Swing: A Mystery

Hidden within the pages and music of Rupert Holmes' brilliant second novel are the keys that unlock the many mysteries swirling around 1940's swing band musician Ray Sherwood. Down-on-his-luck and determined to stay that way, Ray reluctantly looks up from the fog of his past and into the bright and beautiful eyes of Cal Berkeley co-ed Gail Prentice - and promptly finds himself surrounded by dead bodies, mysterious musical charts, and international intrigue. Nothing is at it seems. From the newly engineered Treasure Island rising up out of the San Francisco bay like an Abyssinian city or later day Atlantis, to disappearing women and clever Nazi sympathizers, Ray struggles to separate reality from fiction and friend from foe and in the process save Gail and circumvent an impending national catastrophe. Holmes carefully builds the momentum of the story until we find ourselves barely able to breathe, sitting on the edges of our seats, hoping against hope that our hero will save the day. His lovingly created characters imbue the story with charm and wit, pathos and heart and I, for one, fell in love with Ray...and you will too. As you find yourself turning page after page of a "hist'ry far greater than fiction, a myst'ry with musical diction" you'll find that the music and this book will definitely speak to you.

It's 1940 and jazz sax player Ray Sherwood has been on the run from the bad memory of his daughter's accidental death for a long time. As the book opens he is traveling with the Jake Donovan Orchestra. They are coming into San Francisco to play at the Claremont Hotel. The city has a new Island as the Army Corps of Engineers has just built Treasure Island (I thought it had always been there) to house the Golden Gate Exposition. Ray gets a mysterious invite to meet a young college girl their for breakfast, but another girl gets to him first with a wild proposition. Then not long after, she jumps from the Exposition's Tower of the Sun. Was it suicide? The police think so. Is she somehow connected with Gail Prentice the coed who wanted to meet Ray in the first place? Miss Prentice wants Ray to write a musical score for a whole orchestra of an award winning piano piece she's written, so that a Japanese band can play it at the Exposition. She offers him hardly any money, but he agrees anyway, she is young, he is smitten. This book is slow to get into the whodunnit and why part of the mystery, but you absolutely will not care, because it is so beautifully written. Plus, Mr. Holmes describes the era and feelings of America just before her entry into the war so well that you'll believe you are there. There are good guys and bad guys, spies and mystery in this book along with a CD with music by Rupert Holmes that will give you some clues to solving that mystery. And I'll tell you one other thing, after you finish this book you'll be going to your nearest music store hunting up some swing albums or my name isn't Shelly O.

Swing is a lyrical ride to a time where life seemed simpler, but perhaps it wasn't. Europe was refusing admission to Jews. War drums were beating in Europe and Japan. Pearl Harbor was about year away. However, if you wanted to talk on a phone, you used a rotary dial, you could repair your own car and the government was still answerable to the people. It's 1940 and Ray Sherwood is a sax player on the road with the Jake Donovan Orchestra, who is still suffering over the death of his daughter that happened a long time ago. He is a wise cracking narrator of the Phillip Marlowe school. When he arrives in San Francisco with the band, there is a message for him at his hotel. A woman named Gail Prentiss, who the desk clerk tells him is young and a looker, wants to meet him for breakfast at the new Treasure Island, built by the Army Corps of Engineers for the Golden Gate Exposition, the West Coast's answer to the recently held World's Fair. When he arrives for his appointment, another woman sits down, asks him if he's American, when he answers in the affirmative, she proposes. He declines her offer. She leaves and he meets Gail who wants him to score her piano piece for a full orchestra, so it can be played by Japan's Pan Pacific Orchestra during the Exposition. While he is talking to Gail, the woman he'd met earlier plunges to her death from the Exposition's Tower landing literally at his feet. It turns out she's French, Jewish and wanted to marry Ray or any American, so she could stay in the country. The cops think that is enough of a reason for her to kill herself, her fear of being forced to go back. And Ray is so smitten with Gail that he doesn't think about it. And thus begins a novel of double crosses and double dealings, betrayal and some of the best prewar intrigue you'll ever come across. To say this is a captivating novel that's hard to put down is an understatement. Rupert Holmes has captured a time and place, an era and the people who populated it and he's served it up raw and noir. This is just an extrordinay work, better than his WHERE THE TRUTH LIES and that is really saying something. Also, as a bonus, at least for now, you get a CD with music by the author that has clues to the story imbedded in the songs. Rupert Holmes, by the way, made his mark as a talented musician before he turned to writing Tony winning plays and novels that are just to delicious to adequately describe, so you will be pleasantly surprised that the CD is not only excellent, but worth every bit as much as the book, a very good reason to get this book now while the getting is good.

He'd probably be fairly similar to Rupert Holmes' point of view character, Ray Sherwood. Sherwood, an arranger and second chair sax player, keeps moving. In many ways, he's too good for the band he's playing in, but he's got to keep some road between him and his past. It's 1940, San Franciso. He's playing with the Phil Donovan Orchestra at San Francisco's Claremont Hotel. His first day there, he's set out to meet an Attractive Young Woman (by the desk clerk's standards) who left him a note offering him a proposition. The proposition he gets is from a French Jewish dancer with the Follies Bergere, who wishes to wed an American before she is shipped away.... Only a few minutes later, she ends up dead at his feet--an apparent suicide from the top of the Tower of the Sun, which is part of San Francisco's Exposition Center. From there, the plot sweeps along. Holmes' writing, like his early lyrics, is witty and engaging. He keeps you guessing til the end. The photographs of San Francisco in the 1940's as well as the CD soundtrack are wonderful multimedia additions to the whole "Swing" experience. Great job and very much well-written mystery.

I'm a history buff, so this engaging mystery was right up that proverbial alley for me. I knew very little about the Golden Gate International Exposition and it was grand "exploring" the fair with Ray Sherwood as well as trying to unravel the mystery of the falling body and the complications that snare him deeper into ever-increasing conundrum, especially as his past is revealed. I literally began this book and did not put it down unless I had to; I even ate my dinner with eyes glued more to the page than to my portions. The period feel was excellent. Do listen to the CD--clues abound in the memorable songs.