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The Middle Sister
Jack Salvo teaches philosophy one night a week at a community college, but he pays his bills by working as an L.A. private detective. A wealthy woman hires him to find her wayward daughter Lillie, who has been missing for a week. Salvo figures the girl is probably hiding out with her friends. All he has to do is interview the friends, bust their stories, and deduce the missing brat's location. Salvo soon learns that her "friends" are somewhat parasitical. When he finds Lillie, she is hosting different kinds of parasites - the little ones that help rid the world of rotting corpses. Salvo is then pulled into a maze of murder, arson, and blackmail. During his high-speed run down L.A.'s fast lane, he spars with grifters and gangsters, dodges the cops, and digs up a dark, deadly family secret.
326 pages, Paperback
Published August 2, 2019
3 people are currently reading
10 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
August 20, 2019
LA Private Investigator Jack Salvo is hired by a wealthy woman who wants him to find her missing daughter. The police have not been called .. the daughter, Lillie, has been known to disappear for a few days after having an argument with her mother. It happens frequently.
Jack's inquiries of Lillie's sisters, mother, friends, boyfriend, all turn up nothing. No one seems to know where she is. But he does get some more leads ... the places she normally haunts, parties. But still no clues in where she might have gone.
What is he finding is that Lillie is not the young lady that he expected. Toss in some heavy partying, drinking, and drugs and Jack is pretty sure one of her cohorts knows something they aren't telling.
It's not long before Jack finds Lillie's body.. seemingly dead of a drug overdose. Maybe....
That's not the only body that meets their Maker ... and Jack is pulled into a rushing flood of arson, blackmail, gangsters, and family secrets.
This is well written with a multitude of characters / suspects. Jack is great character... he has a wonderful sense of humor, although a little dry / a little sarcastic at times. He is certainly unforgettable. The story premise is a good one. The reading is easy and the pace is steady.
Many thanks to the author / AmazonPub / Netgalley for the digital copy of this crime fiction. Read and reviewed voluntarily, opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own.
Jack's inquiries of Lillie's sisters, mother, friends, boyfriend, all turn up nothing. No one seems to know where she is. But he does get some more leads ... the places she normally haunts, parties. But still no clues in where she might have gone.
What is he finding is that Lillie is not the young lady that he expected. Toss in some heavy partying, drinking, and drugs and Jack is pretty sure one of her cohorts knows something they aren't telling.
It's not long before Jack finds Lillie's body.. seemingly dead of a drug overdose. Maybe....
That's not the only body that meets their Maker ... and Jack is pulled into a rushing flood of arson, blackmail, gangsters, and family secrets.
This is well written with a multitude of characters / suspects. Jack is great character... he has a wonderful sense of humor, although a little dry / a little sarcastic at times. He is certainly unforgettable. The story premise is a good one. The reading is easy and the pace is steady.
Many thanks to the author / AmazonPub / Netgalley for the digital copy of this crime fiction. Read and reviewed voluntarily, opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own.
January 18, 2020
A refreshing switch from my reading habits of late featuring a male protagonist and author. I've gravitated toward psychological thrillers by women since reading 'Girl on the Train' but sometimes like to change up for a different perspective.
As a private investigator on a missing person case, Jack Salvo employs methodical yet daring methods to obtain information. The title character works through an odd set of colorful degenerates while on route to discovery. The characters were entertaining in themselves.
Did I mention Salvo's confident self deprecating repartee? I love dry humor - when it’s appropriate and this book had it in abundance!
This was a pleasure to read and I’ll be looking for more titles by this author.
As a private investigator on a missing person case, Jack Salvo employs methodical yet daring methods to obtain information. The title character works through an odd set of colorful degenerates while on route to discovery. The characters were entertaining in themselves.
Did I mention Salvo's confident self deprecating repartee? I love dry humor - when it’s appropriate and this book had it in abundance!
This was a pleasure to read and I’ll be looking for more titles by this author.
October 27, 2019
This was my first book by Jesse Miles. I thought it was the first in the series. I know now it is the third. It’s impressive to me that I didn’t realize it was third in the series. I read a lot of series and they tend to give you clues that a previous book or books were written. Looking back, this one had them but they were so well written they blended in to me. I liked Jack Salvo. He does questionable, sometimes outright illegal things to get the puzzle pieces. He knows when to pick fights and when to hold his cards close, keep his head down and dance. I also found him to be intelligent, fair and compassionate yet pragmatic. It’s a good mix, and a realistic one, for a PI. I’m not going into the mystery because there would be no reason for you to read the book then. The mystery was well done, with a few suspects and convoluted enough to keep me guessing. The author knew the area the story was set in and I had no problem in mapping it in my head. The book left me interested in the other Jack Salvo books. I would say go for it.
January 3, 2024
When Jack Salvo is hired by a rich woman in Los Angeles to find her middle child, he doesn't think the case will be that difficult. The girl, Lillie, is mad because her mother had just cut her allowance and downgraded her car after yet another car wreck. Jack figures she is probably staying with a boyfriend or one of her friends and it won't take long to discover where she is.
Lillie runs with a fast crowd. Most are trust fund babies, rich and spoiled. But there are also hangers on who want the money the others have and are willing to do whatever it takes to get it. Then there are the drug dealers who make their living off the high living crowd. But when Jack finds Lillie, she is dead, an overdose say the police.
Jack isn't sure it's that pat of an answer. As he continues to investigate, he runs into a former exercise queen who is down on her luck and trying to befriend Lillie. The owner of Lillie's favorite nightclub used to run organized crime and many believe he still does. Then there are various boyfriends and envious friends. Who is the culprit?
Salvo is an interesting character. He is tough enough but not so tough that he becomes unbelievable. He'd rather talk and figure things out than get involved in fistfights or gun fights. The character of the former exercise queen looms large in the novel and will prove interesting to readers. She is reminiscent of the Jane Fonda type of exercise leader, hoping for a tv show that lasts and an empire of streaming and DVDs for at home users. The plot twists and turns enough to maintain interest and it ends with a twist. This book is recommended for mystery readers.
Lillie runs with a fast crowd. Most are trust fund babies, rich and spoiled. But there are also hangers on who want the money the others have and are willing to do whatever it takes to get it. Then there are the drug dealers who make their living off the high living crowd. But when Jack finds Lillie, she is dead, an overdose say the police.
Jack isn't sure it's that pat of an answer. As he continues to investigate, he runs into a former exercise queen who is down on her luck and trying to befriend Lillie. The owner of Lillie's favorite nightclub used to run organized crime and many believe he still does. Then there are various boyfriends and envious friends. Who is the culprit?
Salvo is an interesting character. He is tough enough but not so tough that he becomes unbelievable. He'd rather talk and figure things out than get involved in fistfights or gun fights. The character of the former exercise queen looms large in the novel and will prove interesting to readers. She is reminiscent of the Jane Fonda type of exercise leader, hoping for a tv show that lasts and an empire of streaming and DVDs for at home users. The plot twists and turns enough to maintain interest and it ends with a twist. This book is recommended for mystery readers.
October 25, 2025
Just completed my third Jack Salvo Novel -- The Middle Sister -- by Los Angeles based writer, Jesse Miles. If you want entertainment, a good plot twist, and a ride through Los Angeles neighborhoods, you should read this story, and the other two Jack Salvo Novels. This is the time of year to curl up with a good book and The Middle Sister should definitely be on your reading list..
October 8, 2019
I have been a fan of the Jack Salvo series by Jesse Miles for quite some time. I read the second book, Church of Spilled Blood, a few years ago and was completely impressed that it was self-published, since I had not read many indie authors up until then. I immediately bought and read the first book in the series, Dead Drop, which was just as good. They can each be read as stand-alones, as I didn't even realize I had read them out of order.
I heard from the author a couple months ago that his third novel was close to being published and he graciously sent me a print copy to review. The main character, Jack Salvo, is just as entertaining as he was in the previous two books: a tenacious private eye who also teaches philosophy one night a week at a community college. His snarky internal and external voice are always a pleasure to read, and he develops the other characters in this novel very well.
Jack is hired by a wealthy family to locate one of three sisters who has gone missing (the titular "Middle Sister"), and he finds himself on the trail of series of disreputable characters in his efforts to find out what happened to her. The author has done an amazing job, once again, in his descriptions of the Los Angeles and surrounding area settings, and creates quite visual pictures in his writing. The plot unfolds gradually as Jack follows the clues, and the characters he meets, to solve this mystery; and the ending was completely unexpected, always a plus in my book (so to speak). I do feel the very end of the book was not quite as tightly resolved as I might have wanted to see, but it did not detract from my enjoyment of the story as a whole.
I would recommend this entire series from indie author Jesse Miles, and am still surprised that it hasn't been picked up by a major publisher. I could see it doing very well with those who enjoy the Nils Shapiro series by Matt Goldman (Gone to Dust) and the Elvis Cole series by Robert Crais.
I heard from the author a couple months ago that his third novel was close to being published and he graciously sent me a print copy to review. The main character, Jack Salvo, is just as entertaining as he was in the previous two books: a tenacious private eye who also teaches philosophy one night a week at a community college. His snarky internal and external voice are always a pleasure to read, and he develops the other characters in this novel very well.
Jack is hired by a wealthy family to locate one of three sisters who has gone missing (the titular "Middle Sister"), and he finds himself on the trail of series of disreputable characters in his efforts to find out what happened to her. The author has done an amazing job, once again, in his descriptions of the Los Angeles and surrounding area settings, and creates quite visual pictures in his writing. The plot unfolds gradually as Jack follows the clues, and the characters he meets, to solve this mystery; and the ending was completely unexpected, always a plus in my book (so to speak). I do feel the very end of the book was not quite as tightly resolved as I might have wanted to see, but it did not detract from my enjoyment of the story as a whole.
I would recommend this entire series from indie author Jesse Miles, and am still surprised that it hasn't been picked up by a major publisher. I could see it doing very well with those who enjoy the Nils Shapiro series by Matt Goldman (Gone to Dust) and the Elvis Cole series by Robert Crais.
September 9, 2019
The Middle Sister, the third installment in Jesse Miles’ popular Jack Salvo crime series, is a deliciously entertaining private investigation mystery that has every seedy element a reader could ask for — murder, arson, blackmail and more.
Miles sends Salvo (and therefore, the reader) down a winding path of intrigue, as a wealthy client hires the private eye to find her missing daughter, Lillie. Lillie is the middle of three sisters, all with distinctly different personalities, but perhaps all just a little too touched by the family fortune and fame.
As Salvo tries to identify what happened to Lillie, he not only discovers that she had plenty of social parasites that preyed on her, but also that other — much older — crimes may be somehow connected to her disappearance and death.
What makes this novel so alluring is that Salvo is such a deep character. He is educated, but rough… and seems to be able to “play well” with both the wealthy elite and L.A.’s unsavory side. The novel’s plot clearly shows the author’s disdain for police investigators, though he doesn’t throw excessive respect toward his private detective either. He offers Salvo as a dogged, but not always on the up and up, savior of sorts, who doesn’t mind breaking into homes or roughing up suspects to collect his information. All of the juxtaposition is a thrill to devour.
The Middle Sister is a mystery that keeps Salvo (and the reader) guessing until close to its final pages. But even then, is it enough to know what happened, or should justice be served?
Miles sends Salvo (and therefore, the reader) down a winding path of intrigue, as a wealthy client hires the private eye to find her missing daughter, Lillie. Lillie is the middle of three sisters, all with distinctly different personalities, but perhaps all just a little too touched by the family fortune and fame.
As Salvo tries to identify what happened to Lillie, he not only discovers that she had plenty of social parasites that preyed on her, but also that other — much older — crimes may be somehow connected to her disappearance and death.
What makes this novel so alluring is that Salvo is such a deep character. He is educated, but rough… and seems to be able to “play well” with both the wealthy elite and L.A.’s unsavory side. The novel’s plot clearly shows the author’s disdain for police investigators, though he doesn’t throw excessive respect toward his private detective either. He offers Salvo as a dogged, but not always on the up and up, savior of sorts, who doesn’t mind breaking into homes or roughing up suspects to collect his information. All of the juxtaposition is a thrill to devour.
The Middle Sister is a mystery that keeps Salvo (and the reader) guessing until close to its final pages. But even then, is it enough to know what happened, or should justice be served?
November 4, 2019
This was the first book that I have read by Jesse Miles and I hope it will not be the last one I ever read by him. This reminded me of an old style private detective novel that is set in modern time. I really like Jack. He has a great personality and such a wry sense of humor. He is hired to find a missing young adult female but she is not found alive. He then decides that he is going to find out why she either committed suicide or was murdered. I really enjoyed how this all pans out. I received a copy of this book from Smith Publicity for a fair and honest opinion that I gave of my own free will.
August 25, 2019
First book I’ve read by the author, but looking forward to more already. The action was non-stop as Jack Salvo starts digging in his search, the hole gets deeper with constant turns (in the plot.) Very entertaining. I received an advanced digital copy of this book from the publisher and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
December 9, 2019
This was such an outstanding title!! The author did a great job making me interested in the story and its characters. I couldn't stop read this one at all and now I am a full fan of Miles!! I haven't read anything from this author before but this will totally not be the last book that I read from them. The pacing in this one was fabulous and I wished it would have been longer.
September 25, 2019
This is the first book I have read by this author. I enjoyed it very much as it has everything a person could want in a good mystery. including a family secret. I highly recommend this book. I would like to thank Net Galley for a copy of this book for me to read and that I voluntarily reviewed.
September 24, 2019
not bad, i liked this book
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews