Occupation: Novelist;  writer of  eleven Mysteries featuring the Cincinnati based detective, Harry Stoner. Stoner Bibliography: The Lime Pit, Final Notice, Dead Letter, Day of Wrath, Natural Causes, Life's Work, Fire Lake, Extenuating Circumstances, Second Chance, The Music Lovers and the latest, Missing. Born: November 23, 1947, Cincinnati Education: Walnut Hills High School, Class of 1965; University of Chicago, M.A. 1974; Washington University, Ph.D. work 1976-77. Personal: Lives in Clifton with his wife, Katherine, and two dogs, Sailor and Baby. Award: Private Eye Writers of America Shamus Award- Best Novel 1989, Extenuating Circumstances. Who would he like to see play Harry Stoner in the movies?: "I used to think Nick Nolte.  But he's been in a lot of  lousy movies.  So, I don't care who they would cast as long as it isn't somebody like Vincent Price."  (Cincinnati Enquirer, March 15, 1993)

There's no money in this case for Stoner, but the more he finds out about Cindy Ann's pals, the more he wants to burn them bad . . . the rotten politicos, pain-happy pimps, kinky crime lords, and the football jock who likes to hurt. They're doing fine with their sicko sex scam-and no private dick is going to mess it up.

Pictures of women in art books at the public library are being mutilated, and Stoner knows instinctively that it's not the work of a vandal. A gruesome, unsolved sex slaying has him convinced there's a psycho loose in the city. Another butchered body - with enough clues to fill a very ugly picture - and Stoner's sure of the killer's identity. Sure that the girl he's falling in love with will be next. Harry Stoner doesn't like to see people get hurt. A good guy toughened up by a stint in Viet Nam, he's still got a sensitive heart and a conscience. Now he only needs luck!

Harry Stoner has a new case - and an even newer corpse. Professor Lovingwell asked Harry to recover some secret papers stolen from his safe. Lovingwell figured the culprit was Sarah, his radical militant daughter. But before you could say "Dead Letter," Lovingwell's taken a bath in a pool of blood. harry hates to lose a good client, so he decides to track down the killer on principle. Naturally, beautiful Sarah is the prime suspect. But she's just the first step on a trail that leads to extortion, broken marriages, a maniacal Viet Nam vet, racial tensions, and a few suicides. Harry Stoner's just a Cincinnati gumshoe trying to make an honest buck. But it's a little bit harder for Harry-Cincinnati doesn't work on the honor system, and he's got a sentimental streak about a mile wide.

Finding a runaway is not Harry Stoner's favorite kind of case.  And a gut feeling is telling him this one will cost him more than his time and peace of mind.  Bad things aren't supposed to happen to innocent blonde teenagers like Robbie Segal.  But even before her boyfriend turns up as the victim of a sick torture slaying, Stoner suspects pretty Robbie has swapped her safe middle-class existence for a painful and probably fatal lesson on the sleazy side of life.  The only clue Stoner's found is a snapshot of Robbie with the local guru and a wealthy woman whose idea of fun is an orgy of sex and violence.  And as he searches Cincinnati from posh penthouses to kinky nightclubs, he puts together another picture of Robbie that's not all pure and natural...until this runaway's trial becomes a bloody path that may leave Stoner staring at the killing end of a loaded Colt .45.

Detective Harry Stoner has seen too much of the seamy side of life not to notice the tarnish on Los Angeles's glitter or the gritty reality behind the never-never land of TV's biggest daytime soaps. A detergent manufacturer, already begrimed by scandal and rumor, doesn't want his image further muddied by the mysterious death of the head writer on the daytime series he sponsors. So it's up to Stoner to find out what really happened that sunny August weekend when Quentin Dover took his last shower. What Stoner uncovers is a slick world of high finance and low morals, all powered with cocaine...a sexy blond widow turned on by booze and boys...the broken lives of the men and women who create America's TV fantasies...and the perfect setting for greed, jealousy, and murder.

Cincinnati Cougars' Billy Parks was All-Pro...and missing. Harry Stoner's job was to find him and get him into shape for the season. But Billy's photo told Stoner he didn't like the man...or the shape he was in. The eyes revealed a killer mentality-a player who crushed, mangled, and sacked with pleasure. Billy's disappearing act might be a part of a contract dispute or something far more deadly. For Stoner suspected that Billy had become a mean machine who went on scoring in a sordid world of drugs and violence, where death hit with with a blind-side tackle...and life only lasted until the final cut.

A phone ringing after midnight means trouble, especially in private eye Harry Stoner's business. This time the 1:30 call is trouble, all right. A motel clerk wants somebody to pick up the loser registered as Harry Stoner who just tried to kill himself. When the real Stoner gets to the Encantada Motel, he finds his old college roommate nearly dead and too many memories still alive. It's a suicide attempt that forces Stoner back into his own past, where a pretty woman, a brutal murder, and the bitter remnants of the sixties drug culture make Stoner's future look rosy...like flowers on a grave.

To P.I. Harry Stoner, Ira Lessing had everything to live for: money, a beautiful wife, good friends, and a reputation that would do credit to a saint. Bur Lessing disappeared one hot July night, and Stoner knew in his gut that the man was dead. Years on the street had taught Stoner that no man is what he seems. Peeling away the layers to the bone would reveal what had become of Lessing. It would lead Stoner into the underbelly of Cincinnati...into places where desire and violence meet...into the darkest byways of the human heart where his own values would be tested to the bloody limit. By acts of love...and murder.

Clients never tell the whole story. Harry Stoner had taken a snowy drive to Cincinnati psychiatrist Phil Pearson's mansion to hear the tale of daughter Kristen-emotionally disturbed and missing. But the doctor left out the parts about his first wife's suicide and his second wife's bedroom eyes that were already chasing the winter cold from Stoner's blood. That's why Stoner suspected the search for Kristen could take a kinky turn. He'd seen teens driven by desperation before-the dark things hidden deep in troubled minds become too much for flesh and blood to bear. And Kristen's secrets were tied to an act so chilling that its reemergence could tear lives apart, unleashing passions so violent that even the hard heart of a seasoned P.I. could break or be stopped forever.

That's how good little Leon Tubin's big stereo system was-so good that Harry Stoner, private eye, thought for an instant that Tubin's over sexed wife was playing a Steinway in the other room. Then Stoner came back to reality, and a melancholy mood...Tubin hired Stoner to find thirty-five priceless vinyl records that had been heisted from his vast collection. What Stoner found instead was a circle of eccentrics ranging from the criminal to the insane, all of whom shared a passion for high-end woofers and tweeters. And Stoner found something else: thirty grand in Tubin's refrigerator. Before Harry could trace the missing records or the source of the cash, Tubin's wife vanished and the couple's offbeat past started to ring a bell. Suddenly Stoner was sure his little music lover was playing a part in a fantastic symphony-following a melody of blackmail and murder...

The woman lived on Blue Jay Drive, and the love of her life had vanished into thin air. For Cindy Dorn, the man had been a safe haven, a good lover, and good friend. But Mason Greenleaf had his demons, and when Harry Stoner began investigating Greenleaf's disappearance, he found those demons fast. Cindy knew her lover was bisexual, but she didn't know what price sexuality had exacted. Now Stoner is trying to stanch a flow of hurt from the gay underworld of Cincinnati. Two people are dead and a man's last desperate act of honor has left behind a violent puzzle-a mystery with too many clues and far too many guilty parties....

 

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