolution of his marriage, Garrett - regarded as an honest, straight-arrow officer - left the SDPD to become an ethics investigator, looking into the activities of his former colleagues. At first his death, which takes place on the eve of a reconciliation with his ex, looks like suicide, but the clues Brownlaw and Cortez find just don’t add up. With pressure mounting from the police and the city’s politicians, Brownlaw fights to find the truth, all the while trying to hold on to his own crumbling marriage. Was Garrett’s death an “execution” or a crime of passion, a personal vendetta or the final step in an elaborate cover-up?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2003039 in Books
• Published on: 2006-02-21
• Released on: 2006-02-21
• Formats: Audiobook, CD, Unabridged
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .87" h x 6.18" w x 5.10" l, .43 pounds
• Binding: Audio CD

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. At the dramatic start of Parker's excellent 13th novel (after 2004's California Girl), San Diego homicide detective Robbie Brownlaw suffers a head trauma that causes his senses to get mixed up. The sounds of conversations, for example, are accompanied by colored shapes that reflect the speakers' emotions. But the confusion turns into an asset, as it helps Brownlaw recognize when suspects and witnesses are lying to him—and he encounters lots of falsehoods when he begins investigating the case of Garrett Asplundh, shot dead while waiting for a meeting with his estranged wife. As an investigator for the San Diego Ethics Authority Enforcement Unit, Asplundh had uncovered a widespread corruption scandal—and unleashed plenty of enemies, including city officials, a financier and a purveyor of high-priced call girls. The suspense is palpable as Brownlaw and his partner, McKenzie Cortez, work to identify Asplundh's killer, but the novel probes deeper mysteries, such as the victim's tragic life and Brownlaw's disintegrating marriage. With his trademark psychological acuity and empathy, Parker creates a world of fully realized characters coping with obsession and loss. The winner of two Edgars for best novel, Parker could well earn a third with this compelling effort.
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From AudioFile
Murder mystery meets sci-fi in this story about a cop affected after a fall by "post-traumatic swelling" of the brain. The injury leaves Homicide Detective Robbie Brownlaw able to judge people by seeing colors they emanate while speaking (red for lying, etc.). David Colacci's tenor voice doesn't have the range needed to successfully portray Brownlaw's female partner, McKenzie Cortez. And Colacci grates on the listener by starting nearly every sentence LOUD, then trailing off. . . LOUD, then trailing off. . . LOUD, then trailing off. . . . There's a great line in the story that describes the performance itself. It won't make your heart pound "like a dryer full of sneakers." D.J.M. © AudioFile 2006, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

From Booklist
*Starred Review* Robbie Brownlaw was just another San -Diego police officer until a fall from a sixth-story hotel window literally changed his perspective on life. Three years later, he still suffers from synesthesia, a neurological condition that jumbles his senses and often makes others' emotionally charged utterings appear to him as colored shapes (red represents deception; yellow equals fear). "I have what amounts to a primitive lie detector," Brownlaw says in the opening chapter of Parker's deft new thriller, "though I'm not sure how reliable it is." When Garrett Asplundh, an upstanding former cop now part of a city watchdog group, is found shot dead in his car, Brownlaw dives headfirst into the case. He quickly becomes entangled in a world of corrupt local politicians, prostitutes, madams, and johns. Meanwhile, Brownlaw has problems of his own: his wife, Gina, has left him, and he must decide whether to pursue her or let her go. This is the thirteenth crime novel for Parker, a native Southern Californian whose long list of awards includes the Edgar and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. His dialogue crackles and pops in an intricate and well-paced tale set in a city where shadowy characters lurk beneath sunny skies. Allison Block
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