Tango Down

A routine visit to one of Sam Acquillo's job sites becomes anything but. The home's owner, Victor Bollings, is lying in a pool of blood, the back of his head bashed in. One of Sam's closest friends in the cabinetry trade is quickly behind bars as the obvious suspect. For the cops, this is all standard operating procedure. But as it turns out, nothing about the case is routine, obvious or standard in any way.

Sam and defense attorney Jackie Swaitkowski are used to an uneasy, though often reciprocal, relationship with law enforcement. But when the chief of police tells Sam to stay the hell away, this time he really means it. For Sam and Jackie, words like this are highly motivational, until strange new forces emerge from the shadows. Forces from well beyond the borders of Southampton, from worlds as sinister as they are unfathomable.

That doesn't mean Sam and Jackie still don t have a job to do. And a responsibility to defend the utterly defenseless: a Colombian immigrant with no legal status, no political power and no alibi, with the full weight of the judicial system local, state, national and international arrayed against him.

The eighth edition of the Sam Acquillo Mystery Series disrupts the illusion that the Hamptons are safely immune from the struggles that enflame much of the world. It s an examination of how fear of the unknown ignites prejudice and hate, overturning norms of decency and principle.

For Sam and Jackie, it's also a lesson in the interconnectedness of evil.

Tango Down (Murder Mystery)

By Chris Knopf

The Permanent Press www.thepermanentpress.com

ISBN #978-1579625016

288 Pages

Price $29.00 (Hardback)

Rating 4-Stars

When a friend of Sam Acquillo, a Columbian immigrant, is arrested for murder, and Sam is told to stay out of the case it could be disastrous for him to intercede in the situation. But when more factors enter the already touchy case, Sam decides to take a hand in unraveling the mystery and solving the murder.

The plot centers around undocumented workers falsely accused of crimes they didn’t commit, giving honest workers from South of the Border a bad name. I found this comical in the reality of the crimes many undocumented workers do commit, while straining our educational and medical systems. But it is fodder for good fictional crime novels. The author is a good writer, and this is a good mystery for the fan. Although I’ve never cared much for his dialog, his plots are certainly topnotch. Highly recommended.

Tom Johnson

Author of THE MAN IN THE BLACK FEDORA