A Murder Too Close

A Phil Rodriquez Mystery, #2

Nothing has been the same in New York City since terrorists destroyed the the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in 2001. Everybody feels the pain, especially the inhabitants of the Lower East Side--the East Village, the Bowery, Chinatown, Alphabet City, SoHo--who, every time they look south, are forced to see  the "the hole in the sky." Who is to blame? Who will pay? The easy answer for some is all those who appear "other," even if they are as American as baseball and apple pie. But the distrust of the "others," readily identified by the wardrobes of their religious beliefs--Muslims, Sikhs, even Buddhist monks-- turns to dislike, and then to something much more sinister. Nuyorican Private Eye Phil Rodriquez, a man known to do a favor for a neighbor if asked, learns how sinister when he's asked put a hurting on a teenaged boy somebody thinks is a Muslim. Phil and partner Yolanda learn how sinister when they're asked to investigate suspicious arson fires at businesses owned by "others" when the insurance company won't pay the claims. Then people start getting dead. And if that's not scary enough, Phil and Yo discover that they've  signed a contract with the Russian Mafia. Not even Phil's almost-friend Carmine Aiello, a real life if low-level Mafioso, wants any part of that. The second Phil Rodriquez book is a fast-paced journey into the workings of Manhattan's Lower East Side...and into the spirits of the survivors of that terrorist attack that literally hit them where they live.