The Thousand Yard Stare

I've read all of Rob Kantner's series with Detroit PI Ben Perkins as protagonist. Having grown up in Detroit and lived here most of my adult life, it's been a treat to read fiction set in the city and suburbs I know so well. Like Loren Estleman, Rob Kantner doesn't just have the locale and ambience of the Motor City come alive but he also has a very believable and hilarious protagonist. Perkins is a bit of a reluctant detective, a young everyman dragged into affairs not of his own making, and without the serious personal screw-ups of other PIs and detectives who seem to be battling booze, drugs, failed marriages, scandals, etc. The narratives are among some of the most imaginative and unpredictable that I've encountered in detective fiction. His prose sparkles. It's fun reading.