"excellent historical mystery"

Harry Spiegel was the writer with a dream and he shared that with Moe Shulman; together they created a hit comic series Wonder Guy and sold it to Donny of American Comics. However they were two innocents who signed away all rights including fees for merchandise based on the comic.. Their contract is coming up and they might not sign up with American Comics. Stark Syndication, the outlet that distributes their work to newspapers across the country would be fairer to them.

They have an idea for a comic book and they want to sell that to Stark Syndication. At Donny's birthday party, he keels over and dies. A toxicology report reveals he was poisoned and Jack Stark, V.P. and troubleshooter for Stark syndication starts an investigation rights. His interest is purely financial as he doesn't want a long protracted investigation involving three players in their stable. By finding the killer, (he is a licensed P.I.) the company will know what business decisions to make but he soon realizes he has his work cut out for him. Donny was a man who many people had a motive to want him dead.

A KILLING IN COMICS takes place in 1948 Manhattan and has a nourish gothic feel to it as well using some comic book Golden Age history . It is a trip down memory lane when people believe that comics are destroying the minds of children who read them. The well executed plot and the Phillips Marlow type protagonist makes this an excellent historical mystery. The illustrations by Terry Beatty are fantastic and visualize key plot points.

Harriet Klausner

Reviewed by Harriet Klausner
Posted May 27, 2007

Summary

A cutting-edge mystery novel that combines the illustrations of Batman artist Terry Beatty with a New York Times bestelling author.

Manhattan, 1948. America's most famous ex-striptease artist, glamorous Maggie Starr, now runs her late husband's newspaper syndicate, distributing the Wonder Guy comic strip. Wonder Guy, soaring superhero, represents all that is good about postwar America. But when the cartoon character's publisher winds up dead, Maggie finds herself working with her stepson Jack Starr (also her V.P. and chief troubleshooter) to find a killer among cartoonists, wives, mistresses and minions of a different sort of "syndicate"—suspects with motives that are anything but superheroic.