A Shoot in Cleveland

A Milan Jacovich Mystery

by Les Roberts

  • Format: Softcover, 304 pages, 5.1 x 8 inches
  • ISBN: 978-1-59851-009-6
  • Price: $13.95
Description

#9 in the Milan Jacovich mystery series . . .

Hollywood producer Sidney Friedman has chosen Cleveland as the location for his new hope-to-be-blockbuster film, Street Games.

The “ shoot” is just getting underway, and the film's star is the movie industry's most notorious bad boy, Darren Anderson. Friedman hires Cleveland private investigator Milan Jacovich (it's pronounced MY-lan YOCK-ovich) to watch over the unruly young actor and keep him out of trouble. Milan, still suffering from the tragic loss of his friend, has no interest in moviemaking but signs on just to keep himself from going crazy brooding.

Keeping Darren Anderson out of trouble is like keeping your hat dry during a downpour. He's too rich, too famous, too good-looking, and too young to handle it responsibly. When he's accused of seducing the fifteen-year-old daughter of a local furniture mogul, Milan gets disgusted and quits the job.

But murder isn't far behind— and suddenly Milan is elbow-deep in all sorts of things that have nothing to do with a Saturday afternoon at the movies.

Book Excerpt:
Chapter One

How about you? Tobacco, alcohol, cocaine, sex, gambling, food— what's your own particular jones?

Me? Except for the nose candy, I'm addicted to all of them, to a greater or lesser degree. I've smoked Winstons for more than twenty years, although periodically I try to cut down. I enjoy a beer, I'm inordinately fond of women, I like to bet on football games, and one quick glance tells you I haven't missed many meals.

But I suppose my big thing is coffee. I slug down a couple of pots a day. Not the fancy flavored kind, hazelnut or raspberry or vanilla fudge, but good old-fashioned coffee, strong as a linebacker, no cream, no sugar. And not decaf, either. Coffee without caffeine is like nonalcoholic wine— what's the point?

So I had two cups at home on this particular morning in August, filled a go-cup, which I drank on the drive down to my office in the Flats, on the banks of the Cuyahoga River in downtown Cleveland, and brewed up another pot there, all before nine thirty in the morning.

For the past four months I'd been drinking my office coffee out of a very special mug, big and heavy and substantial. It had belonged to my best friend, who'd had it made for himself after he'd gotten it into his head that drinking out of cardboard or foam cups could cause cancer.

The mug is white, and on each side is his name and a reproduction of a gold Cleveland Police Department lieutenant's badge, with his number on it in black. lieutenant marko meglich, 7787. My guts twisted every morning when I drank from it, knowing that he was gone now, that a thirty-five-year friendship begun when we were ten . . . [ Read More Free Samples ]

Reviews
Roberts' ninth Milan Jacovich book, with its intriguing plot, provacative philosophical dilemmas, and strong Travis McGee-like hero, is his best yet. This is a series that gets better and better, and is strongy recommended for those who like their detectives cut from the classic mold. — Booklist
Roberts makes fine narrative use of the unlikely mix of Cleveland's blue-collar ethnic traditions with the fairy tale world of a movie shoot . . . [He] tells his tale in spare and potent prose. His Cleveland stories get better and better, offering far more than regional insights and pleasures. — Publisher's Weekly
Roberts puts his story through its paces with vigor and heart. — Kirkus Reviews
With mystery, believable and distinctive characters, and a smidgen of violence, plus romance, this novel can only add to Roberts' fan club. — Ohioana Quarterly / Ohioana Library
About Les Roberts
Les Roberts

Les Roberts is the author of 14 mystery novels featuring Cleveland detective Milan Jacovich, as well as 9 other books of fiction. The past president of both the Private Eye Writers of America and the American Crime Writer's League, he came to mystery writing after a 24-year career in Hollywood. He was the first producer and head writer of the Hollywood Squares and wrote for the Andy Griffith Show, the Jackie Gleason Show, and the Man from U.N.C.L.E., among others. He has been a professional actor, a singer, a jazz musician, and a teacher. In 2003 he received the Sherwood Anderson Literary Award. A native of Chicago, he now lives in Northeast Ohio. More About Les Roberts

Contains References to:

Chagrin Falls, Cleveland Fiction, Cleveland Flats, Cleveland Mysteries, Cuyahoga County, Lake County, Little Italy, Mayfield Road, Milan Jacovich, Severance Hall, Strohs, University Circle,

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