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Deadline Man

Jon Talton
Poisoned Pen Press (2010)
ISBN 9781590587232
Reviewed by Enid Grabiner for RebeccasReads (03/10)


Proud to be identified as a well known writer of a business column in the Seattle Free Press, the voice of this novel is referred to only as “the columnist.”  He is confident in his ability to write.  In fact, he is quite narcissistic about his skill as well as his love life. He keeps his women, of which there are many, at an arms length and seems to be commitment-aversive.

As the book opens, he interviews Troy Hardesty, a successful hedge fund manager, who is one of his sources in an investigation of a leveraged deal of Olympic International, a large equity company. Troy is the epitome of success in his expensive suit, standing in his fancy office, living the good life, but minutes after their meeting has ended, he shockingly plunges from a balcony.  Is it a suicide or a murder related to their conversation?

Suddenly “the columnist” is thrust into an investigation expanding beyond an ordinary corporate takeover.  There appears to be a conspiracy that spirals into multiple murders and a vast political cover-up. The words eleven/eleven keeping popping up as an important but unintelligible clue.  The people he seems to be able to trust no longer become trustworthy.  He finds himself in the role of investigator, detecting in order to save his paper by exposing the corruption.  No longer is he just an observer, he is an active participant in his story.

A running theme in "Deadline Man" by Jon Talton  is the decline of newspapers. The reader feels the writer’s sadness in the loss of the medium, which is rapidly downsizing and disappearing.  The passion of this journalist to maintain the medium is obvious as he aggressively goes after the story in a last effort to save his paper.