Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues
Fate, Robert (Author)
ISBN: 0977627624
Publisher: Capital Crime Press
Published: 2007-05
Binding/Price/Pages: Paperback, $14.95 (280p)
Subject: Fiction | Mystery & Detective | Hard-Boiled;
Fiction | Mystery & Detective | Women Sleuths
Reviewed: 2007-02-15

Library Journal - Starred Review

P.I. Kristin Van Dijk charges through her second entry (after Baby Shark) in this tremendously satisfying glimpse into the underside of 1950s Dallas/Ft. Worth. She and mentor- partner Otis Millett have been hired to find kidnapped teen oil-heiress Sherry Beasley, who needs to be kept safe until her upcoming 18th birthday. They retrieve her once, along with lots of cash, but free-spirit Sherry escapes almost immediately. Unfortunately, crime boss Vahaska and his entourage of unsavory characters desperately want to find Sherry since she witnessed a double murder. Moving adeptly from pool halls into the ritziest hotel in Dallas, Otis and Kristin keep asking themselves whose money is in their safe and how it ended up in a remote farmhouse. Mix in a few dead bodies and an attractive detective from the Dallas PD, and you've got one hot little crime story. Fate's witty dialog, colorful characters, and nonstop action make this pulp-style piece sparkle. Let's hope for more in this series. Highly recommended.

Teresa L. Jacobsen, Solano Co. Library, CA

Subject: BSBB

As anyone in the know can tell you, the initials above refer to "Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues." Yes, I finished this extraordinary book yesterday and can only sit in awe of the continuing story of my friend Kristin. This book is more about her, with some Otis thrown in too, with Henry only mentioned here and there. That would be my only complaint. I truly love *each* of these characters and feel bad when I don't "see" them. The story moves right along, the action isn't too rough or graphic and I especially enjoyed the scene at the sanitarium. For those who have read this ARC-you know what I'm talkin' about. I truly enjoy when bad things happen to bad people. I was not ready for this book to end either-I suppose that is what Mr. Fate had in mind for us-keep us wanting more, wondering what will Kristin, Henry, Otis and Doc be up to next.

This truly is a phenomenal series. You know in your mind that it's 1950's Texas but you feel like you're there too even tho that's not possible. I'm not describing this very well I know, however the feeling everyone should get is that this is another terrific book and I, for one, would like to follow Kristin until she's 60...forget "only" 3 books!!!!

Reviewed by Karen Lavely

Baby Shark's Beaumont Blues

Baby Shark is back in Robert Fate's second novel, and once again, the body count is high, the action non-stop, and the story makes your pulse race. Kristin Van Dijk (Baby Shark) is now a private investigator, a partner in Otis Millett's agency. What are the two partners doing now? Otis sums it up when he says, "Well, take a hopped up heiress, a couple stiffs, stir some speed into the mix along with a hundred G's in cash, and I'd say you're gonna come up with something nasty for sure."

Kristin and Millett thought they were rescuing a kidnapped heiress. Throw in drugs, a crime boss, a streetsmart waitress, and a sexy cop. Set the whole story down in 1950's Ft. Worth/Dallas, and you have a successful suspense novel. Otis insists, "We ain't killed nobody who didn't come out here set on killing us." Kristin Van Dijk and Otis Millett are just waiting for the right actors to play them in an action film. Fate has another winner on his hands. Hollywood, are you reading this?

Lesa Holstine, Lesa's Book Critiques

Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2007 16:34:04 -0500
From: Nikki Strandskov
Review: BABY SHARK'S BEAUMONT BLUES by Robert Fate

Long, long ago, before graphic novels, there were comics. Superman, Archie, Little Lulu, Sergeant Fury and His Howling Commandos. These comics all carried the Comics Code seal on their covers. (Go to http://lambiek.net/comics/code.htm for an illustrated history of the Comics Code). Even longer ago than that, when I was very young (but could already read), there were the lurid, scary, and sometimes morally reprehensible pre-Comics Code comics. I have a fairly vivid memory of encountering some of these in Texas, where I lived at age 5 and 6.

This memory keeps returning to me whenever I read one of Robert Fate's BABY SHARK books. For one thing, they are set in Texas in the 1950s. But chiefly, it is the sense of transgression in them. Even Baby Shark herself occasionally stops and thinks "What did I just do? What have I become?"

In BABY SHARK'S BEAUMONT BLUES, the second in the series, Kristin Van Dijk (Baby Shark for her youth and pool prowess, although there's precious little time for pool-shooting in this outing) and her partner and mentor, Otis Millett, spray blood around in a manner worthy of one of those old comics with "CRIME" in big letters on the cover. We always know that Kristin and Otis are on the side of the angels. They will go out of their way to protect the vulnerable and are strictly honest with money they may find "lying around." Yet, they use any means necessary to fight evil, and they are expert at using the mobsters' own criminal tendencies to defeat them. Part of the reason this works is the setting in place and time. It's quite believable that the rich and powerful (even when their gains are exceedingly ill-gotten) can consider themselves above the law, either because of corruption or simply that they have the police outgunned.

In the first book, BABY SHARK, Kristin's actions were motivated by her personal need to see some kind of justice done to those who killed her father and left her, raped and beaten, for dead. In BABY SHARK'S BEAUMONT BLUES, she's using the skills she acquired at that time as a licensed private investigator. A "simple" task of retrieving a teenage heiress--kidnapped or runaway--turns into a complicated and bloody mess where even Kristin and Otis are not always sure who's conning whom. The ending is satisfying and there is even a possible romance brewing for Kristin.

Mr. Fate's ear for dialogue is unerring and his ability to write from the perspective of a young woman is almost uncanny. Just one small example -- each time Kristin returns home after the latest bloodbath, she never fails to put any salvageable clothing to soak in cold water to get the bloodstains out!

It's often with some trepidation that I read a second book by an author whose first I've enjoyed. There was no disappointment here. I highly recommend BABY SHARK'S BEAUMONT BLUES.

Nikki in Maine