MAJOR LEAGUE MURDER

by Michael Geller ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 19, 1988

As we learn in an overdone melodrama-flashback, N.Y.C. shamus ""Slots"" Resnick (Heroes Also Die) has plenty of reason to loathe star baseball-pitcher Jeff ""Nightmare"" Davis. Nevertheless, for gooily sentimental reasons (loyalty to an old priest, fondness for a suicidal little boy), Slots agrees to try to redeem Davis' good name--by proving that the suspended pitcher wasn't guilty of loading his glove with Vaseline in a playoffs game three years ago. Davis himself, a surly sort, has no interest in helping Slots' inquiry. So the key witness to find is umpire Augie Casillo, who supposedly caught the pitcher red-handed--and who has recently disappeared from his swank Connecticut home. Slots follows Augie's trail to Mexico, where the shamus is nearly killed by thugs. Then, back in the US, suspicion centers on Augie's strange neighbors: nymphomaniac Cynthia Marsh and her shadowy tycoon-husband. And when Slots realizes (about 100 pages later than common sense would suggest) that the ""Vaseline game"" had ramifications for bookies and gamblers, he quickly figures everything out--including who murdered Augie (whose body has been found in a Connecticut lake). Fairly lively but thoroughly routine medium-hard-boiled fare--with patchy plotting, hand-me-down dialogue, and narration that mixes the mildly amusing with the thoroughly cliched. (""Cynthia Marsh was as unpredictable as she was beautiful. She was looking for adventure, and that could spell big trouble."")

Pub Date: Dec. 19, 1988

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: St. Martin's

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1988

Categories: FICTION