Friday 03rd of September 2010

Reviews - Jugglers at the Border

WHO IS THIS WOMAN AND WHY IS SHE HERE?

Robert Fate: A "worthless character" succeeds in a life of crime.

CLICK HERE TO READ Lesa Holstine’s interview

CLICK HERE TO READ Kaye Barley’s interview

Barb Radmore's interview

Click here for a word from the world of boxing (Ringside Books, that is).

Click here to read a letter to the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association written by the award-winning author JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING...

JOIN US AT THE BOOK LAUNCH PARTY! CLICK FOR DETAILS...

Read Wilda Williams' blog on libraryjournal.com

Click here for the Kim Alexander interview with Robert Fate on FICTION NATION XM RADIO 155

JB Thompson / Lunch Room Surprises - Robert Fate Returns

I am ecstatic beyond reason - my pal Robert Fate has graced us with his presence here in the Lunch Room yet again. Bob's fourth Baby Shark book, Jugglers at the Border, is now available at your favorite bookseller.

Bob and I sat down and had a conversation about the Baby Shark series, and I learned a lot of really fascinating things I didn't know before about Kristin, Otis, and the story behind the stories. The iced tea's fresh and cold, so grab a seat and 'listen in.'

JB: Thanks so much, Bob, for coming back to the Lunch Room again - it's always so great to have you here!

We're going to talk about Jugglers at the Border, but first let's give our guests a quick rundown on Baby Shark's history. Tell us a little bit about Kristin, where she came from, and how she became Baby Shark. Sans too many spoilers, of course. ;)

BOB: J.B., I am so delighted to be here - let me put my menu down and pay attention. I agree with you - a little in front info about Baby Shark is a good idea. So - Kristin Van Dijk was born in the mid 1930s in a small rural town on the outskirts of Oklahoma City. Her father was "off at war" for a large part of her young life and her mother died of cancer when Kristin was in high school. She dropped out of school to be with her father and spent eighteen months "on the road" with him, traveling around Texas, sometimes living in his new Cadillac, as he made his iffy living hustling pool. Kristin and her dad actually spent more time parked beside the road reading books than shooting pool - and from Kristin's point of view, being with her father was more important than anything else happening in her life. When she was seventeen, their vagabond, pool-hustling life caught up with them. In one tragic event in a roadside pool hall out west of Abilene, Kristin's life was changed forever. That story is told in Baby Shark, book one in the Baby Shark Crime series.

Now, as to how Kristin became Baby Shark - well, that's because of her pool shooting ability. Like father, like daughter, Kristin became a pool hustler. Her nickname had always been Baby, but after she began cleaning out pool halls all over west Texas, she became Baby Shark. Also, after she trained for a couple of years at "taking care of herself," the name seemed particularly appropriate. Baby Shark carries knives and guns and knows how to use them.

Let's see - Kristin is five-eight, weighs 130, and has platinum blonde hair. In Jugglers at the Border, the most recent book in the series, she's 23 years old. She doesn't think of herself as pretty, but people say she is. She turns heads, so she probably is.

I hope I didn't just run on here, but I think you have the essentials now.

JB: Run on as much as you like - we can't get enough Baby Shark around here!

Since Jugglers at the Border features Kristin's partner, Otis Millett, so prominently, let's talk a little bit about their relationship. Otis pulled a lot of strings to get Kristin licensed as a P.I., which speaks to how highly he values her and her abilities. Considering this is 1950s Texas and she's female, this is a bit atypical of most men in that time, but Otis strikes me as a bit atypical anyway. Now that we know more about Kristin, can you tell us a little more about Otis? Obviously they make a great team, but what advantages did you see in putting these two characters together?

BOB: Okay - how about a quick sketch of Otis first?

Otis was born in a rural East Texas community in the early part of the twentieth century - twelve pounds at birth and over six feet tall by age fourteen. Fully grown he weighed 280 and was six five. He was raised on a dairy farm and could wrestle a heifer to the ground by the age of twelve. He was in grade school during World War I and during the Great Influenza Pandemic and had a clear memory of death happening all around him. He also remembered riding in horse and buggies when he was little, and how motorcars and trucks replaced that form of transportation. He rode to school and delivered newspapers on horseback, and recalled sleeping on his way home from those pursuits secure that his horse knew the way. He wore overalls during the week and knickers and long socks to church. He was one of three children. He had an older sister and a younger sister and a father that encouraged him to protect them. He told Otis, "The only fighting at school I'll put up with is if you are protecting the good name and honor of your mother and sisters." The Millett girls didn't marry until their brother left home, because every boy in the county was afraid of Otis.

After the Great Depression, Otis moved up to Dallas/Fort Worth and got into police work. He was in his twenties, tough as nails, and seriously honest; he made a good policeman. He was in his early thirties when he joined the Army. He was a Master Sergeant by the time he landed in France on D-Day. He was wounded at the Siege of Bastogne while single-handedly destroying a Nazi pillbox. He spent six months in a hospital in London, and returned to the Dallas PD in 1945. Less than a year later, he had earned the rank of Detective.

Otis was a married man. The first four books in the Baby Shark series each tell some part of his relationship with Dixie Logan, the Dallas Firecracker, as she was known on the Texas strip tease circuit. So, I won't repeat it here. Suffice it to say, his marriage to Dixie was the major turning point in Otis's life. She took him by storm, and he never got over her.

It was Otis' mother, Hattie May, who encouraged his addiction to caffeine and cigarettes. She smoked a pack a day and was a ten-cup-a-day coffee drinker. She outlived her husband and siblings and died with her boots on while striding to the milk barn at the age of 92. Otis adored her.

Otis entered Kristin's life shortly after her father's murder, and was instrumental in assisting her in locating the killers and making them pay for their vicious attack on her, her father, Henry Chin, and Henry's son Will. That was from 1952 to 1954. Shortly after that, Otis asked Kristin to be his partner at the Millett Agency. He saw in her the makings of a first rate detective and wanted to be her mentor. She was nineteen and he was in his late forties. Perhaps - though it's not easy to see into a man's heart - he may have thought Kristin needed a strong, positive male figure in her life.

But let's be honest, Kristin had several strong male figures to influence her after her father's untimely death. There was Henry, Harlan, Sarge, and Albert besides Otis. Each of these men helped shape her, each of these men helped blur the lines for her between law and justice. I think you could say that without them, she would not be the Baby Shark we have come to know.

JB: Yes, I think you could say that. In your third book, High Plains Redemption, we see a little bit more of Kristin's coming to grips with who she is and how she handles the necessary evil of killing people that she faces nearly every day. Let's talk a little about the progression of that into Jugglers at the Border. The killers she faces in the fourth book are a lot different from the ones she's faced before. Did that make it easier for Kristin to justify what she had to do?

BOB: The first killer Kristin faced in Jugglers was a cold-blooded sociopathic thief, a man who found it more expedient to kill and rob than just to rob. Taking life was of no concern to him. Kristin got the drop on him and tried reason, tried to talk him down, but he wasn't having it. From his point of view, she was just another problem that could be solved with murder. She realized her position was deteriorating and moved to control him by shooting him in the shoulder. The wound rendered his right arm useless, but didn't change his mind about killing her. The next few seconds - because these things seldom take more time than that - saw an exchange of gunfire that finalized their disagreement in Kristin's favor, but afterwards, it was clear it could have gone badly for her had he not made a mistake.

Kristin viewed killing the sociopath as self-defense. Lt. Lynch of the Fort Worth Police agreed with her and ruled the killing justified. However, Otis and Lt. Lynch both felt that Kristin was quick to the trigger. Then - Otis, just being himself, confused things by being proud of her killing skills.

Kristin's real problem is that she is good at what she does. She was an excellent student when she was being taught to kill and, when she is put in the position of having to decide how to act in the face of danger, her instincts take her to the extreme. She has said that she will never be taken advantage of again and that any fight she has is a fight to the death. She is working with her tendency to "overreact," but it is an uphill battle.

JB: I love how intimately you know your characters. Have you always known them this well or have you come to know them over the course of writing the books?

BOB: I remember thinking, before deciding to pen novels, that it was a truckload of bull when writers said their characters often told them what was correct to say or do. But four books into the Baby Shark series and I must admit Kristin, Otis, Henry, et al, have many times straightened me out about who they are and what they will and won't do or say. Henry, for instance, has worked too long and hard at learning English - especially mastering the idioms - not to expect his speech to improve from book to book, from 1952 to 1958. There are other examples like that one. Characters grow and change.

My writing habits contribute in a meaningful way to the surprises I confront at times in my stories. As you know, my story outlines are rudimentary at best, more just a mental list of events in a sequence that is often fluid. I also think about times, places - that is to say, scenes - and what I want to see accomplished by that point in the happenings. I couldn't prove it, but I think everything that happens is in the service of a distant goal, an ending that I hope for, that always seems to magically come to pass. One of the more peculiar things is how the correct length of the book happens without any conscious effort on my part. Somewhere around 280 pages, give or take a few, the story has been told. This was a page total that was suggested by my publisher for his own reasons. I agreed to it and have never thought about it again. Like I say, it just happens.

Reading the above, isn't it easy to believe what I have always contended - that is to say that I don't write these books at all. It's another guy. A guy who shows up and does all the work while I'm in alpha state. "Are you working?" my wife asks when she sees me staring out the window. I tell her yes, but in truth I'm doing nothing. It's that other guy who has his shoulder to the stone.

So, let's see - your question. Getting to know them is a process, I think. You know how I prefer allowing Kristin to tell the story so that she and the reader discover things at the same time? First person, it's called. Well, it's like that for these folks. We all kind of get to know them as we go along - you know Otis was raised in a rural Baptist house by parents who brought him up to respect things many people today not only don't respect, they don't even know they're supposed to respect them. A different world, you know? When Kristin becomes Otis' partner and he removes the words painted on the door to his office, it was because he was sensitive to something most people today wouldn't notice or even think about. Maybe you remember this little narrative from Kristin in Jugglers-

The Millett Agency was painted in black letters on the frosted glass door of our office. When I became Otis's partner, he removed the two words that had been lower on the glass.
Otis felt that Suspicions Verified conjured up lascivious acts that would be inappropriate now that he had a female partner. I appreciated his sensitivity and was glad to see the words go, but for a different reason. I thought they narrowed our expertise.
Exposing infidelity might make up the larger portion of our business, but it hardly described everything we did.
You see how much more practical - or modern, if you will - Kristin is than Otis? This was in the early fifties and Kristin is already pushing for women to be treated equally and Otis is still concerned about their feelings because they're women. He believes they should be treated differently, protected.

Do you remember in High Plains when Otis is in the hospital and Kristin tells him the baby girl he helped to birth has been named after him?

"There was a baby girl," he said.
"They named her after you. They call her Millie."
It was just humming machinery for a stretch of time while he gazed at me. I was afraid he didn't understand until tears came to his eyes.
He said, "She's gonna get a good education, Missy. That's how gals go places and get what's theirs. Education."

These are breakthrough moments in the development of these characters. Otis is seeing into the future. He's imagining a time when a woman can earn the same as a man. This was revolutionary thought in 1957. There are members of Congress who to this day vote against equal pay for women - fifty years after Otis dreamed of it for his tiny ward. He is a complex character when you watch him ask Kristin, a young female, to become his partner in a man's business, and then show a lack of sophistication by growing tongue-tied when he must converse with a nun who speaks French. The thing about Otis that keeps him steady in all our minds is he knows right from wrong. You can never trick him about that. He never gives a second thought to ridding the world of a bad guy.

So, to get back to your question again - it's a process. The characters are constantly introducing themselves. I don't know from one day to the next what they're going to say, but you can trust they are who they are.

You know what the problem is? You make it too comfortable in your lunchroom, the coffee is too good, and the atmosphere is so congenial. It's your fault I ramble on.

JB: Oh, I'm so sorry about that. I'll have to slack off a little bit from now on.

And now the last - and probably most burning - question, the one your fans are on tenterhooks over. Are we going to be seeing more of Kristin and Otis in the future?

BOB: Did I mention before that I am writing a standalone? There is a story I want to tell about a guy who makes a mistake without knowing he's done it, falls on the bad side of a mobster, and ends up on the run. I'm calling it Kill the Gigolo, a contemporary, third person tale with a male protagonist. This book is half finished, so things can change, but right now here is what the back cover would say-

Erik Lamar, a smooth-talking ladies' man, is on the run. Gangster Al Foley has a grudge to settle and only Erik's head will even the score. The Irish Mob is given an assignment: kill the gigolo.

When the mutilated corpse of Erik's friend, Freddy, is found dumped in the street, Erik gets the warning - what happened to Freddy was a Girl Scout demerit compared to what is planned for him.

But first, they have to catch him. One step ahead of Foley's thugs, Erik flies off to Mexico, thinking he has traded terror for a life of leisure. But it's not so easy: Lies and deceit become his way of life in the tropics. In no time losing his head becomes the least of his worries.
So, here's the thing, JB, in reference to Sharkdom, I'm already thinking about book five, the subject, the title, all of it - very different with Kristin doing some new things, big new things. But first, Kill the Gigolo, and then after that, a new Baby Shark story.

Be honest. Will slipping in the standalone book between Baby Shark books four and five make you totally bugnuts from the wait?

JB: Probably. But to paraphrase an author I know, talking about another author - "I'd read anything written by Robert Fate." Kill the Gigolo sounds like it'll be great too.

Thanks so much for taking the time to talk with me today, Bob. It's truly a pleasure, as always, to be allowed to spend time picking that fascinating brain of yours!

Well, folks, that's the end of the Lunch hour for today. Don't forget to visit Bob's website to keep up with what's going on in Kristin's world, and we'll keep you posted on new Robert Fate books in the future. Thanks for hanging out with us today, and come back soon!

=) JB

P.S. - Read a book. It's good for you!

Front Street Reviews
Your Road To Great Books

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption
Robert Fate

Reviewed by Barb Radmore

I admit it- I have been on the Robert Fate bandwagon since I first read Baby Shark. From the beginning it was the strength of the characters that grabbed my interest. The star of the show is always Kristin Van Dijk, the fast shooting, beating taking, pool hustling girl we first met when her father was killed in Baby Shark. Strong female characters are not unique in literary history, but Robert Fate has been able to imbue Kristin with a personality not seen before. Her personal history, well laid out in the first book, has led her to be able to accept a level of violence and blood shedding not usually seen with female lead characters, especially nineteen years old ones. And the fact that it is not only perfectly acceptable and enjoyed by the reader is the achievement of the author.

In High Plains Redemption Robert Fate has shown that he is able to maintain the role of puppet master. He manipulates his characters as carefully as Gepetto and they respond to his finesse. He has built them well-Kristin, Otis and Henry are all fully developed at this point. The fun comes in their performance as they play to Fate's melodious script. The battaglia-like script is punctuated with the percussion of pistol shots, the bright burble of blood, and the vibration of violence that builds to a crescendo of murder and mayhem. They join together to form a consonance that will resonate with the reader until the next Baby Shark book arrives.

That last paragraph may capture the elegance of the writing of High Plains but does not express the down and dirty fun the reader experiences with this book. Kristin is growing up. She has a boyfriend and a conscience-which are both causing her grief. She is questioning the violence that follows her, but what is a girl to do when the bad guys shoot at her, beat on her, and are generally very bad bad guys. She and the ever-reliable Otis find themselves trapped in the middle of bootleggers, and outlaws, handsome scoundrels, and literate bookies. Just another case of saving a victim in the hot Texan sun.

The Baby Shark series is becoming a pace setter in the modern, literate, noir narrative. It has all the classic motifs: the protagonist is both victim and aggressor, the normal is unusual and the plots never have simple solutions. Robert Fate has perfectly captured the hallmark black humor that relaxes the unease at the ceaseless violence.

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption is a do not miss book. Trite but true. I have tried to give you all the fancy reviewer reasons to read this. But if you like a well written, action packed novel that will keep your interest from beginning to end, one that you will actually enjoy for the story and the characters (not just because someone said it is THE book to read) (which it is) - read this. Now, go... off to your favorite indy book store...go now...no now...I still see you-leave now...buy this book.

MYSTERIOUSPEOPLE.BLOGSPOT.COM

Interview by Jean Henry Mead

1. Bob, how did the name of your series, Baby Shark, come about?

Kristin Van Dijk, the protagonist in the Baby Shark series, is a pool shark. Her father and her father's friend Harlan always called her Baby, and it was a natural progression to Baby Shark because she became so lethal at shooting nine ball. That's in the books - how did I come up with that name? A lot of years ago, I was watching some women shoot pool in a contest in Las Vegas. I thought they looked very cool as they determined their strategy, and very sexy in their tailored slacks as they leaned over the table. I admired their competitive spirit and the professional way they handled their cues. Mostly, I liked the fact they were doing their work as well as any man might.

I knew at that time that I would some day write about a woman pool shark - the name came to me as those kinds of things do when I wasn't thinking about it. Baby Shark just worked--high concept, if you will. For several years, I added articles, pictures, and notes to a manila folder labeled Baby Shark. When I decided to write a crime novel that was the name I chose for my protagonist, and for the name of the first book in the series.

2. What possessed you to write your first novel at the age of 70?

It sure seems like a goofy thing to do, doesn't it? Well, I had written screenplays for film and stage plays for live theater, and scripts for television shows. I had kept journals, written magazine articles, and even penned some poetry--oh oh, my wife just fell asleep. The mere mention of my poetry robs her of consciousness. Anyway, short stories were as close to a novel as I had ever come. In fact, I was certain I could not write a novel. I'm not sure what caused me to think that, but it was true. So, when Bruce Cook, a friend with whom I had written screenplays, said that he was joining a mystery-writing group and wanted me to join with him, I declined. "Last thing I'd ever wanna do," I told him.
Uh huh.

A number of months later, he told me how well he was doing in the group and asked me again. This time I gave it a try.

The group met once a month and discussed what had been written since the last meeting. It was rocky at first, but evened out as some members fell away and we gained a new member. Eventually it was just four of us: Sheila Lowe, Bruce Cook, Gwen Freeman, and Robert Fate. We were all serious about writing well and getting published. We displayed no ego, were dead honest with each other, and helped one another succeed. Now, going on five years later, we've all written several novels; we all have publishers; and we are all presently working on new books. We still meet, though more like eight or nine times a year, still love and trust each other, and still benefit from our relationship. Don't tell Bruce, but he was right again.

Now--you asked about my age. Yes, I was 70 when I wrote Baby Shark--a challenge since the protagonist is a 17-year-old girl. But, you know, I didn't see then and don't see now what difference age makes. If you're a writer you have imagination to spare or you shouldn't be writing. Tell me how age or gender enters into that? And the writing for a woman thingy--I had clever women around me as I was growing up, my mother, my sisters, my aunts, all strong, accomplished women who did in life what they set out to do--good examples. The women in our writing group are intelligent and capable, as well. Sometimes the cards are stacked in your favor, if you take a moment to look at them. Why not write for a young girl? Who's to say you can't?

I have chosen to try many different things in my life, but none as gratifying as writing crime novels--this may be my last re-invention.

3. You've had a varied employment background. Briefly tell us the highlights?

I assume what you're really asking me is why I've never been able to hold a job--let's see. Where to start? I'm a Marine Corps veteran (8 yrs) who lived in Paris, studied at the Sorbonne, lived in Thessaloniki and studied at the University of Salonica, lived in Oklahoma and studied at OU, lived in L.A. and studied at three different schools there--never got a degree, but used up all of my G.I. Bill.

I worked as an oilfield rough neck on a Texaco rig in Northeastern Oklahoma and a TV cameraman in OKC. I was a fashion model in NYC for a few years to earn a living while I co-authored a stage play that never sold. I was a project manager and later a sales exec in Las Vegas after working as a chef in L.A., where Gourmet Magazine asked for my Gingerbread recipe-actually, it was my grandmother's recipe. Along the way, I owned a company that airbrushed flowers on silk for the garment industry, wrote scripts for the soap opera Search for Tomorrow, produced an independent feature film, produced equity-waver live theatre (including a Penn & Teller show), and, as a Hollywood special effects technician, won an Academy Award for Technical Achievement. I've always enjoyed staying busy, and paying the bills has motivated me, as well. No rich uncles in my tree.

4. Tell us about the Academy Award. How did that come about?

As we all know, much in life that happens for good and bad, happens because we are where we are at the right or wrong time. It was in the early 1980s and I was working at Apogee, a motion picture visual effects production company, a firm that had done the visual effects for such blockbusters as Star Wars, Star Trek, Firefox, and many other major films. I was at the right place at the right time.

I helped with the development of a screen and projection system that advanced blue screen technology. Several of us were rewarded with Academy Awards for the work we did with that system in the films Dune and 2010. I was proud to have worked with the talented men and women at Apogee Productions and the crews of those films, and grateful for the recognition by the Academy. At the ceremony, my wife looked marvelous in a gorgeous silk dress.

5. Tell us about your protagonist, Kristin Van Dijk.

As you know the Baby Shark story takes place in the 1950s when all women were called girls or gals. They weren't expected to do more than keep house and raise the kids. So, at that time Kristin is the youngest private investigator in the American southwest and the only woman in Texas to carry that license. Otis Millett hired her to be his partner at the Millett Agency after seeing her stand up to evil and win. You don't have to be around her long to recognize that she is a good girl. But here's the thing--she is a good girl who is capable of very bad things if you cross her.

She carries a Colt .38 Super Automatic and can use it. She also carries Army Ranger knives in her boots, and can use them, too. She learned to handle these weapons so she would never be afraid again. Read Baby Shark--book one in the series--to understand why.

Kristin was 17-to-19 years old in book one and is 23 years old by book four. She's a natural platinum blonde, five seven, and varies according to her exercise from 125 to 130 lbs. She doesn't think of herself as pretty, but folks say she is. Her standard dress is black Levi's and boots with colorful shirts and a short leather jacket. In cool weather, she wears a black wool stocking cap. When she isn't out at Henry's homestead, she lives in an apartment above a pool hall in a blue-collar section of Fort Worth. She hustles pool when she isn't busy fighting crime.

Her boyfriend is a Dallas homicide detective named Lee. Her dearest friend is Henry Chin, a Chinese/American who saved her life. Her dog's name is Jim, a 120 lb German shepherd who pretty much does what he wants. Otis is her partner and mentor and, along with Henry, the only family she cares to have.

To relax, she reads the good stuff and enjoys Jazz.

6. Your first two books were Anthony Award nominees, and your first novel, Baby Shark, was optioned for film. How's the film project coming along?

Ah, Hollywood. There is talk and more talk as things move slowly forward--or sometimes sideways.

In December 2007, Baby Shark had been in bookstores for just over a year when Brad Wyman, the producer of Monster, starring Academy Award winner Charlize Theron, told my publisher he was interested in doing the first book in the series as a movie. We talked and by the spring of 2008, my publisher was instrumental in the sale of the motion picture and television rights to Brad Wyman. The last I heard, it is on his shooting schedule for the summer of 2010. Let's keep our fingers crossed.

7. Tell us about your work in progress. When will it be released?

This is exciting for me, Jean, because it is a departure from the Baby Shark series. This will be my first stand-alone crime novel. Is this guy a one trick pony? I decided, for a change of pace, to pen a contemporary noir in third person with a male protagonist. It's called Kill the Gigolo and takes place in New York City and on the Pacific coast of Mexico. The book cover copy will say something like the following:

Erik Lamar, a smooth-talking lady's man, is on the run. Gangster Al Foley has a grudge to settle and only Erik's head will even the score. The Irish Mob is given an assignment: kill the gigolo.

When the mutilated corpse of Erik's friend, Freddy, is found dumped in the street, Erik gets the warning--what happened to Freddy is a Girl Scout demerit compared to what is planned for him.

But first, they have to catch him. One step ahead of Foley's thugs, he flies off to Mexico, thinking he has traded terror for a life of leisure with a rich older woman who likes bad boys like Erik.

But it's not so easy. Lies and deceit become his way of life in the tropics, and in no time losing his head to the mob becomes the least of his worries.

My publisher, Capital Crime Press, will release Kill the Gigolo in the fall of 2010.

8. What's your writing schedule like?

I write when there is a moment to do so, though I particularly like early mornings. My iBook is on a desk that faces a wall. I must turn my head to see out the glass doors that lead to a balcony that overlooks the lake. The dog gets to track the water birds--I don't. But sounds and activities don't matter to me anyway, since for the most part I don't notice them. Nanda the cat sleeps on a cashmere sweater next to my computer and ignores me when I talk to myself. Fair's fair. I ignore him when he does that.

9. Advice to novice writers?

Don't do any of the writing. That's my advice. I long ago relinquished all creative duties to that other guy who does the work while I'm spaced out in alpha state. I never suffer writer's block or angst driven anything, since I do nothing and have so little to worry about. For example, I'll be sitting in the living room staring out the window at the distant mountains and my wife will ask me if I'm working. See how that goes? Easy does it.

The success of this strategy is the most apparent to me when I'm reading something the other guy has written and I'm surprised by it. "Did I write that?" I look forward to every minute I spend writing--it's like a pleasant afternoon nap. And, since writing is really rewriting and a book is never finished, it's a good thing there are deadlines. It's difficult to stop doing something that is so enjoyable, so without stress, so satisfying.

Two more small pieces of advice--keep the other guy a secret and show up on time to take the credit.

Well, okay, if you insist on a serious answer--marry wisely, someone smart and strong who keeps you honest, and never let a day go by without writing.

10. What would you be doing if not writing? And do you plan to ever retire?

Traveling. No.

11. List your web and blog sites.

www.robertfate.com

My electronic address is robert-fate@sbcglobal.net and I answer emails.

Thank you, Jean. I was delighted to answer your questions and look forward to an exchange of comments with your readers.

Warmest best regards, Bob Fate

Baby Shark
Reviewed by Margaret Marr

After being introduced to Baby Shark in Robert Fate's Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption, I knew I had to go back and start from the beginning of the series, to learn more about this fascinating character. What I got is so much more-a story that I never wanted to see end and characters that I didn't want to let go of.

Seventeen-year-old Kristin Van Dijk watched as a motorcycle gang killed her father then turned on her. They beat and raped her and left her for dead after setting fire to the pool hall where they'd been playing earlier. If Henry Chin hadn't dragged her out and taken her to the hospital, she never would have survived.

Forced to grow up and get tough much too soon, Kristin is taught to fight, handle guns, and keep from getting killed by "instructors" that Henry hires. Both seek revenge-Henry for his son's death (Will, the owner of the bar) and Kristin for her father's death and the loss of her innocence. In the 1950s, a good girl didn't admit to rape, and she simply did not seek revenge, but Kristin has no intentions of playing nice.

During her training, Kristin learns how to hustle pool like her father. Winning almost every game, she earns the nickname "Baby Shark." Thanks to her blonde hair, quiet demeanor, and innocent face, men dismiss her as harmless-a fact that will go a long way in helping her exact revenge.

With the help of private detective Otis Millett, Kristin and Henry hunt down the bikers one at a time until they come down to the deadliest one of them all. Kristin draws on an inner strength that keeps getting stronger, and she'll fight until someone dies-even if that someone is her.

I've never wanted a character to get revenge as much as I wanted Baby Shark to. What those men did to her was despicable, and though it forced her to harden her heart, the goodness within still managed to come out in unexpected and often touching moments. Kristin is a girl that good men would take on the world for-and it's much deserved. You won't be able to stop yourself from admiring Kristin Van Dijk. In fact, Baby Shark would not have worked as well if not for the author's skillful characterization. Mr. Fate simply makes you love Kristin, Henry, and Otis-and he makes you despise the biker gang.

With Baby Shark, not only do you get a deep, thoughtful crime novel; you also get plenty of gunfights, action, and harrowing car chases. If you choose to read just one series this year, please make it the Baby Shark series. I promise you're going to have a fantastic time as you escape into the 1950s and root for Baby Shark's revenge.

Musings of a Bookish Kitty
Review: Baby Shark by Robert Fate

My recent crime spree has taken me from Laos to Sweden and landed me in Texas, the setting for Robert Fate's novel Baby Shark. Kristin Van Dijk is only seventeen when her father is murdered before her very eyes. She is left for dead after being sexually assaulted and beaten.

Although he lost his own son to the murderous biker gang, Henry Chin, owner of the pool hall where the crime went down, comes to Kristin's rescue, pulling her out of the burning building and saving her life. Together, Kristin and Henry are determined to go after the men responsible for the deaths of their loved ones and for hurting Kristin. The police do not seem to care and someone has to pay the price of justice.

Baby Shark is set in Texas during the early 1950's, a time before DNA testing, cell phones and computers. Women and minorities had their place in society and rarely stepped outside of that. Kristin broke the mold when she picked up the pool cue, following in her father's footsteps, and trained to be a killer. She had been victimized once and instead of turning inward, she decided to face her fear and act out against it.

Kristin is both intelligent and quick on her feet. She has a hard outer shell, having built up her defenses to protect herself as best as she can. She can kill without remorse. And yet, she still holds onto her humanity. One of my favorite moments in the book is when she asks about the welfare of the dogs, knowing the owner will not be able to see to them anymore.

Robert Fate brings together an unlikely cast of characters. There is Henry Chin, the cabinet maker, who takes Kristin in and helps guide her down her new life path; Sarge, a World War II veteran, who teaches both Kristin and Henry how to fight; Albert, the one legged Korean War veteran who has a weakness for booze and whose knowledge in guns comes in handy; Harlan, a con man and pool hustler who mentors Kristin in the game of pool, shaping her into Baby Shark, a force to be reckoned with at the pool table; and Otis Millett, the former police officer now private investigator, who Henry hires to find the men behind the attack at the pool hall on that fateful night. Each of these men plays an important part in Kristin's life as she transitions over from child to woman.

The novel is even more salient, coming from Kristin's point of view. Robert Fate's writing style is straight forward, and the story he has created is captivating. There was a split second near the beginning of the novel when I wondered if Baby Shark was for me, but that thought died a quick death the more I read. Baby Shark is one of those stories that grips hold of the reader and plays on the emotions. It is easy to understand why Kristin and Henry seek a justice of their own variety-and I cheered for them all along the way.

As an aside, I commented to my husband a couple of times as I was reading the novel how I could see this book being made into a movie, and so I was quite pleased when author Robert Fate mentioned at the book signing this past Saturday that it will in fact become a movie. I look forward to seeing it! Rating: (Very Good)

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption
by Maryann Miller in All News, Book Reviews, Entertainment, Literary News

Often, things are not as they first appear, and that is true in this story of kidnapping and subterfuge. Baby Shark is the nickname for Poolshark-turned-PI Kristin Van Dijk, the heroine of this hard-boiled 1950s mystery. A tough, gun-toting lady, she has been compared to Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer, and the comparison is dead on.

In this third book of the series, Van Dijk and her partner, Otis Millett, travel to Oklahoma to track down Savannah Smike, girlfriend of Travis Horner. She is allegedly being held for ransom, but when the investigators get to Oklahoma they find that the assignment is not what they were led to believe. This leads them to wondering if their Texas client is to be believed.

Horner is involved in bootlegging, and it turns out that Savannah is the daughter of rival bootleggers in Oklahoma. Maybe this isn't a kidnapping after all.

Right from the start, Baby Shark is skeptical of taking the ransom to Oklahoma. "There were two things I didn't like about the deal. Hell, there were more than two, but first off, bagmen never get respect. And, besides that, I didn't like doing business with a two-faced bootlegger who drank his lunch with double-dealing politicians."

Fate has done a masterful job of capturing the mood and the tempo of the pulp-style mystery with plenty of action and wise-cracking to engage the reader. While Baby Shark might be a little too over-the-top for some, she walks comfortably in the same shoes as Hammer and McGee and other notable tough guys of the genre.

The narrative is tightly-written, fast-paced, and does an equally good job of moving the story along and revealing character. "He was desperation in misdirected slow motion, but his little pistol was pointed at my heart. I knew what could be next. He would shoot me and Otis would kill him. Maybe I'd survive, and maybe I wouldn't."

This is a delightful read and Baby Shark is sure to win over many more readers.

About the Author
Robert Fate is the pen name for Robert Fate Bealmear, author of Baby Shark, Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues, and Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption. He is a USMC veteran, attended the Sorbonne, worked as an oilfield roughneck in Oklahoma, a fashion model in NYC, and won an Academy Award.

Maryann's Web site

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption
Reviewed by Mat Brewster

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption is the third book in Robert Fate's Baby Shark Series. It's a '50s crime novel in the hard-boiled style. Kristin Van Dijk, aka Baby Shark, is a hard-hitting private dick from Texas working a case with her meatier, harder hitting partner Otis. The case is a simple one - be the bagmen for a simple kidnapping-for-ransom deal between bootleggers.

Being a hard-boiled crime novel, and the bag-drop happening within the first chapter, things of course go more than slightly wrong - and that quite quick. The drop was nothing more than an excuse for a little killing and soon our heroes find themselves being hunted for reasons they can't quite be sure of. There are car chases, state-line crossings, non-stop action, enough bodies piling up to have a ball team, and lots and lots of one-liners.

Fate knows his genre and is relentless in his desire to keep the pages turning and turning and turning until the novel is read in one fell swoop. I've not read the previous two novels in the series, but I never felt like I was behind. He does a good job of giving the new reader a good sense of who the characters are without boring old readers with a rehashing of events or ideas.

Fate's use of language could be considered adequate - I didn't find myself underlining any turns of phrases for later usage, nor did I cringe at any failed attempts of uniqueness. He keeps the action moving quickly, and by choosing a female lead he easily differentiates his book from the heaving piles of similar detectives-in-peril stories. Unlike so many of the early pulps Fate also adds in a little moral pondering to the story which makes Baby Shark more than just an empty vessel.

The crime genre, perhaps more than any other, creates a great gap between the good writers and the lousy. For every Raymond Chandler and Elmore Leonard there are a dozen lame mediocrities dishing out stinky tripe. Fate manages to occupy some nice middle ground here. No one is going to mistake Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption for high literature, but neither should they be embarrassed to show themselves reading it on the subway.

For fans of the genre this is a great edition to the library, and for those looking for something to pass the time in front of the fire as Lady Winter fast approaches, Baby Shark is 300 some pages of exciting goodness.

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption

Reviewed by Julie Failla Earhart

Mickey Spillane, Raymond Chandler, and Dashille Hammett may be dead, but the PI novel lives on thanks to Robert Fate. The new edition in the Baby Shark series, Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption, is what every reader wants: a great read. While I missed some of the back-story by starting with the third book in the series, it was not detrimental to keeping my rapt attention in this fast-paced novel.

Baby Shark is ahead of her time. A gun-toting PI in 1957 isn't the career most young women aspire to. Then on the other hand, neither is pool hustling. However, Kristin Van Dijk, a.k.a. Baby Shark, isn't your ordinary young woman. Her only family is her partner, Otis; a dog named Jim; and a man whom I couldn't quite figure out named Henry. A platinum blonde who dresses in black all the way down to her boots, Kristin packs more guns and knives than any of the modern bad guys on "Law & Order."

Kristin and Otis are supposed to deliver the ransom money for a beautiful, yet simple, young Oklahoma gal, Savannah Smike. When Kristin shows up at the rendezvous site, guns start blazing. Savannah's brother, Lester, is killed in the shootout along with a host of other bad guys. Caught in the crosshairs of rival bootleggin' gangs, Otis and Kristin grab the red-haired gal and hightail it out of there. They don't go alone though. There are at least two sets of bad guys after them, but Kristin and Otis outsmart them all.

The novel's action takes place between Otis and Kristin's office in Fort Worth and Savannah's parents' home in rural Oklahoma, near Broken Bow. There is lots of shooting, fighting, fast driving, and all-hell-breakin'-loose action.

While Otis may be rather stereotypical of the private investigator, it's okay. Kristin's uniqueness lends a new beat to the tune. When Otis is sidelined and almost dies from bullet wounds, it's up to Kristin to put all the pieces together and figure out what's really happening.

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption has a bit of a wandering narrative problem, but not enough to cause too many problems. The pages flew as fast as the bullets.

Armchair Interviews says: Fast, fun read.

Author's Web site: www.RobertFate.com

From our armchair to yours...

AOL JOURNALS
Reviewed by G.A. Bixler

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption
By Robert Fate

"In a spine-jolting crunch that flattened me against the steering wheel, the Mercury slid under them and their car came down on my hood, leaving my horn blaring and my engine roaring...I spun around in the seat, used both feet to push open the door, moved fast...and started forward with my pistol in my hand." (p. 137)

Like Fast-paced? Like strong female PI's?

Meet.... Baby Shark!

I came in on the "third act" of Baby Shark, in High Plains Redemption, but I'll be going back to pick up the first two books...and continue on with this hot series by Robert Fate! Baby Shark reminds me of Geena Davis in my all-time favorite action movie, The Long Kiss Goodnight! If you can picture Geena in some of her outrageous acts in that movie, then you'll certainly want to meet Baby Shark:

She can take it:

"He grabbed me by my hair and pulled me around so hard I thought my neck would snap. He jammed a hand between my thighs, picked me up by my crotch and the hair of my head, swooped me up shoulder high—and then I was falling..." (p. 130)

And she can dish it out:

"I moved instantly, swinging my hands out as I fell forward, chopping my blades into their necks as if I were striking cymbals. The first cuts were to the bone, but I slashed up and pressed in, doing even more injury as I withdrew, leaving their neck wounds open wide and their heads nearly detached from their bodies." (p. 251)

High Plains Redemption takes Kristin Van Dijk, aka Baby Shark and partner, Otis Millett into bootlegging country and two warring mountain clans as they are hired to find and return Savannah, daughter of one of the clan leaders—hired, but not by her own family!

Baby Shark is as confused as everybody else as they try to determine exactly what is happening and who is leaving the trail of bodies behind as Savannah is located and then lost again. Baby Shark knows only one thing—she must protect Savannah! No matter what or who gets in the way.

Unfortunately, that could actually be her lover, Lee, who happens to be a law officer who expects her to follow all the legal rules that he does in protecting the innocent! It is a constant struggle, for Baby Shark knows, "we work on the edge of the law, and...it gets blurry out there were Otis and I deal with things." (p. 198) And Baby Shark just doesn't think she can trust Lee...

Admit it, readers! This sounds like that exciting novel into which you want to escape and read this weekend! Well, you'll be right! This book is highly recommended...

So, excuse me, now...I'm going back to start reading: Baby Shark—first book in what I expect will be Robert Fate's fantastic series! You might want to start at the beginning... but, no problem, High Plains Redemption stands alone as a great addition, so wherever you meet her, I think you'll thoroughly enjoy Baby Shark!

Gravetapping
Reviewed by Ben Boulden

BABY SHARK'S HIGH PLAINS REDEMPTION by Robert Fate

May 1957. Baby Shark--a former pool hustler turned Texas private eye--is backup in a ransom deal. Her partner, Otis Millett, is the front man in the cash for girl exchange they were hired to do by a powerful Texas bootlegger. His mistress found trouble in Oklahoma that ended with a ransom demand. It is planned to be a simple deal, but Baby finds trouble in the parking lot of the seedy tavern where the switch is to take place and when she ducks it she finds Otis inside taking a beating from a couple of heavies.

Baby is quick on her feet and it doesn't take long for her to figure the deal and wedge it open, but it is only the beginning. Otis is certain they were betrayed, but the real question is why. And when thugs and hired guns keep coming at them they decide they need to figure the scam, and quickly, if they're going to stay upright.

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption was a major surprise, and a good one at that. It opens running hard and Mr. Fate not only keeps the pace up, but actually shifts it into a higher gear as the climax approaches. To use a cliche, the pace is unrelenting--the body's pile-up around the protagonist nearly as quickly as the pages turn and the action scenes are perfectly developed with a sparse noir style:

"'Who dies first?' I said, and stopped about a dozen feet away from them. Even a bad shot could kill at that distance, and they both knew it. My hands were steady. They could see that, too."

The plot is very nearly pitch-perfect as it takes the action and reader across the sprawl of Texas and Oklahoma. The characters are neatly defined and uniquely developed with a seemingly simple style and limited backstory; enough background to develop the characters without slowing the story. The major players--Baby and Millett--are cast in a dark filament glow that paints them somewhere between villain and hero. And smartly gives them foibles, weaknesses, and more than a few strengths. They are both very much worth rooting for.

The overall tone and style of the novel has the feel of an old black and white film mixed with the ultra-violent sentimentality of modern noir. The subject matter is far from unique, but Mr. Fate gives it a fresh and invigorating narrative that amps it past the average crime thriller. Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption should be high on every crime reader's list for the simple reason that it is damn good.

Note. Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption is the third novel to feature Baby Shark--real name Kristin Van Dijk--and the third novel written by Robert Fate. The first two are: Baby Shark and Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues.

BISH'S BEAT
bishsbeat.blogspot.com

BABY SHARK!
Reviewed by Paul Bishop

I was really ready for this book – an antidote to all the high-tech, here's-how-you-change-the-oil-in-a-submarine technobabble, wooden-charactered, missing-historical-keys-to-the-end-of-the-world, non-thrilling thriller novels inundating the current bookshelves.

Baby Shark, set in 1952, but written in 2006 (followed by Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues and Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption) is a straight ahead revenge tale with biker bad guys and heroine just tough enough to break your heart. I loved it. It's as if author Robert Fate had discovered an unpublished Gold Medal original and delivered it to the world – if you don't know what a Gold Medal original is, then stop reading this blog right now and don't return until you are suitably versed. Charles Ardai, the Hard Case Crime publisher, should pick Fate up in a heartbeat.

In a roadside pool hall out west of Abilene, Kristin Van Dijk, 17, is forced by four biker thugs to watch the murder of three men, including her pool hustler father. She's assaulted and beaten and left for dead as Henry Chin, a Chinese immigrant whose grown son was one of those murdered, saves her and secretly helps her recover. Because the local police show no interest in solving the pool hall crime, Henry hires a private investigator — more set on justice than law – to start a search for the nomadic killers.

Then Henry hires two vets to teach Kristin how to protect herself. She develops into one tough package of trouble as she also perfects her pool. At eighteen, she looks for the thugs as she hustles pool in west Texas and earns the nickname Baby Shark.

Revenge is difficult, but satisfying.

Baby Shark is a pure shot of stripped down adrenaline – a modern, old fashioned, kick-ass, blood, guts, and bullets good time.

Tim Hallinan on the Baby Shark series

Just finished BABY SHARK by Robert Fate. I'm coming at this series backwards, having begun with HIGH PLAINS REDEMPTION and now backing up to the beginning. I have to say thank you to all the DLers who went out of their way to praise Baby Shark and Fate. He writes this 50s noir as though no one has ever written it before, as though the whole genre is newly minted, and the books propel me from the first page to the last like few others I've read lately. This is just great stuff, and I'm going to blog about it next week.

MYSTERIOUS MATTERS

The titular Baby Shark is Kristin Van Dijk, 1950s pool hustler turned P.I. Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption (pictured) is the third in the series, which to me just gets better and better. To me, the series is a glorious homage to pulp fiction, except with better writing, plotting, characters, and dialogue. Kristin is tough and resourceful, but she's always struck me as real, as opposed to a Tough Sleuth created by an Author for Widespread Appeal. I also find the details of the time and setting to be rendered almost perfectly. These books have a cinematic quality to them; you can't read them without picturing how they'd look up on the big screen, with a highly charismatic actress playing Baby Shark herself.

BOOKLIST

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption
Fate, Robert (author)

May 2008. 287p. Capital Crime, paperback, $14.95 (9780979996023).
REVIEW. First published May 1, 2008 (Booklist).

Set in the 1950s, this hard-boiled private-eye yarn cranks right up with guns blazing and fists flying. All the traditional elements of old-school pulp fiction are here, but Fate goes beyond homage, blending innovation and skillful writing to transport the reader to a time when cigarettes were good for us and Packards owned the road. In this outing, Kristin Van Dijk, known as Baby Shark, and her PI partner, Otis Millett, find themselves knee-deep in rival bootleggers, kidnappers, and hit men. Baby Shark manages to squeeze in a recreational round of pool hustling with a shotgun-toting thug, but the two spend most of their time dodging a hail of bullets and trying to live long enough to collect their fees and make it home to Fort Worth. Two other books in this too-little-known series are Baby Shark and Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues. For those who love the no-frills, first person, hard-boiled style, this series is a delight.

- Elliott Swanson

ALLBOOKS REVIEWS

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption
Reviewed by Jan Evan Whitford

Robert Fate is the author's pen name and he has a colorful past, which includes being a student in Paris, an ex-Marine, oilfield roughneck in Oklahoma, TV cameraman, fashion model, sales executive, chef, wannabe playwright, airbrush artist, soap opera script writer, producer of an indy film, plus an Academy Award Winner as a special effects technician. And, if that wasn't enough, he's a pretty damn good mystery writer.

Sure, the plot and characters of High Plains Redemption were totally engaging, but I was particularly impressed with the author's snappy, give-and-take dialogue, which is so essential to a good hardboiled mystery. The dialogue meshes perfectly with his precise descriptions and ability to speak volumes with few words; sentences like: "He was handsome, but not as good-looking as he thought he was." And the icing on the cake? That'd be the nostalgic background, laced with scenes set around the "Friday Night Fights", Route 66, Teresa Brewer, Frankie Laine, and an old windmill with one of those cement tanks. I remember them well.

Highly recommended.

STRAND MAGAZINE
July 2008

BABY SHARK'S HIGH PlAINS REDEMPTION by Robert Fate
Fort Collins, CO: Capital Crime Press, 2008. $14.95

Latest in the Baby Shark series, Robert Fate's High Plains Redemption hits the road running and doesn't stop till the final page. It's a tough, hard-boiled action-adventure that reads like the best of the 1930s pulps.

In this installment, Fates pool-shark private investigator heroine, Kristin Van Dijk, and her partner Otis Millett, take on what they believe is a simple assignment. They must find the kidnapped girlfriend of bootlegger Travis Horner, pay a ransom, and bring her back. But the exchange is compromised and soon guns are blazing, tires are squealing, and bodies are falling. Van Dijk and Millett suspect they've been set up and return Savannah Smike to her family instead of to Horner.

Between hired killers and avenging family members, the two private eyes have to dodge bullets, blades, and bombs. Millett's luck runs out and he takes one in the chest, leaving an anxious Van Dijk to puzzle out the mystery and clean up the mess, which she does admirably. After a particularly bloody showdown, she wonders how she's able to do the things she does, and weeps bitterly. Readers----especially those who know Van Dijk's back story from the first book-will find themselves rooting for this sympathetic heroine.

Fate's Baby Shark series is set during the 1950s in Oklahoma and Texas, which explains the bootlegged liquor, profusion of firearms, and the chauvinist attitude towards women. But the storyline could have been set in any time period and been just as gratifying. Although the authorial voice doesn't totally nail the feminine persona, Van Dijk's first-person narrative keeps readers in the immediate action, as if they were viewing each scene through a camera lens perched on her shoulder. Indeed, the non-stop action, vivid descriptions, and cunning plot shifts are as dramatic as a big-screen adventure.

The violence is graphic, but Fate's matter-of-fact style moves readers through the fights, chases, and beatings so quickly and cleverly that only the most sensitive will object. Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption is a high-speed, tremendously satisfying tale that's hard to put down.

--Jackie Houchin

Baby Shark, Robert Fate

This debut book, Baby Shark, starts off fast - one night of violence and murder that ultimately leads to the birth (creation is probably a better word) of Baby Shark, a teenage girl who survives the chaos.

As a reader, you know what the book will be about. You know that the 17-year old girl who walked into the pool hall with her dad will eventually take not just the name Baby Shark but revenge on the men who left her scarred and fatherless. It's not necessarily the destination that keeps you reading, but the road you travel with her to get there.

And by the end of the book, you're anxious to see where she'll go next.

--Helen Ginger

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption
Reviewed by J.B. Thompson

When Kristin Van Dijk (aka Baby Shark) and Otis Millett are hired to deliver the ransom for redheaded Savannah Smike, the mysterious piano-playing girlfriend of an Oklahoma bootlegger, they find themselves involved in more trouble than they bargained for. It is kill or be killed from day one.

Who wants Savannah so badly they are willing to murder anyone who gets in the way? That is the mystery Kristin and Otis confront in what becomes a no-holds-barred struggle between two feuding outlaw clans.

Robert Fate continues his outstanding series with this third installment, which is by far the best yet. It is hard-driving, fast paced and bloody - the embodiment of Baby Shark - and yet in this segment of her story, nearly five years out from the brutal attack that shaped her character, we get a much deeper look into Kristin's psyche, an emotional exploration of what she has become and how she sees herself. It's a bit disquieting to watch a person trained to kill begin to reflect about how easy the killing has become, but it's this hard-edged introspection that compels us to love Baby Shark all the more. Even in the face of more danger than she's ever dealt with, Kristin remains cool and competent, and fiercely protective of those she loves. Fate's captivating storytelling style is in top form. He introduces us to new characters and reacquaints us with old friends while maintaining the now-familiar taut suspense that drives us to keep those pages turning.

J.B. Thompson, Let's Do Lunch

Hershel Parker on the Baby Shark series:

Robert Fate is setting his mystery series in Texas in the Eisenhower years? Ha! Ten pages before the anachronisms drive me off! After all, starting in 1952 I was a railroad telegrapher down the Sabine parishes and in post-Audrey Port Arthur. Wrong! Baby Shark was a triumph. In the third book the toughening Baby Shark is still endearing herself to readers, the supporting characters are folks fit to grow older with, gasoline has stayed cheap, and Robert Fate is still master of the most ferociously convincing laconic Texas talk since James Hime's The Night of the Dance. In #4 will Robert Fate stop teasing us with "Beaumont Blues" (as he did in #2) and give us some scenes in the Golden Triangle? A series set in Texas in the 1950s has no business being so very good, but the secret is out.

-Hershel Parker, award-winning Melville biographer

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption Robert Fate. Capital Crime (www.capitalcrimepress.com), $14.95 paper (287p) ISBN 978-0-9799960-2-3

Pool shark-turned-PI Kristin Van Dijk, the heroine of Fate's third hard-boiled 1950s mystery (after 2007's Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues), could give Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer a run for his money in the toughness department. At the behest of a Texas client, Travis Horner, Van Dijk and her partner, Otis Millett, travel to Oklahoma to track down Savannah Smike, Horner's girlfriend, who ís being held for ransom. The assignment proves trickier than advertised, leaving the detectives doubtful of Horner's integrity. After the pair successfully reunite Smike with her family, Millett is seriously wounded by gunfire, possibly from one of the thugs involved in Smike's kidnapping. Vowing revenge, Van Dijk stealthily and skillfully knocks down doors and twists arms in her effort to identify the triggerman as well as uncover the true motive behind all the bloodshed. Van Dijk's resourcefulness makes her a winning series character who merits a long run.

Fans of Sara Paretsky and Robert B. Parker will find much to enjoy. (May)

Bloodstained Book Reviews

This is the third installment of the Baby Shark novels and is by far the best of the series. Kristin Van Dijk ( Baby Shark) and her partner Otis Millet are hired to deliver a ransom for Savannah Smike the girlfriend of an Oklahoma bootlegger. Before they know it they find their mission to be a set up that is designed to leave no one left alive. As Otis and Kirstin try to find out why someone wants to kill them and Savannah they find themselves caught between two feuding outlaw clans.

Once again Robert Fate has continued to produce a fine fast paced novel. The dialogue is witty and the characters are more fully developed and colorful. I particularly enjoyed seeing Baby Shark playing pool again. Kristin continues deal with conflict by shooting her way out of trouble but she is beginning to reflect upon how easy it has become for her to kill and has a deeper recognition of how much her past has contributed to who she presently is. I found that this hard edged introspection made her more endearing. Robert Fate's captivating style of story telling kept me reading well into the night. I highly recommend this book and I look forward to reading the next one in this series.

Lillian Porter

BABY SHARK'S HIGH PLAINS REDEMPTION

Reviewed by JT Ellison

"Reading Robert Fate is like savoring the finest chocolate you've ever tasted. Smooth, silky and oh so slick, Fate weaves his tales with a deft hand. Breathless and satisfying, populated with one-of-a-kind characters and effortless prose, Fate is a writer's writer, and a reader's dream. Kristin "Baby Shark" Van Dijk gets stronger, tougher and more appealing with each entry, Otis Millet takes on more subtlety and shine, and the bad guys become more outrageous, but never without a purpose. And visiting with Henry and the Kristin's German shepherd Jim again felt like coming home. Fate's endless imagination makes him a master worthy of your time. He's one of my all-time favorite writers, and BABY SHARK'S HIGH PLAINS REDEMPTION is his finest effort yet. Do yourself a favor. Clear your schedule, settle into your favorite chair, start at the beginning of the series and lose yourself in Fate's world. You won't be disappointed."

JT Ellison, author of All The Pretty Girls and 14

Crimespree Mag / January 18, 2008

Robert Fate has been showing up on a lot of people's favorite book lists. With his latest, HIGH PLAINS REDEMPTION from Capitol Crime Press, he has yet another great book proving that all the praise is well deserved. Feuding outlaws, kidnapping, and non-stop action keep Kristin and Otis on their toes. The cover describes it as action-crime-adventure and that sums it up quite nicely. Calling this fast paced doesn't really do this book justice; it's faster than that. It's kind of like trying to keep track of a bullet after it leaves the barrel. Wonderfully memorable characters make this a ride you'll want to take again. This is a May release so keep your eyes open and ask your bookstore to pre order for you.
—Crimespree Magazine

LESA'A BOOK CRITIQUES

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption

Robert Fate's first book, Baby Shark, has been optioned for a film. That film company better find the right actress soon, because Fate's third book, Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption, is another action-packed, page turner. His fast moving crime novel is as vivid and colorful as any movie.

In the third book in his hard-hitting series, Fate dumps Kristin Van Dijk (Baby Shark), and her partner, Otis Millett, into the middle of a bootleggers' fight. As usual, the two private investigators accepted a simple job that escalated into disaster.

Otis accepted a job to rescue Savannah Smike, a redheaded piano player who had been kidnapped from her boss and boyfriend, a bootlegger named Travis Horner. When Kristin interrupted at the tavern, she found a beat-up Otis, and a young woman who didn't seem to be all there mentally. Suddenly, everything falls apart as one group of gunmen after another appear. It takes everything she has for Kristin to rescue Savannah and Otis. When they finally get Savannah home, they discover she's the daughter of Bull Smike, a powerful bootlegger in his own right. Otis and Kristin are suddenly targets, although they're not quite sure why someone is out to get them. The two detectives earn every penny, as they fend off hired killers.

Kristin knows she has a brutal, vicious job, one that most other women couldn't handle. However, after the murder of her pool hustler father, and her own rape, she had vowed she would never be a victim again. She has a hard time resolving her feelings for a police officer with her job. She says, "We work on the edge of the law...It gets blurry out there where Otis and I deal with things." Kristin Van Dijk is a killer with a conscience. She's a strong young woman, who kills a man who beat her up, and then examines her ruined suede purse. "I didn't know why I ever thought I could have anything nice." There's always a sly humor in Kristin's world, despite its cruel nature.

In 1957, Oklahoma is a dry state, where bootleggers pay off the "three P's," police, politicians and preachers. It's a violent time, one that comes to life as a visual treat. Fate vividly describes the Friday Night Fights, with its crowds, sexy women and well-dressed men, and smoke filled room. His descriptions of the cars, the roads, and the people, paints a picture of Texas and Oklahoma in the 1950s. And, Baby Shark's return to the pool halls to deal with the killers on her own turf, is a riveting account.

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption marks Kristin's welcome return, along with her "family," Otis, Henry and her dog, Jim. It's a powerful story that examines a vicious part of American history. Baby Shark continues the fight against dangerous men, in an intense novel that never lets up its blistering pace.

Robert Fate's website is www.RobertFate.com

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption by Robert Fate. Capital Crime Press, ©2008. ISBN 978-0- 9799960-2-3 (paperback), 288p.

KIRKUS STARRED REVIEWS

Fate, Robert BABY SHARK'S HIGH PLAINS REDEMPTION Capital Crime Press (Adult FICTION) May 1, 2008 ISBN: 978-0-9799960-2-3

Kirkus Starred Reviews 6/89 (And Ongoing)

Baby Shark's in a sea of troubles involving bootleggers, racketeers, crooked politicians, a wounded partner, a cooling romance and hordes of hit men out to do her in.

Kristin Van Dijk and Otis Millett, partners in a Fort Worth private investigation agency, don't much like the gig because neither of them much likes their client Travis Horner. But when big Otis indicates that he has a reason for taking it on, Kristin, aka Baby Shark-a renowned pool hustler from a young age-stifles her protests. Otis's reason, she soon learns, is gorgeous Savannah Smike, who might not be all there mentally but is fully present from the neck down. She hasn't exactly been kidnapped, Horner tells Otis while handing him a bag of ransom money, but the bad guys are keeping her in her underwear. It turns out, of course, that Horner is a lying scalawag and that Otis and Baby Shark have been set up. After Otis goes down with bullets in his chest, Baby Shark's outnumbered by a whole mess of murderers. Not that there's ever any real doubt that this smart, tough, endlessly cool platinum blonde will be able to cope. Love her or hate her, everyone knows Baby Shark is lethal.

A lively addition to a highly diverting series (Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues, 2007, etc.).

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption

Baby Shark, tough but lovable
By Pat Browning

Baby Shark walks into Curly's Tavern where two guys are pounding Otis Millett. Her Colts are drawn and cocked. When she says, "Pay attention," it's the best advice those two pounders will ever get.

Endearing may be the wrong word to describe a young woman who wields a blackjack,wears a .38 under her arm and a .32 at her ankle, and has commando knives stuck in her boots. I make allowances for the high body count when it comes to Kristen Van Dijk.I almost hate to see her grow up.

But time doesn't stand still even for a favorite fictional character. In this third book of Robert Fate's series, it's 1957, four years since the massacre in Henry Chin's pool hall. Kristen has settled that score and joined Otis Millett's detective agency in Fort Worth. She and Otis rack up the miles between Texas and Oklahoma to retrieve a young woman being held against her will, more or less.

Savannah Smike is the daughter of one powerful bootlegger and the plaything of another. She has flaming red hair and is a competent lounge pianist. Otherwise, she's a couple of steps behind everyone else. As her daddy puts it, some say she didn't get all the gifts that God promised her.

The Smike family is the most colorful set of characters I've met in a long time. Bootlegger Bull Smike minds his manners like a proper gentleman, reminding his sons that there are ladies present, and they promptly remove their hats. Bronagh Smike, Bull's wild Irish wife, slaps the boys around but is gentle and loving with her daughter.

The boys are the strong silent type. They wear big hats and carry big guns and not much gets past them. I like Kristen's detective lover, Lee, but "bad boy" Buford Smike could be a real contender.

Bull Smike is one of two big-time Oklahoma bootleggers. The other is Travis Horner, who employs some truly nasty thugs. The way Baby Shark sets them up in a pool match is a perfect payback.

I liked everything about this book.

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption
By Kevin Tipple

The third in the action crime Baby Shark series opens in May 1957. Kristin, aka Baby Shark, is still wielding guns and pool sticks with deadly accuracy. She is still working with Otis and the latest case and resulting plan of action were supposed to be relatively simple. Travis Horner has a girlfriend who got into some sort of trouble and is currently up in Oklahoma. She isn't kidnapped exactly, but she isn't free to leave either. In exchange for some money, Otis gets to bring the girlfriend back to Travis Horner. Kristin is supposed to lurk, provide support, and deal with anything unexpected that comes up.

Something she does very well and normally she is on time. However, as usual in May in Oklahoma, the weather is atrocious. A tornado that traveled through the vicinity has delayed her arrival by some two hours making the drive up from Fort Worth, Texas even harder.

Plenty of time for things to have gone badly and they have. Kristin never wanted any part of rescuing the girlfriend of a bootlegger, no matter how pretty or how well she can play the piano. Now, she has to rescue Otis also which will require violence. Violence is something Kristin has become very comfortable with the few years since her father died in front of her and she was brutally assaulted. Nobody does violence better than Kristin, aka Baby Shark, and there are serious consequences for those stupid enough to get in her way.

Featuring the same occasionally funny one liners, plenty of violence, and more break neck adventure, Robert Fate has penned another winner. Morality, always present in this series, plays a bigger role as Kristin in considers two major problems. One is the ease she steps into and out of violent actions which often leaves others dead in the chaos and wreckage. Truth be told, she likes it when circumstances force her into acting violently because she no longer knows any other way. Violence to those who interfere is simple while relationships and love are far more complicated. If violence is the answer, where does that leave the romance between herself and Lee, a detective with the Dallas PD?

Questions that have no easy answers much like what to do with the gorgeous redhead bootlegger's girlfriend, who is responsible for the waves of bad guys coming after them, and the major question as to the why of everything. Like the other books in the series, the motives of others, beside shooting at them is vague and unstated and Otis and Kristen have to survive long enough to get any answers at all. What is clear from the chaotic opening under an Oklahoma sky pulsing with jagged lighting to the final chaotic shoot out in a hospital in Fort Worth, Robert Fate's latest novel in the series easily is equal to the first two books. Another clear winner and one sure to please his growing legions of fans while recruiting new ones.

MYSTERY MORGUE

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption
by Robert Fate
Reviewed by Jeffrey Cohen

Kristin "Baby Shark" Van Dijk has come a long way since the beginning of the first book in this series (the current volume is the third). Now an established P.I. in the 1950s, Kristin and her partner Otis Millett are involved in "rescuing" a young woman of questionable mental ability taken from her family in Oklahoma.

In the course of taking Savannah Smike back from her captors, Kristin and Otis do their best to annoy Travis Horner, who is responsible for her being lured away. And annoying Travis can be a bad idea, given that he tends to have the people he doesn't care for killed without thinking twice about it.

As with the rest of the series, what ensues is a series of action scenes, often involving Kristin defending herself or Otis against very nasty foes, and usually coming out ahead. Car chases, gun battles, fistfights and more play into the mix.

It's a fast-paced ride with just enough character development to keep the series from getting stale. Baby Shark, having earned her name by hustling pool from the time she was a child, even manages to get Travis into a serious game of nine-ball.

The series continues to be entertaining without being trivial. Kristin feels like a real person, and we care about her and the people she likes. That's no small accomplishment. Readers might want to start with the first in the series, simply titled Baby Shark, but it isn't a must. Fate manages to get us up to speed-literally-with a minimum of fuss.

BABY SHARK'S HIGH PLAINS REDEMPTION
by Robert Fate

Travis Horner is a bootlegger in Texas whose girlfriend, Savannah Smike, is being held for ransom in Oklahoma. He hires Kristin Van Dijk ("Baby Shark") and her partner, Otis Millett, to track her down. As it turns out, things aren't that simple. Horner hasn't exactly told the truth about the situation; things rapidly go from bad to worse. In fact, the whole thing is a set-up meant to leave no one standing, including our intrepid PI team.

Savannah appears to have some mental limitations, but she also has some surprisingly cogent moments. In addition to being the girlfriend of a bootlegger, she is the daughter of one. You don't grow up in a family like that without becoming very crafty.

Whenever there is any conflict along the way, Kristin pulls out her guns and shoots her way out of the situation. When Otis is gunned down in a violent showdown, Kristin turns into a one-woman killing machine. Actually, that is my main gripe about the book, the fact that the only way that she knows to solve a problem is to shoot someone. She does appear to be developing a bit of a conscience and wonders at her own propensity to kill. However, over the course of the book, it began to feel that she was playing an arcade game, shooting down a bunch of ducks. I do wish there had been a few more pool hall scenes, with Kristin shooting eight balls instead of bullets.

Other than that, I found HIGH PLAINS REDEMPTION to be the most satisfying book in the series so far. The characters and plotting are becoming more complex from book to book. And Fate does a nice job of portraying Oklahoma in the 1950s.

-Maddy Van Hertbruggen

Library Journal Reviews

March 15, 2008

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption
Pulp fiction makes a comeback with this series featuring Kristin Van Dijk, better known as Baby Shark, the pool-hustling, butt-kicking18-year-old heroine of Baby Shark and Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues. Kristin is comfortable in her job as a private eye at the Millett Agency in 1950s Texas. Her latest case seems simple enough: pick up bootlegger Travis Horner's girlfriend and return her to him. Horner is one of the biggest bootleggers in Oklahoma, and his girlfriend happens to be the daughter of his biggest rival, Bull Smike. But someone doesn't want Baby Shark and her partner, Otis, to succeed, as Otis is set up and Baby Shark walks into a fight and a shoot-out. For readers new to the series, these books must be read in order, as there is no background regarding what came before or how and why all these relationships were formed. The language is rough and the body count high in this fast-paced shoot-'em-up.

Recommended for larger mystery collections.

Stacy Alesi, Boca Raton, FL
Copyright 2008 Reed Business Information.

Baby Shark 3
Reviewer: Ursula Hoffmann

We ought to worry about Baby Shark. Even though no longer quite a teenager, she definitely does not get enough sleep, she does not eat properly, the bad men use her body as a shooting target and a punching bag almost daily in the fast-paced setting of the narrative. But whenever the bad men, two or three at a time, come to kill her either at the pool table or literally, she prevails, with a gun or knife in each hand, defeating or killing them before they can do her any more harm. She is beautiful, she is smart, she is fit, at least some of the time. But she is also insecure about her love life and her lifestyle: should she be killing all these people coolly, without remorse or even regret? Robert Fate's outrageous story telling, however, keeps us from worrying about his heroine. It is so enjoyable that we can only cry "Baby Shark, go, girl" and "Mr. Fate, go man!"

GENREFLUENT

www.genrefluent.com

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption by Robert Fate

Kristin is taking names and kicking ass in this follow-up to Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues. Five years have passed since she was brutalized in Baby Shark. The detective agency she and her business partner Otis Millet run has proven to be successful but maybe even more than ever they are running across people who are willing to shoot first and ask questions later. Sent to Oklahoma to ransom a bootlegger's girl friend, they find they've been set up to be killed. As always they escape but not unscathed. Returning the young woman to her own bootlegging family they find they aren't out of the woods when people keep trying to kill them. On a stake out Otis ends up delivering a baby girl in the hallway of a residential hotel and when the bad guys come out of the room he is critically injured leaving Kristin on her own. Kristin has honed her skills and grown up a lot since her debut in Baby Shark. Fate's dialog and descriptions make the 1950s come to life as the body count rises and we even get to see Kristin do what it is that earned her the name Baby Shark in this series that always satisfies.

-Diana Tixier Herald

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption by Robert Fate

If you haven't yet read any of Robert Fate's Baby Shark series, let me recommend that you go out right now and find it. This series kicks ass, as does Baby Shark. It's exciting, funny, and dangerous - as is Baby Shark. In short, it's everything you could possibly want in a mystery series.

Baby Shark, as Kristin is known, works as a private investigator with her partner Otis. Their relationship has developed into the now third book of the series, from Otis being hired to help her find her father's murderer, to now the two of them working side by side.

At the beginning of this book, it's May 1957, and Kristin and Otis have been hired to deliver the ransom for Travis Horner's girlfriend. Horner is a not-so-legal Texan, and he says his girlfriend hasn't exactly been kidnapped, but she is being held against her will.

So Otis and Kristin are to deliver the money and get her back. Of course the deal is sour from the moment they get involved, and soon enough Kristin and Otis find themselves being shot at by men on both sides of the damn thing. That can only mean that nothing is what it seems, and that Otis and Baby Shark are going to have to be doing some fancy footwork to stay alive.

As always, the language and the tone of Fate's book is pitch perfect for the time and the story. When Otis is wounded and Baby Shark finds herself on her own, we have no doubt that she will handle herself well. She's tough and smart, and more than resilient.

There is much to love in these books. Kristin, Baby Shark, and Otis have a true partnership. Kristin's relationships are always complex, including with her on again off again boyfriend who is a police detective.

There's guns, guns, more guns, and then a few knives.

There's conniving and conning and all manner of double crossing.

There's also wit, strong plotting, and very human beings on every page.

Get thee to a bookstore, or Amazon, or your local library and put your hands on Baby Shark. She will kick your ass, for real.

-Sarah Bewley

GUMSHOE, A literary investigastion

Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption by Robert Fate

Baby is back and she's just getting better! Kristin (Baby Shark) and Otis are on the job, and they are doin' it like they been taught! This is our third round with Kristin and Otis, and we open with Kristin coming in as backup for Otis, but a couple hours late because of a tornado. The job is to pick up a kidnapped (stray?) girlfriend and a suitcase of money and return it to an acquaintance of Otis' as a favor. What Kristin comes into is Otis tied up and bloody with the redheaded girlfriend practically naked playing the piano without a hitch during the fist and gunfight.

After being taken by surprise by the redhead's brother, Kristin and Otis wind up following and rescuing the redhead again after her brother is killed by another group of gunslingers. Kristin takes the lead with Otis and Savannah (redhead) miles behind when Kristin spots more gunslingers who think that Kristin has the girl. Kristin manages to setup a showdown in an oasis, but with only her shotgun and her wits against two heavily armed men, will she live to tell about it?

By the time Otis and Savannah arrive on the scene, Kristin is alive but out of ammo, and the other two have taken off for parts unknown. But what Otis has discovered is far more important: Savannah does not want to go back to Travis Horner, the bootlegger who hired Otis to find her. This, of course, makes the job a lot more difficult, but Otis is the type of man who will look after a woman - and respect her wishes. The change in plan is to return Savannah to her daddy - Bull Smike. Turns out Bull Smike is the other bootlegger in the area. And Otis and Kristin just stepped in it big.

Fate has got it all, though -- he's got Henry, Jim (needs more Jim, though), Lee, some flirting with Kristin, and he was able to get more billiards in with Baby Shark, which was great. There is definite character development but not anything overwhelming and plenty left for a lot more books. More time out with Henry would be cool. I liked Cooty and Edna and the side touch -- the personal touch in the middle of the terror.

But these books aren't for people who can't take blood or violence - there is plenty of both in them. The slight historical aspect is always on the edge - in the description of the cars or the guns, bringing you to their world - or in the fan that always runs in their office. I highly recommend these books. All of them.

-Beth Slater

---

Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues

Reviewed by Henry W. Wagner

A sassy angel of vengeance, July 15, 2007

Fate's follow up to his hard hitting 2006 debut opens as his heroine, PI Kristin Van Dijk, maneuvers herself into being hired as a driver by a couple of thugs who are, unknowingly, leading her to a kidnapping victim she's been hired to recover. Minutes after they arrive at the site where young oil heiress Sherry Beasley is being held, all hell breaks loose, and Kristin finds herself fighting for her and Sherry's life.

It's not really spoiling anything to say that Kristin gets out of that mess, especially since that opening scene only provides a small taste of the mayhem and outright craziness to follow as Kristin and her partner/father figure Otis Millett navigate their way through the treacherous terrain created by the quirky last will and testament of Texas oilman Hiram Beasley. In their travels, they'll encounter many dangers, including numerous gunfights, mobsters, assorted thugs, and (shudder) lawyers.

Reflecting back on the action of this novel, one can only conclude that much of it is way over the top, but that can certainly be forgiven in light of how much fun Fate is to read. Probably the best way to go about describing the book would be to say what you'll be reminded of as it progresses, namely films like Blood Simple and Kill Bill, comics like Max Allan Collins' Ms. Tree, and books like Joe R. Lansdale's Hap and Leonard novels--if you enjoyed those, you'll have a great time with Robert Fate's Texas noir and his sassy angel of vengeance.

---

A Turn of Fate, February 17, 2008
By Ben F. Small

Baby Shark, a teenage girl, doesn't have the normal teenage evenings. Baby's are spent in pool halls, where she watches her father shark for a living. But one night, Baby's father bucks the wrong gang. He's murdered, along with the son of the proprietor, and Baby Shark is raped, beaten and left for dead. Most young girls, if they recovered at all, would be traumatized by this for the rest of their lives, probably hover in the shadows, stay close to walls, and avoid the eyes of oncoming people.

Not our Baby Shark. She heals and vows revenge. Housed by the proprietor of the bar that was trashed and burned, the man who lost his son, he secures martial arts and guns experts to mentor his protégé, while she seeks out the best pool training in the land. Meanwhile, a sleazy private eye friend of the bar owner has been tracking down the gang.

When she's ready, Baby Shark swoops out of the deep and delivers fatal bites tailored to each participant in the crime.

This is no normal book of revenge. This book seethes; it burns. The reader revels in the cold revenge Baby Shark dispenses. I couldn't put this book down.

Baby Shark
by Robert Fate

In the hands of a lesser writer, this could have been a pulp novel of stereotypes and super heroes. Instead, Bob Fate has created a well-paced story of developed, believable characters at a time and place the reader can taste and smell. Set aside a weekend and let Baby, Henry, Otis, Doc and Jim the dog take you on a wild ride through the pool halls and back roads of Texas in the 50s.

Reviewed by Julie Campbell at Amazon.com

BABY SHARK
by Robert Fate

There are very few books that I read these days that take my breath away. But Robert Fate's BABY SHARK is one of them. It's certainly the best book I've read this year, and possibly one of the best I've ever read. That may sound like overblown hype, but believe me, this is an amazing debut.

Kristin Van Dijk is a 17-year-old nomad -- on the road of life with her father, Marvin Van Dijk. He is an existential hero to his daughter, a philosopher, a grifter, a pool shark. He takes Kristin with him from pool hall to pool hall, covering Texas, making money bilking others.

One night in Henry Chin's pool hall, it all goes terribly wrong. A biker gang erupts in violence, killing Kristin's father and Henry's son. Kristin is horrifically raped and beaten, and the bikers leave both Henry and Kristin for dead, burning down the hall around them.

Kristin and Henry recover, both scarred for life in visible and invisible ways. Henry, a Chinese American, takes Kristin into his home, where they plan their revenge and heal. She re-emerges as Baby Shark, a talented pool hustler, trained in the ways of death.

This is a story of love and revenge, of acceptance and deceit. The setting of this story is Texas in the 50s, a time when young women who run into 'trouble' are outcast or shamed into silence. As Baby Shark so eloquently and painfully puts it, "Not so many years ago I would have been called Soiled Dove instead of Baby Shark." Instead, Baby Shark finds herself, buried in the rubble of her soul.

The desolate beauty of Texas is a character unto itself. The people who populate Fate's book are so finely drawn they leap off the page. Add to that Fate's command of spare, devastating language -- all combine to make BABY SHARK a must read. To say much more would ruin this amazing title.

Reviewed by J. T. Ellison

September 2006
ReviewingtheEvidence.com
 

"After finishing BABY SHARK… I got a feeling of deja vu: I had felt quite a bit the same way after reading Dennis Lehane's A DRINK BEFORE THE WAR about ten years ago. Like Lehane, Robert Fate is a very, very good writer. His skills are far deeper than that of most first-time mystery authors I have read. If he keeps on writing, reviewers are likely to accuse him of transcending the genre." (See review below)

 

"It could easily be made into a movie by Quentin Tarantino or Sam Peckinpah."

 

"Wonder how long it will take movie producers to get a hold of these rights?"

Baby Shark, a review by Lesa Holstine

Robert Fate's first novel is a made for the movies page-turner. It's violent with a stark world, and a gritty heroine. Baby Shark was meant to be a film, so moviegoers can stand and cheer when Kristin Van Dijk faces down her opponents.

Kristin was only seventeen when her father, a pool hustler, was killed by a motorcycle gang. She herself was dragged back into the pool hall, beaten, repeatedly raped, and left for dead when the bikers torched the place. If it hadn't been for Henry Chin, the Chinese owner of the pool hall, who dragged her out, she would not have survived. Henry was also responsible for her emotional survival. He took her home, gave her a dog and trainers to teach her self-defense, survival and shooting. She and Henry prepared for the day they could avenge themselves against the gang. When they found out the cops were looking the other way about the deaths and fire, they knew they were on their own. They hired a private investigator, Otis Millett, to find the gang members, while they waited.

In the months they waited, Kristin turned herself into Baby Shark, a pool hustler who drew a great deal of attention in Texas in 1952. Texas was a cruel place in 1952, a place of motorcycle gangs and crooked cops. It was a world where a Chinese man and a white woman living on the same property would not be accepted. It was a world where female pool hustlers were rare, and violence was common. Kristin became Baby Shark, a denizen of this world.

Robert Fate has created a fascinating world inhabited by intriguing characters. Baby, Henry and Otis have to become cold-blooded killers to seek vengeance. Readers will find themselves cheering for Baby Shark in her fight against evil.

"A compelling tale with well-developed characters that drew me into their world."

 

"I took BABY SHARK, by Robert Fate, into the bath. Big mistake. When I came up for air, the water was frigid, my skin resembled a chicken, and I'm stuck reading this until I finish it tonight. AMAZING book!"

"Baby Shark's Kristin is my kind of woman, a combination of Uma Thurman and Jennifer Garner. High-energy entertainment. Great fun!"

 

"Not the typical mystery revenge, Baby Shark reels you in and keeps you in its jaws.  A grabber from page two with a killer ending.  A great read and highly recommended."

 

From:    Diana Bane
Subject: New mystery author to watch: Robert Fate

Robert Fate, how great a name is that for a writer of mystery and suspense? His first novel, as many here already know, is BABY SHARK. I read an arc because he sent it to me, but I was intrigued enough by the blurb on his publisher's website that I would have ordered the book if he hadn't.

To be perfectly frank, what attracted me was the time frame in which the book is set, the 1950s. Nobody, but nobody, writes about the 50s anymore. I would have been Baby Shark's exact age in the year the book was set. I might have been going to an upscale school (before we had the term "upscale") in California when Baby Shark the high school drop-out was hitting the pool halls in Texas with her dad, but the prevailing attitudes of men toward females were not that different in her milieu and mine. Not at all, not at all. So I was most impressed by the decisions Mr. Fate's main character makes. What, after all, is a mystery novel for if not to make a point by heightening a situation, and to right the wrongs vicariously?

OK, that said, the book's violence was for me at times hard to take. Yet I kept on reading, and reading and reading, and was sorry when it came to an end. I also had a problem with the character Henry in that his Chinese-ness seemed stereotypical to me, so that grated a bit. Yet the problems were trivial even as I was encountering them. Somehow there's more going on in this book than just what is on the page. The novel resonates. We live in times that are increasingly violent, and to keep one's head in the sand is not the way to deal with it -- at least not for me. I learned early on to face my fears, and in that way Baby Shark and I are alike, so as hard as it was, I could relate. I made the connection, and I think a lot of people, probably both male and female, will.

After finishing BABY SHARK, while thinking about what to write for DorothyL (Mr. Fate was careful to say his arc came with no strings), I got a feeling of deja vu -- which I eventually tracked down: I had felt quite a bit the same way after reading Dennis Lehane's A DRINK BEFORE THE WAR about ten years ago. Like Lehane, Robert Fate is a very, very good writer. His skills are far deeper than that of most first-time mystery authors I have read. If he keeps on writing, reviewers are likely to accuse him of transcending the genre. (I, of course, would do no such thing. <grin>)

I wish Robert Fate a quick and deserved success.




From:  Sarah Bewley
Baby Shark by Robert Fate - link to my review.

I just finished BABY SHARK last night, and I'm stunned.  This book was so good, I quite literally stayed up WAY past my normal bedtime to finish it. I have posted a review to my blog:  www.myspace.com/wpadmirer. I highly recommend this book.  I don't normally read dark stories, and yeah, this one is definitely dark - but it's also wonderful.



From:    Nikki Strandskov
Subject: Baby Shark by Robert Fate

Stories of private eyes, especially female ones, occasionally give us a bit of back-story explaining how the protagonist got where she is. (For example, Charlaine Harris's Lily Bard series does this in flashbacks and allusions to her rape and assault.) Mr. Fate's protagonist, Kristin Van Dijk aka "Baby Shark," has something in common with Lily, as we learn in the first chapter. She has been brutally gang-raped by a motorcycle gang in an attack that also killed her father (her mother has died before the book opens). However, she also suffers from living in Texas in the early 1950's, meaning that she must contend with all the prejudices of the time and place about rape victims and women in general. The other survivor of the attack, who becomes a good friend to her, is a Chinese-American and has a whole other set of prejudices to deal with. In addition, the police don't seem very interested at all in tracking down the killers. What ís a girl to do? This book, the first of a series of which at least two more are to come, is apparently setting the stage by giving us the whole story of how Kristin Van Dijk became Baby Shark.

If you do not like scenes of extreme violence, you should not read this book. It could easily be made into a movie by Quentin Tarantino or Sam Peckinpah (in which case I wouldn't go-I can read it, I just can't watch it).

Kristin or Baby Shark (her dad was a pool player and she becomes an even better one) is an exceptionally strong character, yet I found her believable (and yes, Robert Fate really is a man, and writes from a female point of view very well). Although she performs many acts that I would consider highly reprehensible in real life, I found her a sympathetic character. The book is full of action, but there is more to it than just a shoot-em-up. Baby Shark creates a new family for herself with the few people she ís able to trust, and they are all intriguing characters. She also thinks about her own motivations and feelings in a very intelligent way.

I don't normally like noir all that much, and in some ways this is a noir story. I also am heartily sick of coming-of-age stories, and in its way, this is one. Yet I could hardly put it down and finished it in one day. I'm eager to read the next two books in the series. If you can stand the heat, take a chance on Baby Shark when it comes out.



 BABY SHARK by Robert Fate

        "Forgot to mention another FANTASTIC book I just finished - Baby Shark by Robert Fate. I loved this book and could not put it down until I finished it. Please, please, please tell me you're going to have the SECOND Baby Shark book out soon!"



From:    Cathy Strasser
Subject: Book Review, Baby Shark

As I was packing for vacation (my husband and my 25th anniversary and our first real vacation without kids in the last 18 years) I put out a pile of books to bring. Among them was the book Baby Shark, by Robert Fate. I'd read a review earlier this week, talking about the amount of violence in the book and, since I'm not a fan, I decided to just read the first few pages to make sure I really wanted to bring it. That was yesterday morning, and today I'm reviewing the book. It pulled me right in and I kept going back between packing and laundry just to see what happened next.

The main character, Kristin, is a 17 YO girl who is traveling around
the country with her father, a pool hustler, in the early 1950's. One
night in Texas, a motorcycle gang catches up with them and kills Kristin's father, beats and rapes Kristin, and kills the pool hall owner's son. The violence in this scene is real, but handled well in an almost dream-like sequence, and is easy to skim (as I did) without losing anything from the story. After the gang is done killing, they burn the place to the ground. The pool hall owner, Henry, rescues Kristin and they make a pact for revenge.

One of the things I liked best about this book is the characters do
things that make sense, given what has happened to them, and there are no super heroes. After the attack, Kristin spends several months in retreating from reality, sleeping as much as she can, given the nightmares she's having, and escaping into books and music. Finally, she's willing to start facing the world again, and she and Henry, along with a quirky cast of characters, work to turn her into an expert in self-defense, shooting, and pool. Her reasons for doing this "so I never have to be afraid again" really resonated with me.

Kristin, transformed into the Baby Shark of the title, hunts down the
members of the motorcycle gang, one by one, but again, in a believable fashion, complete with unexpected screw-ups and falling asleep on surveillance. The story is fast paced and draws you forward throughout the book. I highly recommend it.

 

BABY SHARK by Robert Fate

        "Robert Fate sent me an ARC of BABY SHARK, which I told him I'd be delighted to read, and would be happy to post a good review if I liked it. I did. Many other people have already described it, so I won't spend a lot of time on plot details. He asked me especially to think about how well the teenage female viewpoint worked for me, coming from him. My daughters are 15 and 22, not to mention once being a teenage girl myself, so I really thought about that. The protagonist, the daughter of a traveling pool player, is raped and her father is murdered by bikers at the beginning of the book. The rest of the story is about recovery and revenge and a search for answers.  At first the narrator didn't feel particularly feminine to me; I kept asking myself if the voice could have equally well been male. But as she began to heal from her experiences, she became more comfortably female, as if she were regaining that part of herself, and that worked very convincingly for me. More generally, this book is very well written, suspensefully plotted and carried out and I was really entertained. I'm trying to figure out why I only rated it A- instead of A in my book log, and I think it's because the main character is lacking that seasoning of warmth or humor that tends to draw me in completely. And that's not a fair criticism of the book, because this is a dark book with a character who has little cause for warmth or humor (though she is capable of forming emotional connection, and does). The book itself is written with a certain dryness that I enjoyed, and I will definitely watch for the sequel."

 

Caryn St. Clair
Baby Shark by Robert Fate

The thing about this book is that when I read the reviews and the promo blurb, I thought, "no way am I going to like this book." It's about a girl who watched her dad be killed and then she was raped repeatedly by a motorcycle gang. She then goes about plotting revenge. How gruesome is that! I was positive that I was not going to like this book. I wasn't even sure I'd be able to read it. Well, the thing is, although the plot is truly gruesome, the writing is not all that violent. Yes, the reader knows all of those things happen, but its not graphically described and is over quickly.

What the book is really about is Kristin Van Dijk's ability to heal, put the past behind her, and move on with life. It's about a young woman with incredible inner strength. The way she systematically went about training to fight, shoot, and play pool is inspiring. Time after time, things go wrong for Kristin, but she always picks herself up and moves on. This book is not for the cozy reader however. The subject matter is hard to read about and scenes are definitely gritty, but in its own way, it is a heart-warming story of recovery and revenge.

Baby Shark by Robert Fate

Review by Andrea Maloney

Set in the 1950's, Baby Shark is the story of Kristin Van Dijk a young girl who travels from town to town in Texas with her pool hustling father. Living out of her father's car she spends her time reading books and listening to Jazz. Life is good until one horrible night in a local pool hall when a local motorcycle gang turns her life upside down. Kristin is assaulted and left for dead. Her father is murdered along with the son of the pool hall's owner.  Henry Chin, the owner, is also beaten and left for dead but he manages to pull himself and Kristin out of the pool hall before it burns to the ground.

In the 1950's girls didn't admit to being raped and they certainly didn't seek revenge for wrongs committed against them and their family.  The local police don't seem interested in finding the perpetrators so Kristin sets out with Henry Chin to find the killers and make sure justice is done.

She sets out to learn how to defend herself while also learning to shoot pool even better than her father. With the help of a local private detective, Kristin and Henry set out to find the members of the motorcycle gang responsible and exact their revenge.

Robert Fate's first novel, Baby Shark, is a dynamite read.  It pulls you in from the very first page with non-stop action, violence, and characters that live and breathe.  Straightforward writing tells the story of a tough heroine who refuses to take life lying down.  She refuses to play by the rules and she refuses to let the criminals responsible go unpunished. Fate has written characters who are full of life, tough yet tender.  Characters you will find yourself jumping up and cheering for in this dark, almost noiresque novel. The tightly written plot will have your pulse racing, your heart pounding, and leave you breathless until the very end.

 

Baby Shark by Robert Fate

My bookmark has just left "Baby Shark" which the author so generously sent to me since my local library wasn't cooperating. Everyone, and I do mean everyone should run out and beg, borrow, or steal this book. There's no other way to describe how great this book is and we should be hearing a lot more from Robert Fate. The characters, the setting, the plot-all just seem to flow so smoothly that it's hard to believe this is his first book. Trust me, there will be no "sophomore jinx" with this author. I'd like Kristin to be my friend-never mind that she can kick some serious booty. I just shake my head over how great it is. Not many authors, at least for me, come out of the chute with a winner on the first try. Steven Havill, Steve Hamilton, and William Kent Krueger sure did and now we can add Robert Fate's name to that list.

Epinion.com

A teen-aged pool shark cues up revenge in this new series.

The occupants of the pool hall knew trouble was brewing when four bikers from the Lost Demons gang walked in. They just didn't realize how bad it was going to get. Seventeen-year-old Kristin Van Dijk did as most others and left, going out to her dad's Cadillac to wait. Besides the gang members, only Kristin's pool shark dad, the owner Henry Chin, and his son remained. Until a hand smashed through the glass of the car and pulled Kristin out by her pony tail, dragging her back inside.

What followed happened quickly, but was all too real. Kristin found herself in the middle of a bloodbath which resulted in the death of three men, including her dad. When the bikers were done with the adults, they turned their attention toward Kristin. She was brutally beaten, raped and left for dead. Thankfully, Henry Chin survived and pulled her to safety.

Somehow the police detective doesn't seem too interested in the case. It's almost as though he figures those dead and wounded had it coming. Bikers, hustlers, a couple of Chinese men, and a young girl in a pool hall? Oh well. Henry and Kristin aren't so willing to let it go, though. The police might have mysteriously mislaid the files, but Henry knows people. He knows how to get justice when the law fails.

Henry takes Kristin in and introduces her to a couple of vets who train her how to use both her own strength and weapons to get the job done. Together, the two survivors work to turn their home into a stronghold while waiting for news from their PI. The bikers they're after have split off, but cold revenge is just as good as any.

During down times, Kristin also practices pool and follows in her father's hustling footsteps. She makes a name for herself as "Baby Shark." When becoming good puts her in the spotlight, her hiding out days may be over. She could just find she will share the same fate as her father only this time the Lost Demons don't plan to leave survivors.

When I first heard about Baby Shark by Robert Fate, I wrote it down on my list of books to check out thinking it had an interesting premise. I figured I would pick it up someday when nothing else looked enticing. That day came, and I'm so glad (and, at the same time, so frustrated) that I checked it out of the library sooner than I had expected to.

Rarely does a debut novel succeed in drawing a person in so completely as this one did. There is usually some struggle with character development or pacing, but I found none of that here. What makes it more amazing is that this is the first book of a series. While many suffer from the fate of boring the reader through the set-up process, Baby Shark was a book I had difficulty putting down.

One of the aspects that may have helped in impressing me was the author's way of making the timeline of Kristin's training believable. She had just suffered terrible injuries that were going to take time to heal. Robert Fate not only gave her that time, but he also gave her a sufficient amount of the same in order to prepare her for fighting. In other words, she didnÕt become an overnight super girl. Perhaps she was a bit more deft than she should have been during her first encounters, but that could easily be explained away as the adrenaline rush of revenge. Either way, I was surprised to find that I remained interested during the months of healing and preparation.

The characters were so well done. While one may feel some emotion toward what happened to Kristin, it's difficult to feel sympathy for her. That's not a bad thing, though. She wants none of that and is portrayed in such a way that the reader can care for her without pitying her. Henry Chin was very easy to like with his broken English and his habit of quoting others. He loved Kristin as his own yet always maintained the distance required of their differences in age, gender, and race during that era.

Which brings me to the only thing I could find flaw with. The setting of Baby Shark is 1950s Texas. I just didn't get the feel for it, though. Outside of a few references toward vehicles, music and movies, the backdrop just didn't scream 50s. Then again, when the events revolve around poolrooms and biker thugs, it's not exactly the sock hop and letter jacket thing we're used to, is it? It's quite possible that my mind had a problem grasping it via my first impression based on the cover art. Nothing about the girl's clothing or hair seemed to fit the time she was living in. Acid-washed jeans and a halter-top? Just a little off. Not that it's even that big of a deal. I really only thought about it when I came across a heading that made a notation of the month and year. This story could have happened at any time, and I would have enjoyed it the same.

The frustration I felt toward having chosen to grab up this book now was timing. I am not used to being introduced to a series when it's not yet finished, hence my not having begun either the Lemony Snicket or Harry Potter books until now. I am an impatient person when it comes to seeing how the characters I've come to know are getting along, and I prefer being able to go from one book to the next. What I didn't realize was that acquiring the second installation would require that missing patience of mine because it's still new enough that I cannot put a hold on it. Not to mention, the third installment has not yet been released. Don't let that stop you, though, join in the wait right along with me. Unless you shy away from brutality, go pick up Baby Shark now. Then you'll want to pick up a copy of Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues. At that point, we should be on equal ground, and we can wait together.

By the way, the name of the third volume has apparently gone through some changes, so I cannot tell you what exactly to look for. It had begun as Baby Shark's Sooner Weekends but I recently saw that it's now said to be Baby Shark's Panhandle Caravan. I would suggest that you periodically check out the author's website at www.robertfate.com for any upcoming details.

Recommended:
Yes

Danielle Reid, Epinion.com

BookPleasures.com
BABY SHARK by Robert Fate

From the first chapter of Baby Shark, Robert Fate delivers all the satisfactions of the traditional crime page-turner, as he exposes to his readers the merciless activities of a gang of vicious brutes.
Our plot unfolds in Henry Chin's Poolroom where a young woman of seventeen witnesses her father being murdered with a cue stick by a member of a biker's gang, Henry Chin, the Chinese owner of the hall being badly pummeled, while his son is murdered, several members of the gang being killed, the pool hall being set ablaze and the young woman being beaten, raped and left for dead by four of the gang's beasts, who manage to escape.

Quite an opening and if you managed to survive all of this, as the woman, Kristin Van Dijk also known as Baby Shark did along with Henry Chin, what would you do? Probably, your first reaction would be to leave it to the law authorities, however, what happens when you discover that there is some rotten business going on with the police, as they don't seem to be too eager in pursuing the case. What is more, there seems to be a cover up, as some influential person is protecting the gang, known as the Lost Demons, and as a result, the file is conveniently and mysteriously lost.

Kristin and Henry unshakably agree that they must avenge these atrocious crimes and consequently they choose to take the law into their own hands, seeing that, according to Henry, "no police justice. Henry know more ways one skin cat." Consequently, as Kristin exhibits a great deal of doggedness, she decides that it will be necessary to financially support herself and she calls upon a friend of her late father to teach her to become a pool hustler, something her father pursued before his untimely death. She also engages two instructors, one to show her how to become a sharp shooter and the other to teach her self-defense. Although, Kristin considers herself to be a good person, she has arrived at a place where she could easily justify killing without remorse, notwithstanding that she would be driven to a level of barbarism in the process. To aid them in hunting down the killers and avenge the murders of a father and son, Henry, engages a private detective friend of his, Otis Millett who does a masterful job in coming to their assistance.

Although, Fate inserts several characters into his narrative, they are all well defined. The pace of the story and the chase to track down the killers moves along steadily, picking up in intensity when the author permits his readers to learn more about who is trying to protect the gang and in particular its leader, nicknamed "blue eyes." Moreover, readers are given a realistic opportunity to solve the mystery along with Kristin and Henry before the rewarding finale. All the clues are on hand and conveyed without the surprising coincidences that sometimes ruin crime novels.

This one is a winner!