Rhapsody in Blood

by John Morgan Wilson

Book Overview

Disgraced journalist Benjamin Justice finds himself enmeshed in two old deaths--a 1950s movie star and the black man lynched for the murder--as well as a new murder, that of a gossip columnist who... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312341474
• ISBN13: 9780312341473
• Release Date: March 2006
• Publisher: Minotaur Books
• Length: 278 Pages
• Weight: 1.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.9" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

"Rhapsody In Blood" is an excellent book

My favorite gay mystery writer John Morgan Wilson is back with a seventh Benjamin Justice novel, Rhapsody in Blood. Benjamin Justice is a 40-something, HIV+ white gay man missing one eye who lives in West Hollywood and is a disgraced former Los Angeles Times reporter who was forced to return a Pulitzer Prize after it was revealed he faked his award-winning article. Somehow he finds himself in situations where people harboring secrets frequently meet violent deaths (and he is often in mortal danger, too--when we first met Justice he was HIV- and intact). His sidekick is Alexandra Stevenson, a statuesque African American trust fund baby in her early 30s who also happens to be a star Times reporter. Other characters in the Justice series are Maurice and Fred, a 70-something gay couple who have been together for over 50 years and who rent out the room over their garage to Justice in the heart of Boystown. The first six books in the series have also used Los Angeles (and usually West Hollywood) as a character. One of the most enjoyable features was reading Wilson's descriptions of locales around the city complete with historical nuggets of places that I can (and often do) drive by whenever I want. Initially the books in the series had the cute affectation of always including Justice in the title: Simple Justice, Revision of Justice, Justice at Risk, The Limits of Justice. Then the series took a harrowingly dark turn during the last one and continued in that vein in Blind Eye with some relief coming in Moth and Flame. The latest installment is Rhapsody in Blood, which is not set in Los Angeles but is a classic Hollywood murder mystery. Justice and Stevenson go up to a small mountain town a few hours away from L.A. now called Haunted Springs. Fifty years ago gorgeous movie star Rebecca Fox was found murdered in one of the family-run hotel's rooms on March 15th while shooting a movie in Eternal Springs. She had recently had sex with someone and the hotel owner's teenage son claimed he had seen a black man coming out of the room. The man Ed Jones was immediately arrested by the local sherrif (who happened to be related to the hotel owner) and lynched later that same night--no murder weapon was ever found in the hotel room. Twenty-five years ago Rebecca Fox's daughter Brandy Fox checked into the same hotel room on the 25th anniversary of her mother's murder and was found dead in her room with her throat cut and the knife in her hand. The death was ruled a suicide. The name of the town was changed to Haunted Springs and the mythology of the two Hollywood deaths and the creepy hotel grew, particularly after the publication of a best-selling true crime book about the ill-fated town. Now Hollywood is filming a movie based on the Rebecca and Brandy Fox deaths at the hotel. Templeton is writing a story about the filming of the movie, which stars one of the current top female box-office stars, a very attractive up and coming male starlet and a popular rapper.

This is why we read mysteries . . .

John Morgan Wilson's books have always been filled with beautifully drawn characters, especially his lead storyteller, Benjamin Justice. The stories are richly layered, and each one has become darker than the last. Rhapsody in Blood is as compelling as every other book in the way it gently but surely draws you into the mystery, but it's a definite departure from the world in which the other stories take place. Justice is lured away from Los Angeles for what is supposed to be a mountain resort getaway and gets pulled very quickly into a mystery that spans generations and leads to killing in a remote hotel occupied by a handful of people with many potential motives for murder. It's amazingingly engaging . . . a true page turner. It's also a pleasant sojourn from the rest of the Justice series -- by taking the action away from West Hollywood and the broader Los Angeles area it becomes a different kind of story, with less emphasis on Justice's downward psychological spiral and more on the characters around him. It might have been inspired, in part, by Chandler's The Lady in the Lake, given the sequestered setting and the layers of corruption that conceal what really happened in the 1950s murder that sets the current story on its course. And it should be a must-read for anyone who's drawn to character-driven mysteries that become more complex with every page. It's a unique -- and standout -- entry to this amazing series.

Older but still adventurous Justice solves another one...

As a fan of Morgan's "Benjamin Justice" series since the very start, I have had some silent misgivings about the direction in which he has taken the character in the past two novels, from a sexually-active, hard-drinking gay man to a more reclusive, one-eyed HIV+ man on the wagon who seems to dwell more on his past than live for the day. After some thought, I think my reaction is more a byproduct of the fact that I am aging as well, and somehow resented being reminded of it in seeing Benjamin slow down as well. However, in his newest "Rhapsody in Blood," Morgan takes the character out of his cozy nest in West Hollywood, teaming him with longtime friend, LA Times reported Alexandra Templeton, covering the shooting of a movie at a historic hotel in the remote town of Eternal Springs, now known as Haunted Springs due to two murders that took place there, and which is the focus of the film. They meet the cast, including the 30ish male lead - a frequent subject of tabloid rumors about his sexuality - whose seeming interest in Benjamin has him simultaneously flattered and flustered. When another reporter, known for her merciless "expose'" stories about celebrities, is found murdered with her throat cut (the same as the two victims that are the subject of the film), Benjamin finds himself in the middle of the mystery, with no shortage of colorful suspects around to choose from. Was the murderer the actor, who feared the reporter would try to "out" him, or perhaps it was the rapper with the "gangsta" image who seemed to alienate everyone, or the troublemaker midget stuntman, the hotel owner living with a troubling secret from his past, or perhaps it was the ghostlike female figure Benjamin saw on the rocks outside the hotel window, right before the murder took place? "Rhapsody in Blood" is a complex, captivating mystery that also teaches lessons about the danger of bigotry and the shallowness of some people in show business. I rate it five stars out of five for lovers of this great series.

"Living in deception has to take a toll in a person's psyche and soul"

In Blind Eye, Benjamin Justice suffered a terrible beating, and ended up violently blinded in one eye. In Moth and Flame, the recovered Benjamin ended up solving the riddle of a complex murder in the city of West Hollywood. Now, in Rhapsody in Blood, Ben is accompanying his best friend, sassy African-American journalist Alexandra Templeton, to a once glamorous hotel just outside of Los Angles, in the town of Eternal Springs, where once again, Ben is plunged into murder, deception and intrigue. In 1956, on the Ides of March, glamorous film star Rebecca Fox was murdered in the Haunted Springs Hotel. Blame is swift and brutal, Ed Jones, a young African American is immediately judged as the culprit and lynched at the local gaol by an angry mob led by the Ku Klux Clan. The government has since damned the valley for hydroelectric power and the poisoned and lifeless waters of Lake Enid now cover the town where the viscous killing took place. However, the spirit of Ed Jones continues to haunt the area; new DNA evidence proves that the semen found on Rebecca Fox's panties was not that of Jones, and that he may have been innocent of the crime. The murder investigation is reopened, but things are complicated. An independent film on the events all those years go is currently under production starring some of Hollywood's hottest actors, and there's a new murder for Justice and Templeton to solve when Toni Pebbles, an aggressive and belligerent gossip columnist shows up, intent on outing one of the movie's stars. Of course, Ben continues to be haunted by a scandal, which long ago cost him the Pulitzer Prize and his job as a journalist. Now 50, HIV positive, and existing mostly hand to mouth, Ben is still relies on Templeton and his older friends Maurice and Fred to keep him focused, but in this tale, Ben is mostly able to keep himself out of trouble. Still prone to foolish vanity, wishful thinking and the loneliness of a man pushing fifty who hasn't hooked up with anyone for a while, Ben can't help but be attracted to sexy A-list movie star Christopher Oakley. Author John Morgan Wilson keeps the action moving with a hectic plot and lots of wonderfully enigmatic characters. There's no doubt that Ben is an assiduously charming hero, his instincts are always finely tuned, and he still has the ineffable knack for getting to the heart of the story. But can he uncover the truth behind Rebecca Fox's murder and bring the real perpetrator to justice? There are so many possibilities, false leads, missing evidence, modus operandi, opportunity, motivation and all manner of deception. Perhaps the answers to the riddle lie in the past, lost in a place that means something so different to so many of the characters and where nefarious motives and furtive shenanigans have been shrouded in secrecy for so many years. The themes are vital and relevant - the misogyny of rap music, life in the closet, the injustices of racism, and the fickleness of Hollywood. As Ben draws

complex Justice thriller

Once Benjamin Justice was revered as a fine journalist who deservedly won a Pulitzer for his articles on nursing his lover while his beloved was dying from AIDS. When it was substantiated that Ben fabricated his story, he became despised and black balled. Sixteen years later, the only person to return a Pulitzer solves mysteries instead of writing articles. In 1956 in Haunted Springs on the Ides of March, Eternal Springs Hotel handyman Ed Jones allegedly killed film star, Rebecca Fox; Jones was immediately lynched. Twenty-five years later on the same day in the same room, Rebecca's daughter Brandy committed suicide. Author Richard Pearlman writes a book on Rebecca's death, but his DNA testing of semen found on the victim proves not to be from Jones. A movie A Murder in Eternal Springs is about the be made at the site of the tragedies so LA Times reporter Alexandra Templeton convinces her friend Ben to accompany her as she covers the event. Also there is despised viper tabloid reporter Toni Pebbles, who plans to expose the secrets of someone involved in the project, but is killed before she can do so. With Templeton encouraging him, Ben investigates four murders five decades apart. People will sympathize with Benjamin Justice, who is HIV positive and not a bad person though he made a terrible mistake sixteen years ago under extenuating circumstances. He has accepted his fall from grace gracefully and since has tried to do the right thing even solving numerous homicides along the way. His latest caper is a complex tale that has its roots in the past as Benjamin seeks what happened in 1956, 1981, and now. RHAPSODY IN BLOOD is John Morgan Wilson meting out justice for the dead as only he can. Harriet Klausner