Highway 61 - David Housewright

Rushmore McKenzie is a former cop, current millionaire, and an occasional unlicensed P.I. who does favors for friends. Yet he has reservations when the daughter of his girlfriend Nina Truhler asks him to help her father, Nina’s ex-husband Jason Truhler, a man in serious trouble.

En route to a Canadian blues festival on Highway 61, he met a girl, blacked out, and awoke hours later in a strange motel room with the girl’s murdered body on the floor. Slipping away unnoticed and heading home, he thought he got away with it—until he started getting texts with photos of the body and demands for blackmail money he couldn’t afford to pay.

McKenzie soon discovers that Truhler was set up in a modified honey trap. But Truhler’s version of events wasn’t exactly the truth, either. And McKenzie soon finds himself trapped in the middle of a very serious game involving teenage prostitution with some of the most powerful men in the state on one side and some of the deadliest on the other.

Praise for HIGHWAY 61:

“Rushmore McKenzie agrees to help Jason Truhler, the ex-husband of his lover, Nina Truhler, in Housewright’s solid eighth novel featuring the Twin Cities ex-cop who occasionally does ‘favors’ for friends. Jason appears to be the victim of a variation on the badger game when he attended the Thunder Bay Blues Festival in Ontario. He woke the next morning in a cheap hotel room, naked, with a dead girl on the floor, lots of blood, and no memory—now he’s being blackmailed for murder. Trying to unravel the scam leads McKenzie into a morass involving an Internet sex ring, drug dealers, a pair of thugs called Big Joe and Little Joe Stippel, arsonists called Backdraft and Bug, and some of the Twin Cities’ most powerful people. The tenacious McKenzie bounces between cops, bad guys, and movers and shakers with a tenuous hold on legalities but a good grasp on ethics.” —Publisher’s Weekly

“In his latest favor (see The Taking of Libbie, SD), Rushmore McKenzie is at his best as he muses over the outcome of good intentions in a caper that is too close to home. The story line is fast-paced as the hero figures out the motel game, but unprepared for the truth about Truhler. Instead of case closed, McKenzie finds deadly felons with ugly intent and even more lethal powerhouses with uglier intent targeting him. Readers will think twice before venturing on Highway 61.” —Mystery Gazette

“As the title would suggest, this novel proves to be one of author David Housewright’s most fast-paced endeavors. The author consistently creates top-grade, expertly written mysteries. There’s much to like about the delectably smart-alecky Rushmore McKenzie and his insider’s take on The Cities. He’s the kind of guy whom many women would like to date, and whom many men would like to have as a friend. After all, he’s big on the favors.” —Shine from Yahoo