Belle Isle (Willie Black Mystery #9)

Hardcover 228 pages August 2020 When two teenage lovers find a human leg while cavorting in the thickets of Belle Isle, can Willie Black be far behind? Belle Isle, in the middle of the James River, was one of Willie’s party spots growing up wild in Oregon Hill, and it’s a short walk from where he now resides in the posh Prestwould. Now, as the 50-something night cops reporter for the local daily, he returns to his old haunts to try to unravel a mystery. When it becomes known that the dismembered member belonged to Teddy “T-Bone” Delmonico, a state college football legend, whose now-widow is running for a seat in the House of Representatives, the plot thickens. The deceased had plenty of enemies: the investors who lost their nest eggs in a scheme fronted by T-Bone and an associate, a former wife with an ax to grind, and, among others, the grieving widow. Who did it, and why, will consume Richmond’s most dogged journalist, who drinks too much, smokes too much and hopes the fourth time is a charm, marriage-wise. Willie Black, whose first-person voice has been called by the New York Times “a crisp and colorful urban idiom we can’t wait to hear again,” is on the prowl, looking for answers. Belle Isle is Howard Owen’s 19th novel and the ninth Willie Black mystery. The first Willie Black book, Oregon Hill, won the Dashiell Hammett Prize for best crime literature in the United States and Canada. Owen’s earlier novels include the best-selling Littlejohn and critically acclaimed works such as Answers to Lucky and The Measured Man. Owen, a 44-year veteran of print journalism, and his wife, Karen, live in Richmond, Va., where Willie Black also resides.