Back Bay Blues - (Andy Roark Mystery) by Peter Colt (Paperback)

About the Book

"1985, Boston. In Vietnam, Andy Roark witnessed death and horrifying destruction. But for the soldiers who made it back alive, there are other casualties of war--the loss of tenderness, trust, and connection. Still feeling adrift and unsettled, Andy has struck up a welcome friendship with Nguyen, a Vietnamese restaurant owner. Sipping beer and trading memories after the restaurant shutters, Andy gradually learns of the extraordinary lengths Nguyen took to flee Saigon shortly after its fall. Andy's latest case, too, has ties to Vietnam. His new client, a beautiful and enigmatic young Vietnamese woman, hires him to investigate her uncle's murder. Andy discovers a connection to a group of refugees determined to overthrow the communist government. Led by the sinister Colonel Tran, the Committee is extorting local business owners to raise funds. The search for more answers takes Andy from Boston to Washington D.C. to San Francisco, and deep into a web of political and personal betrayal"--

Book Synopsis

"A classical mystery with an honor-bound detective and a keen sense of place... Besides having the P.I. spiel and the P.I. moves down pat, Roark is genuinely likable (not too tough, but not a patsy) and very much a character of his time." - The New York Times Book Review on BACK BAY BLUES

In the second hardboiled P.I. mystery by law enforcement officer and Iraq veteran Peter Colt, a Boston P.I. struggling to come to terms with his role in the Vietnam war investigates the murder of a beautiful, young Vietnamese woman's uncle in 1985 New England.

Theft, greed, and corruption collide in Peter Colt's hard-edged mystery featuring Vietnam veteran turned Boston P.I. Andy Roark.

1985, Boston. In Vietnam, Andy Roark witnessed death and horrifying destruction. But for the soldiers who made it back alive, there are other casualties of war--the loss of tenderness, trust, and connection. Still feeling adrift, Andy has struck up a welcome friendship with Nguyen, a Vietnamese restaurant owner. Sipping beer and trading memories after the restaurant shutters, Andy gradually learns of the extraordinary lengths Nguyen took to flee Saigon shortly after its fall.

Andy's latest case, too, has ties to Vietnam. His new client, a young Vietnamese woman, hires him to investigate her uncle's murder. Andy discovers a connection to a group of refugees determined to overthrow the communist government--and extorting local business owners to raise funds. The search for more answers takes Andy to D.C. and San Francisco, and into a web of political and personal betrayal. For near the heart of this mystery is a link to Nguyen's daring escape. Decades have passed, but sometimes the price of freedom twists allies into enemies, loyalties into betrayals, and truth into lies...

Review Quotes

Praise for Peter Colt and The Off-Islander

"Entertaining . . . Like Philip Marlowe--or Robert Parker's Spenser--Andy has a sharp eye for telling detail and male haberdashery. Those who enjoy newish reworkings of classic PI tropes will be satisfied."
--Publisher Weekly

"If you like your mysteries to be old-school in the vein of John D. MacDonald, or even farther back to Raymond Chandler or Dashiell Hammett, then you will appreciate this striking debut by Peter Colt. Long on atmosphere, detail, and character, it could place detective Andy Roark amongst the classic noir sleuths."
--Raymond Benson, author of Blues in the Dark

"New England police officer Colt's first novel is a boozy pipe dream of a private eye's search for a long-missing father . . . [with] lots of attitude."
--Kirkus Reviews

"This atmospheric debut mystery should appeal to fans of the early works of Dennis Lehane and Robert B. Parker."
--Library Journal

"By the end of the book . . . the reader has been taken for a long, exciting ride . . . We are told that this is not the last of the Andy Roark novels. I look forward to the next one."
--Vietnam Veterans of America

"Readers yearning for a noir mystery in the vein of Mike Hammer or Sam Spade are in luck. Peter Colt has delivered just such a tale of intrigue. . . . Colt, an Army veteran who served in Kosovo and Iraq and now is a police officer in a small New England city, captures his firsthand, on-the-job experience in moody prose. The novel spends nearly as much time exploring Roark's inner demons from the Vietnam War and life afterward as it does with the case at hand, adding a deeply evocative perspective to events."
--Bookpage

About the Author

Peter Colt is an Iraq War veteran, a New England law enforcement officer and an FBI certified Crisis Negotiator. He spent over twenty years in the Army reserve and was deployed to Kosovo in 2000, where he was attached to the Russian Army. He was deployed to Iraq in 2003 and again in 2008, and has had the fortune of knowing many Vietnam vets and U.S. Army Special forces soldiers. Born in Boston, he grew up on Nantucket and lived there in the 1970s and 80s, when the distinction between off islanders and on islanders was very real. Visit Peter Colt online at Peter Colt.com.