Octopus Alibi

New York: St. Martin's Minotaur [Thomas Dunne Books], 2003. First Edition [Stated], First Printing [Stated]. Hardcover. Very good/Very good. Bob O'Neal (Author photograph). [10], 325, [1] pages. Autographed copy sticker on DJ. Sticker residue on spine of DJ. Signed by the author on the title page. Tom Corcoran is a Florida-based writer of mystery novels. He has authored three books on classic Ford Mustangs. Corcoran is friends with Jimmy Buffett and shot photographs for seven of Buffett's album covers, as well as cowrote the hits "Fins" and "Cuban Crime of Passion". Derived from a Kirkus review: Alex Rutledge, Key West's hunkiest freelance photographer, is looking longingly for a safe harbor. Just south of Cuba lies the Grand Cayman, and he thinks of his seven-day shoot there as healing for both a shattered exchequer and a battered psyche. Obstacles keep looming. First, there's the call of friendship. Alex's buddy, Sam Wheeler, faces a trip to Broward County to identify a body that might be his missing sister, and Alex can't let him go alone. Next, there's a proliferation of corpses, most of which seem connected to each other and, dismayingly, to him—like Naomi Douglas, the older woman beloved by Alex for insisting he was more talented than even he believed. She died in her sleep, they tell him, but he can't help remembering how very robust she'd seemed only days earlier. There are problems with live bodies too, like the opulent Teresa Barga. With haste, she appears on the point of vacating the Rutledge bed after a mere flash of passion. When Alex, a part-time crime photographer, is tapped to take pictures of a crime scene, he goes reluctantly, knowing that once he gets sucked into sleuthing, he can kiss off the Caymans. The Key West setting is as always a plus. In three previous novels, Tom Corcoran established himself as a shrewd observer of Key West's eccentricities and landscape. In Octopus Alibi, he delivers Alex Rutledge to labyrinths of the past, agendas of power, and greed that jumps generations. The suspected murder of a long-missing woman, the death of an elderly mentor, and the suicide of Key West's popular mayor are revealed a single April day. Rutledge, a freelance photographer with part-time forensic ties to the Monroe County Sheriff's Department and the KWPD, must accompany fishing guide and friend Sam Wheeler to identify a body in Broward County. Hours later, back on the island, a Key West detective coerces Alex into documenting Mayor Gomez's demise. Rutledge also learns he must administrate the estate of Naomi Douglas, the woman who encouraged his creative photography. Rutledge soon suspects that nothing is as it appears. The police choose not to see crimes. Only Rutledge senses foul play on the island, a linking of deaths, and the threat of more peril. Home-front troubles compound the dilemma. Teresa Barga, Alex's new housemate, is absorbed by the arrival in town of Whitney Randolph, a college friend with cash, wild stories, bent morals, and more alibis than an octopus has suckers. Randolph, it appears, has already slithered into the unfolding suspense, linking himself to scam victims and murder victims. Rutledge must ignore a relationship gone sour, then focus on wisps of clues to connect the past and present. Friends act out of character, officials become duplicitous, and threats of violence take Alex to the most dangerous confrontation of his life. Filled with edgy characters and insights to island existence, the tight plot of Octopus Alibi promises Tom Corcoran's most unforgettable tale of the hot, crazy tropics.