Director's Cut

"Director's Cut" is the latest mystery novel starring the wise-cracking LA-detective Moses Wine, a private hack who cut his cultural teeth during the 1960s ... if you know what I mean ... but this book contains more than a few surprises, and I don't mean the "mystery novel" kind.It starts off with a bang in Chapter One, speaking favorably of John Ashcroft, and unfavorably of Louis Freeh. Uh oh. The countercultural cred is being blown already. At one point mid-novel, in an excellent little scene, it boldly compares the Holocaust to the Rwandan massacres. Gee, what kind of disrespectful guy is this Moses character anyway? Actually, the whole book is a gutsy cultural statement for a mainstream mystery novel, especially for one with this character's past, and this author's history. The book is written with a sense of personal freedom and confidence, which clearly shows through.And oh yeah ... during all this cultural commentary, there's apparently a mystery novel going on. (Smile.) Seriously, I loved the feeling of being on a movie set. It's such a mysterious industry to begin with, it was so interesting to read about it from an insider's point of view, seeing it treated like any other real job. Moses even shows his hand at directing at one point, which was a lot of fun to read.I also loved the wonderful descriptions of Prague, which made me jealous of the author's experiences there; as well as all the contemporary references to the Internet sprinkled throughout the book, which were really fun to see in a novel. It certainly had its share of the "mystery novel" kind of surprises too, with enough twists and turns to keep the plot going from Los Angeles, to Prague, to New Mexico, to the Sundance Film Festival in Utah.The only question is, if the novel begins with a bang, does it end with a bang? I'll never tell. But I will say this book can be recommended as the nation's first post-9/11 mystery novel.

Moses Wine, that wistful, ironic and always thoughtful P.I. has been with us through eight books and some thirty years, rambling from his beginnings in Berkeley to the capitals of the world. We've been along with him through marriage and family, divorce and acrimony, to what he hopes will be his final wife. Has Moses done everything? Well, not quite because now, in this new book, Moses Wine wants to direct. In "Director's Cut," Roger L. Simon has rediscovered his satiric impulse. In "The Big Fix," the first in the series, Simon had fun with the Los Angeles-Chandler style. ("I turned left on La Cienega and drove right on Santa Monica...") This time around, Moses gets mixed up with the twin scourges of the present age: movie making and terrorism. He's game, if not quite ready, on both counts. Book for book, I've always been caught up in the various capers and scrapes, and that, appropriately, is the case here. But this time, I saw something else. Moses Wine has become part of the American cultural landscape. Simon has created an American archetype, a fictional detective who has entered our collective mind and now stands for more than his adventures. Like Lew Archer or Sam Spade, Moses Wine -- who is just trying to get through the day -- finds people are shooting at him. Just like the country he reflects. What Simon has done to keep this series fresh is to let Moses grow and change. That's unusual for literary detectives who are usually frozen along one mean street or another. The joke is that as Moses ages, it seems that he's only going to make new mistakes, and he does, but then damned if he doesn't also manage to achieve a certain wisdom. In "Director's Cut" he's in Prague with a pregnant wife, chasing down a completion bond problem (it's a kind of insurance)on a movie set. Moses winds up in the director's chair. He's not bad at it, at least he's no worse than the people who direct movies all the time, and after all Moses Wine can also collar miscreants, crack cases and crack wise.

Saw the Glenn Reynolds' review on MSNBC.com and snapped the book up. This is a true insiders look at the madness of indie filmmaking with good scene in PRague as well. I read one of Simon's earlier books set in Japana and liked that too.

Immediately following September 11th, Moses Wine's detective agency became seriously strapped for clients. They only had one case and his partner (who is also his wife) was handling it. Moses was puzzled when he was called into the local FBI office and questioned about the destruction of the Twin Towers, the Czech Republic and Radio Free Europe headquarters in Prague. Of course he knows nothing about the subjects the FBI asked him about but matters become a little clearer when he receives a call from a friend who is in Prague.Arthur Sugarman, a completion bondsman for movies, wants him to come over there and act as private security for a film being shot in Prague. Almost as soon as he arrives, Islamic fundamentalists kidnap Moses and the film's leading lady. When government officials rescue them, the kidnap leader escapes. Moses becomes the film director because his predecessor was badly injured during the abduction. Moses works with CIA officials to try to stop a terrorist cell who infiltrated the movie set from carrying out their diabolic agenda.DIRECTOR'S CUT is a wild and wacky thriller that satirizes the games one has to play to make it in the motion picture industry. It is also a somber reflection about the effect September 11th has had on the protagonist and how he needs to contribute to the cause. The mystery revolves around the leader who is manipulating events to further his personal agenda and how the hero finally figures it out and tries to stop him. Robert L. Simon is a talented writer who can always be counted to deliver a chilling thriller.Harriet Klausner

This was the first Moses Wine book I've read and now I plan on going through the whole series. What a treat! This is not only wildly entertaining, it's timely as well. I do know a little about independent filmmaking and this book captures the craziness and humor of that world better than anything I've seen or read. Not to mention the fact that it's a darn good mystery. Wry, exciting, intellectually stimulating. You can't ask for more.