The Mozart Code
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REVIEW BY WILLIAM GAGLIANI
Dick Adler reviews mystery novels for The Chicago Tribune, but with The Mozart Code he proves that the critic can also play the game. And score. Slick as a whiskey shot and smooth as a beer chaser, The Mozart Code falls into a category all its own. It follows the tradition of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, but with a wink and a nudge. Call it "genteel noir -- soft-boiled, but hard in all the right places. In fact, that might describe Adler's hero, private eye Ivan Davis. Overweight and 50ish, Ivan is a former magazine editor (as was his creator) whose interests include music, food, sex and crime. Divorced but still friendly with his ex, he indulges his passions by singing for The Opera Cafe, an amateur group under the direction of a pretty, young soprano who sets his heart aflutter. And, true to the best wish-fulfillment literature, the lovely Esther does indeed need his help. Esther's father, an English professor, has gone missing under strange circumstances involving a musical code, and a famous cryptographer has also disappeared. Ivan takes the case, along with another job that involves Fish Taylor, a reformed junky rock star who now heads an environmental commune and whose mother, once involved in a massive swindle plot, may have threatened his life. Suddenly facing and evading dangerous thugs in a white BMW from one case or the other, and romancing a peculiarly receptive Esther, Ivan finds thatóin best noir traditionóthe cases may intersect. But how? If Esther's father disappeared while tracing a lost Mozart operetta, as Ivan soon suspects, what does that have to do with swindlers and celebrity commune dwellers? Ivan's jousting with various snotty cops brings Rockford to mind, and he accepts the help of a small-time, big-hearted PI with drastic consequences. But with the sprawling gunfight climax in the mountains, all the strange connections fall into place. And Ivan proves his mettle. Though it sometimes reads more like a novel in shorthand and some key scenes happen offstage, The Mozart Code's brisk pace and snappy dialogue ultimately serve to make it a delight of wit and less-than-hard-nosed crime fiction. Reminiscent of Lawrence Block's Burglar books (in atmosphere if not style), The Mozart Code represents a grand entrance for Ivan Davisóand one can only hope for an encore. Bill Gagliani is the author of Shadowplays, an e-book collection of dark fiction from Ebooksonthe.net.
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