Infernal Angels

Amos Walker #21

by Loren D. Estleman, Stephen Hoye (Narrator)

Motor City private investigator Amos Walker has long been reluctant to embrace technology. But crime marches on, and twenty-first-century Detroit has embraced the digital age. Walker gets proof of that when a vintage merchandise dealer asks him to recover not classic items from the early twentieth century, but a bunch of HDTV converter boxes that the shopkeeper has been selling as a sideline.
Walker knows where to find people who fence hot merchandise. But when he stumbles onto the dead body of a suspect, he starts to think that something other than converter boxes has been stolen. When he gets a visit from attractive Deputy Marshal Mary Ann Thaler, he's glad to see her. But Walker's old friend drags him out of bed to go with her to answer pointed questions about why his card was found on the dead body of his latest client. Once Walker has finished explaining, he feels honor-bound to find out who killed these people and why, even if it means cooperating with local police and the feds. But he's on his own when he discovers why so many people are interested in his case. The converter boxes were being used to smuggle high-grade heroin that's been killing off junkies left and right. The trail to the missing dope might lead him to whoever's cutting a swath of death as wide as the interstate.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Detective, Crime

Audio CD

First published July 5, 2011

About the author

Loren D. Estleman is an American writer of detective and Western fiction. He writes with a manual typewriter.

Estleman is most famous for his novels about P.I. Amos Walker. Other series characters include Old West marshal Page Murdock and hitman Peter Macklin. He has also written a series of novels about the history of crime in Detroit (also the setting of his Walker books.) His non-series works include Bloody Season, a fictional recreation of the gunfight at the O.K. Corral, and several novels and stories featuring Sherlock Holmes.

Series:
* Amos Walker Mystery
* Valentino Mystery
* Detroit Crime Mystery
* Peter Macklin Mystery
* Page Murdock Mystery

Reviews

[James Thane · Rating 4 out of 5]

Detroit P.I. Amos Walker appears for the twenty-first time in Infernal Angels. As always, the case seems innocuous enough at the beginning: a resale dealer has been burglarized and twenty-five HDTV converters have been stolen.

Amos is a detective of the old school who still drives a souped-up Oldsmobile Cutlass and who only recently--and begrudgingly--got a cell phone. He wouldn't know an HDTV converter from an Xbox 360. The dealer patiently shows him the sample he was sent ahead of the shipment that was stolen and explains what it does. That night, the resale man appears on television, showing the sample converter to a reporter who has tumbled to the story.

Bad move.

The burglar, or burglars, now realizing that they apparently missed one of the converters, return to the scene and steal it, this time killing the resale dealer in the process. One might wonder why in the hell an HDTV converter, or even twenty-six of them, would be worth all this trouble, but as Walker belatedly discovers, the twenty-five that were originally stolen were packed with super high-grade heroin and were shipped to the resale dealer by accident.

Now a fortune in primo heroin is missing and drug addicts are dropping like flies on the streets of Detroit. The dealer had hired Walker for three days, and Amos feels honor-bound to give the man his due, even though the client has now expired. This will involve him with a lot of rough characters and, to make matters worse, the local cops and the Feds will soon be all over his case.

Amos Walker is his own man, and he doesn't take a lot of crap from people, irrespective of their rank. As is usually the case in these books, his determination and his insubordination will get him into a lot of trouble. It will also get the crap beaten out of him a couple of times, which is no small thing for a guy who's getting on in years. But Walker will soldier on as always, and will see the case through to the end, no matter the outcome or the risk to his own well-being.

This is a very good entry in an excellent series. If you like your action down and gritty and your P.I.s clever, tough and mouthy, you'll want to search it out.

[Donna · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this very much...maybe 3.5 stars. Amos Walker reminds me of Parker's Spencer and Chandler's Marlowe. The low-life criminals of Detroit are well drawn, but I found the ultimate bad guy a bit of a stereotype. Walker is the kind of PI who keeps going even when (especially when) you tell him to stop.

I'll read more of these.

[Dave · Rating 3 out of 5]

I know the character Amos Walker mostly thru the short stories.
I haven't read many of the novels.
I did enjoy this one.

[Ed · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been a long-time fan of the P.I. Amos Walker mystery series based in blue-collar, gritty Detroit and its environs. This latest entry is up to the series' usual excellence. Amos gets involved with stolen HDTV converter boxes which soon escalates into a case of more evil and mayhem than he signed on for originally. Mr. Estleman's hardboiled prose is stylish and picturesque, part of why I enjoy reading his crime fiction as well as Westerns. If you have a yen for reading a modern private eye protagonist, Amos Walker will rarely disappoint.

[Frank · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good mystery thriller featuring wise-cracking Detroit PI Amos Walker. I've read a few other books by Estleman and for the most part I have enjoyed them. This is the 21st in the Amos Walker series so I have a lot of catching up to do! Anyway, this was an enjoyable read although for me it started out rather slow with Amos on the track of some stolen HDTV converter boxes. These are boxes that will convert the now-required digital TV signals into analog for use with older non-HD TVs. Well, that technology is already pretty dated with most of us using large-screen digital TVs now days (this book was written in 2011) and most non-digital TVs are now in land fills or thrift shops! So a detective looking for converter boxes? Would it be worth the effort? Well it turned out that the boxes were a front for smuggling high-grade heroin which ended up resulting in a couple of murders and getting the local Detroit police and the Feds involved. Amos was on a 3-day retainer to look into this so even though the person who hired him was killed, he stays involved and ultimately solves the case which also involved some connections with Chinese gangs and a former Korean sex slave turned entrepreneur out for world domination?? As Walker points out in the book -- shades of Sax Rohmer! Overall, I would mildly recommend this one and will probably be reading more in the series.

[Thom Haneline · Rating 2 out of 5]

I only gave it 2 stars. I've been reading Estleman for 30 years, and am a big fan. But I found this one difficult to get through. The writing is stilted and convoluted - almost as if someone else was trying to write like Estleman. I usually enjoy his metaphors - for instance, in a previous novel he wrote - "When it's February in Detroit, it's been winter forever" is almost a haiku. Sentences in this book seem endless. And the plot is way too convoluted. Still better than many other writers,and I will continue to read him, but this was a disapointment.

[Catherine Woodman · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found this murder mystery to be a littlee too hard boiled for my taste--and kind of convoluted (which are not too criticisms that normally go together. The book was enjoyed more by my spouse, who likes this sort of mystery far better than I do.

[Craftygirl81 · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book had an interesting concept but the writing style just didn't work for me. It seemed unrealistic the way the characters talked much too elaborate. Had a hard time finishing the book so that's why I rated this book as such.

[Al Stoess · Rating 2 out of 5]

I been reading Estleman's bools since the early 1980's and have enjoyed them greatly. Intrenal Angels was a disappointented compared the intrique and hard hitting action of his other bools.

[Andy Plonka · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know why it has taken me this long to read Estleman's Amos Walker series since I usually get into writers from my home state but this, Amos' 21st adventure was a winner.

[Todd Hogan · Rating 2 out of 5]

This author is just not my cup of tea, so take this review with that in mind.

The story, which was published in 2011, is already old. Highest quality heroin packed in TV converter boxes to lead to the deaths of thousands of addicts which somehow leads to the overthrow of the government, or something. It's sometimes hard to tell what the author intends because he writes like he's afraid he'll run out of typewriter ribbons. Lots of short cuts and leaps of logic. Elmore Leonard makes it work but this author is lacking.

So, besides the jumps of action and logic, all the characters sound very similar. Imagine Humphrey Bogart taking every part in the novel and speaking in his wise-guy, side-of-the-mouth style. Even the women! I see Humphrey in a long wig with his hang-dog eyes with false lashes.

Then there are the similes and metaphors. The author pokes and jabs with metaphors and similes in nearly every paragraph, like a prizefighter who only knows how to jab. I long for the big uppercut that never comes.

Finally, the big bad is not revealed until the last fifty pages. Now, this is a series and I've not read the earlier novels featuring Amos Walker. The big bad is a Chinese lady who is described as crazy, wealthy, and beautiful, of course. She must have appeared in other novels, but her reveal in the last fifty pages seems to play false with the reader, who by the time she appears on the stage has no real interest in the story anymore.

So, not a great read. In fact, it's aggravating to try to suss out what the author is referencing. I don't want to work that hard. Sorry.

[Debbie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although I have read several Estleman titles, I had never read any about the smart-Alecy Amos Walker. I found him to be a little too glibly silver-tongued and missed the point of what he was trying to say. I found past-its-prime Detroit to be its own character. Estleman had a gift for physical description from Detroit to smaller spaces such as the mid-20th century kitchen which could have been my mother's--down to the round florescent ceiling light. There were a number of characters from previous books in the series. I'd read another, but don't feel the need to run out and get the first in the series.

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am not sure what to say about this book. I jumped in at 21 as the first I've read in the series. I didn't jump up and down, but It was an ok book that fit its market well. A little bit predictible and no amazing twists, but it didn't lack because of it.

[Christopher Taylor · Rating 4 out of 5]

The biggest drawback to reading this book is being unable to find Pitfall anywhere to watch. Its referred to several times through the book and sounds like a great noir film with the great William Powell, but its not easy to dig up.

[Stacy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm pretty sure I received this for free at a book convention four years ago. I'm glad I finally got around to reading it. Normally, I'm not a huge PI fan (Kinsey Millhone excepted), but I may have found another series to explore. This is the 21st book in the series so there's plenty of catching up to do, but I didn't feel like I missed anything by not knowing the back story. Set in Detroit, Amos Walker is a PI who wise-cracks just enough to be entertaining but not too much that it becomes annoying. Modern technology isn't Walker's cup of tea (whiskey really), but he needs to learn quickly since his latest case involves HDTV converters. Like I said, I enjoyed it much more than I expected to and do intend to try and read more in the series.

[Bayneeta · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this fine, but I have no desire to go back and read the first 20 books in the series. It was an easy read, not fast-paced, and it was easy to put down and go do something else. What it does have going for it is great sense of time and place: contemporary Detroit.

[Peter Talbot · Rating 3 out of 5]

A nourish ode to hard boiled private gumshoes and the decrepitude of Detroit: Estleman has great facility with snappy patois, a quick flick with plots and never gets bogged down with sentiment or confessional characters. Frankly very enjoyable quick read. No fuss. No muss.

[Marni · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good mystery. I love the author's numerous similes.

[Dave Wallace · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stolen cable boxes, only Estleman could do this idea justice.

[Gloria Feit · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the twenty-first novel in the wonderful Amos Walker series, Loren Estleman once again captures the spirit of Detroit, as much a character in the novel as it is the mise en scene. As the author describes it, it is a city which “continued its slug’s crawl toward bleak oblivion.” Although the tale begins innocuously enough, when Walker is hired to recover 25 stolen cable-TV converter boxes, it is soon apparent that there is more going on than meets the eye, when two people with whom Walker has spoken turn up dead, within hours of those meetings.

Walker is undaunted, and pursues the case with even greater zeal. He is no longer invincible, he admits: “In the pursuit of my profession I’d been shot, beaten, coldcocked, drugged, and threatened with death . . . It would be a good joke on a lot of bad people if it was a heart episode that took me.” The title derives from the line, soon after the second body is discovered, that of a man Walker had known for years: “Once you’d made the decision to live on the dark side of the moon, all your friends were infernal angels at best.”

His descriptions of several characters are exquisite portraits. Of a detective: “He’d lost flesh from age and the weight of the world, pasting skin to bone like shrink-wrap. His boys were grown and married, one of them was still speaking to him, and his wife, who earned more money than he did working shorter hours, was often away on business. Home for him was just a place to change horses between shifts;” of a colleague: “His face was the same vintage as mine, but he ironed his more often and packed it in ice overnight;” a building caretaker “an ambulatory dandelion gone to seed.” The prose is equal parts elegance and street.

There are perfect fleeting references on such eclectic topics as jazz musicians, politics and politicians past and present, and The Snows of Kilimanjaro, as well as little-known facts on historical figures as diverse as Black Bart and Marcus Garvey, and nostalgia for Tigers Stadium.

A fast-paced and consistently witty entry in this terrific series, it is highly recommended.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reviewed for Library Journal. Review below:

Library Journal
Few authors could write a gripping crime novel about the theft of HDTV convertor boxes in Detroit; but if the tale is told by esteemed noir writer Estleman, sit back and enjoy the ride. Motown's most cantankerous gumshoe is back in his 21st novel, and he's never been more irrepressible or caustic. When Amos Walker (The Left-Handed Dollar) gets a tip on a client looking to recover some stolen convertor boxes, he signs on for a few days work. What follows is the uncovering of a heroin smuggling ring that turns an easy case into a federal investigation. Throw in the widow of an infamous crime boss, dead junkies, and Walker's increasing dependency on Vicodin, and you've got yourself a great story. VERDICT While this mystery can be read as a stand-alone, it is more enjoyable when the reader is familiar with the cast of characters from past adventures. Gritty and full of depressing facts about an American city that has seen better days, this would strongly appeal to fans of Raymond Chandler, Ross MacDonald, and other authors of hard-boiled detective fiction.—Amy Nolan, St. Joseph P.L., MI

[Joe Slavinsky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loren Estleman is one of my favorite authors. Whether it's mystery, or western genres, his stuff is as entertaining as anyone's. This is his Amos Walker character's 21st novel, and he is one of the best noir detectives ever. Walker operates, primarily, in seedier parts of Detroit, which is saying something. As I was born, and raised there, it almost always saddens me somewhat reading Walker, or any of the "Detroit" novels, that Estleman has written. Of course I'm also the one who has often joked, when mentioning my hometown, that Detroit is a great place to be "from"(meaning that you're better off not being there). Estleman, like me, has license to say whatever he wants, as he is still a local resident. Don't let us hear anyone, who's not a current, or former resident, talking bad about Detroit, or we might take offense. Of course, in as bad a shape as the Motor City is these days, fewer people are actually joking about it. Anyway, this Walker novel is as gritty, and entertaining, as all the previous ones, so if you have never read one, please check it out. You won't be sorry.

[Jane Auringer Danjin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some fun. I was amused when Amos Walker finally admitted he could not do without a cell phone. He finally is catching up.

Another little item I enjoyed so much was the Detroit Free Press reporter, Barry's, comment when he and Amos were in the riverfront warehouse district. He said: I was born to late, I should be shooting rumrunners with a Speed Graphic. My father had a Speed Graphic and photographed the J. T. Wing, the last sailing ship on the Great Lakes, in the Detroit River. Just after, the ship was grabbed because it was smuggling. Dad wondered why the sailors were so threatening.

[Ed · Rating 4 out of 5]

#22 in the Amos Walker series. Amos Walker is an old school, blue-collar detective in hard-scrabble, blue collar Detroit.

Amos Walker is hired to recover HDTV converter boxes stolen from a retailer whose shop also does vintage resale business. Before long, the case turns old school: both a suspect and the man who lost the boxes are murdered, and Walker ends up working with both the local police and the feds.

[Henry · Rating 1 out of 5]

My first try at the Amos Walker series. Awful, just awful. Grand conspiracies all around, one stereotypical character after another, people speaking in entire paragraphs, one after another. If telling rather than showing was a crime, this author would have to serve about ten consecutive life sentences. It doesn't help that the publisher of the hardcover edition had their proofreaders on strike (e.g."inherant").

[Rachel N. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Private Investigator Amos Walker is hired to find stolen television converter boxes. When his client is murdered Amos becomes involved in a larger investigation with Homeland Security and the Detroit police. It was interesting reading a story set in my area but some of his descriptions of downtown Detroit were wrong. The mystery itself was interesting and I look forward to reading more books in the series.

[Karen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I never could get int0 this book because of the manners this author writes the story. My mind wandered and I did not want to read it. I forced myself to finish because it was being used for a challenge that ends this month and I have a lot of other books going I do want to read. I did not want to dig up another "I" title book this close to the finish line. Sad, because the plot of the story sounded so good. Because of the plot, I am giving it a low 2* instead of a 1*.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amos Walker is the old fashioned kind of fixer...working one relentless step at a time. You will not be disappointed in this story.

It escalates from a mundane tale of missing stuff to a very complex plot filled with danger and intrigue. Good stuff !!

[Carolyn Rose · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although some parts of the plotting (the extended foot chase) didn't work for me, I closed the book as I usually do with Estleman's work, wishing I could craft similes as visually exciting as he does.

[Cindy B. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Like this tale, though it's darker sometimes, remained interesting with no bad language, graphic sex or gore. Will read author again. Audio well narrated by Stephen Hoi (?sp). No TTS-enabled eBook but hard/ soft cover & audiobook available.

©2011?