The Boardwalk

By Reed Farrel Coleman

Gulliver Dowd is finally on the verge of unraveling the mystery behind his sister’s murder when the man who is supposed to give him the scoop, NYPD Detective Sam Patrick, is gunned down on the Coney Island Boardwalk. As Dowd delves into Patrick’s accidental shooting, he uncovers a pattern of corruption and deceit involving organized crime and the police. But there are tough choices to be made. Just how much is Gulliver willing to sacrifice in order to find out why his sister was murdered and to unmask the killer? The answers aren’t found in the moon or the stars, but on the boardwalk.

The Boardwalk is third in the Gulliver Dowd Mystery series, featuring a New York private investigator. In award-winning author Louise Penny’s words: "A little man with a huge heart and a huge chip on his shoulder, Gulliver Dowd swaggers into the crime fiction world and takes his place with the great investigators. Smart, vulnerable, wounded, heartbreakingly hopeful, I just adore his company."

• Language: English
• Publisher: Orca Book Publishers
• Release date: Feb 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9781459806764

Reed Farrel Coleman

REED FARREL COLEMAN is a two-time Edgar Award nominee. He has also received the Macavity, Barry and Anthony Awards. To find out more visit: www.reedcoleman.com

Book preview

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Reviews for The Boardwalk

[stanski_2 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This is more a novella than a novel, the cover even shows it as a "Rapid Reads". Unfortunately, it suffered from being sandwiched between Harlan Coben and Michael Connelly on my reading list. The character development was OK, albeit cartoonish. The plot, however, was without much redeeming grace. Heavy handed, and full of holes a Mack truck could drive through. If you've only got a couple of hours, maybe this one is for you. For the more serious readers, there are lots of better choices. I have since learned that this book is meant for a specific audience, which does not include serious readers.( )

[raucousrain · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Like other LibraryThing reviewers, when I requested this book I did not realize this book was written for ESL students and other adults lacking literacy skills. At first, I was surprised by the book’s short length and the simplicity of writing … but when I realized why, I appreciated it for what it was meant to be.I enjoy mysteries, and this story is a good one. The characters are not particularly well developed, but the reader can get a good sense of the personality & spirit of the main character, Gulliver Dowd. The short sentences and sentence fragments were disconcerting to a degree, but they definitely help to move the story along at a quick pace and make sense for the audience for whom the book was written. I am familiar with the various neighborhoods in Brooklyn where the story took place, therefore I cannot comment on whether I would have felt “lost” if I were reading about these places for the first time.Over all, I enjoyed the book as a quick read. If the story were to be fleshed out into a full novel, I believe I would have liked it a lot more … but it was meant for a certain purpose and written for a certain type of reader. Judging it from that perspective, it was excellent!

[grumpydan · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

PI Gulliver Dowd wants to find out who killed his sister and why. His investigation may have gotten a policeman shot and the further he gets involved the more mysterious it is. This is a novella consisting of 142 pages and so there may not be a lot of character development (this is the third in a series) but the author has written a tight, fun, quick mystery noir that I enjoyed.

[crazybatcow · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

First up: note that this is a novella, and is meant to be a quick and easy read. It is not intended to be a deep dark noir with a complex, mysterious and dangerous protagonist. It is something you read while waiting for a plane to board.It is also the 3rd in a series with the same main character, and I think if you were to start with this as the first exposure to Dowd, you'd be a bit put off by him. (Oh, okay, he is off-putting in any case).In such a short novel, it is hard to develop much of a plot, or character, but the author does a satisfying job of both. I don't like the stereotypes involved, but the author does call them out, so it is clear he was making a point in his choice of protagonist. If you pick it up for the right reason (to start and finish in a single setting, or as a quick distraction in the doctor's office, or between meetings at the office), you will get exactly that: a quick, non-deep, decent distraction.

[jim53_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Gulliver Dowd is a little person who is also a private detective. His adopted sister, a NYC policewoman, was killed on the job seven years ago, and a friend alerts Dowd that he has some information. The friend is shot, apparently accidentally, before he can tell Dowd the truth. Dowd investigates and has to make a decision.The protagonist is short, but the book is shorter; I'm not sure it's over 20K words. While Coleman tells us a lot about the characters, he shows us very little and the characters are not well developed. Neither is the plot. Apparently this is intentional; if this had been noted in the description, I would not have requested his book. While it's mildly interesting to see what an author can do to tell a story in so few words, I feel that my time has been wasted and that by requesting this book I lost a chance to be awarded something far better.

[mrmapcase · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Once I found out that this was a series of books aimed at ESL readers and adults overcoming illiteracy, which is a wonderful idea, I figured I would just review it in that context. Then I started to read and was immediately hooked, this has all the hallmarks of classic mysteries, memorable characters, pulse pounding action, and an ambiguous resolution. This is just a spectacular mystery in a tight package.

[edgoldberg · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Reed Farrel Coleman describes Gulliver Dowd as follows: “Gulliver was so short that his reflection filled up only the bottom half of a mirror. Gulliver looked as if he had been built from mismatched body parts. His arms and legs were too small, even for his squat body. His hands were too big for his arms. His fingers, too small for his hands. His head, too big for his height. But the cruelest thing God had done was to give Gulliver a handsome face.” Dowd was adopted as a child along with a young Black girl, Keisha, who he considered his sister. They both overcame the odds, he becoming a private investigator and she becoming a police officer. Since her on-the-job death seven years ago, he’s been mourning her and has vowed to find her killer. He’s gone so far as to move into her Red Hook loft, to feel ‘closer’ to her.DirtyWorkThe two best months of Dowd’s life were the two months at the end of high school when he was dating the gorgeous Nina Morton. She made him forget what a cruel joke he was, until she dumped him on graduation day. Now, in Dirty Work, seventeen years have passed (for all seventeen years he’s been dreaming about her), and she comes to him asking him to help locate her (and his) missing daughter, Anka, a daughter he never knew he had. With the help of his friend, and former Navy SEAL, Ahmed Foster, Dowd visits the prestigious Wilton Academy which Anka attended, snoops around and comes up with an answer I didn’t see coming.In Valentino Pier, Nina has called him again, but he’s ignored her call.ValentinoPier Instead, he takes a walk along Valentino Pier in Red Hook and is approached by a young homeless boy, Ellis Torres, who starts talking to him. Torres has seen Dowd in the neighborhood and trusts him…somewhat. Torres asks Dowd to find his dog, Ugly, who has disappeared and Dowd agrees. He even goes so far as to give Torres $20 for food for both him and the dog, when it is returned. When Torres is found beaten up early the next morning and hospitalized, Dowd vows to find out what happened. Dowd always sides with the underdog, as that’s how he sees himself. Dowd and Ugly, with limited help from Ahmed Foster, crack the case.TheBoardwalkSam Patrick is a cop Dowd met in Valentino Pier. Patrick worked at the same precinct as Keisha, the 75th. Patrick knew her and respected her, which is more than Dowd could say about many of the cops. Patrick and Dowd became friends and when Patrick calls him to request that they meet…in some isolated place…later that night to talk about Keisha’s murder, Dowd readily agrees. Patrick never shows up and Dowd driving home, is rammed three times by a van, that last hit overturning Dowd’s car. At the hospital, Dowd overhears that a cop was shot by accident and died. When he finds out it’s Patrick, Dowd doesn’t believe it was an accident and tries to find out what really happened.What’s nice about these books for struggling readers, is that Coleman doesn’t talk down to the reader. He keeps a high interest level, has created interesting characters and believable plots…as far as any mystery can be believable. In approximately 130 pages, Coleman tells an entire story. If he wanted to expand Dowd to full length novels, he could do it without changing the character. All he has to do is extend the story line. There’s action enough to keep readers interested. I highly recommend these books for struggling readers who want a good story.