Recent Book Read : Dream City by David Baldacci

Recent Book Read : Dream City 

I do not normally read fiction but I had recently read David Baldacci’s latest novel Dream Town in a single go.

The novel is set-up in Los Angeles of a different era i.e. fifties. It is a pot boiler which shows that their was some kind of unholy  alliance between few  tinsel town film industry people  with gambling industry and drug cartel. Something very similar to what  happened in Bollywood during seventies. 

Private investigator and World War II veteran Aloysius Archer intends to ring in the New Year Eve 1952 with his old friend who is an aspiring actress Liberty Callahan her Screenwriter friend Eleanor Lamb interrupts to hire Archer.

Archer working for his experienced Bay Town mentor Willie Dash, based in Bay Town who is an Ex FBI. 

Eleanor Lamb is  afraid that someone is trying to kill her, but Archer has a sort of feeling that she is keeping something from him. When he makes his way to Malibu later that night, he finds a dead man in Eleanor’s home, with no sign of Eleanor, and ends up being coshed and knocked out.

Archer accrues further injuries the same night when he encounters smugglers on the beach, it's one hell of a beginning to 1953 as he finds himself in a chillingly dangerous investigation that sees him immersed in the seedy, sordid, criminal and mob underbelly lying beneath the fantasy glamour of Hollywood and the gambling city of Vegas. He is helped by Liberty becoming increasingly concerned for his safety, Willie Dash and a group of other PI's that provide necessary support for each other when required, including ex-PI Jake Nichols. The dead man turns out to be Cedric Bender, a PI with a good reputation, and Archer finds himself hired by the much in demand screenwriter, Cecily Ransome, to find the missing Eleanor. Archer's case highlights the misogyny of the time and in Hollywood, where little is as it appears to be, as he uncovers lies, secrets, blackmail, and deceptions, and mixes with Hollywood royalty, like the actress Samantha Lourdes.

The dangers that Archer faces end up testing his relationship and feelings for Liberty, his work is far from well rewarded and his life is at constant risk, yet when he considers the possibility of other better paying opportunities, it is clear that when it comes down to it, a PI is what he wants to be and nothing is going to change his mind. Luck and grit keep him alive in both Vegas and the City of Angels, which is rife with gangsters and crooked cops. Not rich at all, his one luxury is the blood-red car  Delahaye he likes to drive with the top down. He’d bought it with his gambling winnings in Reno, and only a bullet hole in the windscreen post mars its perfection. Liberty loves Archer, but will she put up with the daily danger of losing him? Why doesn’t he get a safe job, maybe playing one of LA’s finest on the hit TV show Dragnet? Instead, he’s a tough and principled idealist who wants to make the world a better place. Either that or he’s simply a “pavement-pounding PI on a slow dance to maybe nowhere. Baldacci paints a vivid picture of the not-so-distant era when everybody smoked, Joe McCarthy hunted commies, and Marilyn Monroe stirred men’s loins. In the novel , Archer’s investigation takes him from the rich, glamorous and glitzy LA to the seedy, dark side of the city, and onward to the gambling mecca of Las Vegas, just now hitting its stride as a hot spot for celebrities and a money-making machine for the mob. In a place where cops and crooks work hand in hand, Archer crosses paths with Hollywood stars, politicians and notorious criminals. He almost dies several times, and he discovers bodies and secrets from the canyons and beaches of Malibu and the luxurious mansions of Bel Air and Beverly Hills to the narcotics clubs of Chinatown. The 1950s weren’t the fabled good old days, but they’re fodder for gritty crime stories of high ideals and lowlifes, of longing and disappointment, and all the trouble a PI can handle. 

Despite wealth and fame, everyone interviewed by PI Archer seems to hide a secret pain, a longing for a simpler existence. Archer is a Boy Scout; good, kind, and intuitive. His experiences in the infantry during World War II have fine-tuned his abilities to discover the humanity hidden in the pain, and to keep him on track when the investigation gets out of control, endangering his life, Liberty’s, and Willie’s.

The plot of Dream Town is as windy as the narrow curves of the Hollywood Hills that Archer navigates in his Delahaye. Baldacci captures the dark underbelly of Hollywood’s Golden Age by creating a mystery so chock full of juicy leads and supporting cast members that readers need a scorecard to keep them straight. But that is half of the fun. As Archer collects bumps on his head, and the bullets fly, villains, drug lords, crooked cops, and smugglers are lurking around every turn. Baldacci keeps piling on the tension until the last chapters, when Archer finally pieces together the shocking puzzle of Lamb’s disappearance and the decadence that is Hollywood.

Baldacci  evokes in the novel the historical period of fifties with flair and style, and he has created a great central protagonist in the charismatic Archer, who is developing into quite the PI.

First novel of David, Absolute Power, was published in 1996; followed by its the film adaptation, with Clint Eastwood as its director and star. In total, David has published 46 novels for adults; which are  international bestsellers, and several have been adapted for films and television series.