I just finished Ken Kuhlken's mystery, The Biggest Liar in Los Angeles, and thoroughly enjoyed it! I was transported to L.A. (an area where I grew up) in the 1920's. The scenes, street names, places, and personages are authentic and the characters come off real and flawed, varied and interesting.
The strong moral sense of love and loyalty that pervades those on the protagonist's side wonderfully balances the darker side of L.A.'s secrets and history, making this an easier book to read than many crime mysteries dealing with dark issues of prejudice, mobsters and corruption.
I highly recommend this well-written novel that kept me turning pages until 5:30 a.m.!
The strong moral sense of love and loyalty that pervades those on the protagonist's side wonderfully balances the darker side of L.A.'s secrets and history, making this an easier book to read than many crime mysteries dealing with dark issues of prejudice, mobsters and corruption.
I highly recommend this well-written novel that kept me turning pages until 5:30 a.m.!
About Ken Kuhlken
After borrowing time from his youthful passions, such as baseball, golf, romance, and trying to make music, to earn degrees in literature and writing from San Diego State University and the University of Iowa, Ken got serious (more or less).
Since then, his stories have appeared in Esquire and dozens of other magazines, and anthologies, been honorably mentioned in Best American Short Stories, and earned a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship. He has been a frequent contributor and a columnist for the San Diego Reader.
With Alan Russell, in Road Kill and No Cats, No Chocolate, he has chronicled the madness of book promotion tours.
Ken's novels are Midheaven, chosen as finalist for the Ernest Hemingway Award for best first novel and the Tom Hickey California Century series:
The Loud Adios, San Diego and Tijuana, 1943 (Private Eye Writers of America/St. Martin's Press Best First PI Novel); The Venus Deal, San Diego, Mount Shasta, and Denver, 1942; The Angel Gang, Lake Tahoe and San Diego, 1950; The Do-Re-Mi, rural Northern California, 1972 (a January Magazine best book of 2006 and finalist for the 2006 Shamus Award); The Vagabond Virgins, rural Baja California, 1979; The Biggest Liar in Los Angeles, Los Angeles, 1926.
Since then, his stories have appeared in Esquire and dozens of other magazines, and anthologies, been honorably mentioned in Best American Short Stories, and earned a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship. He has been a frequent contributor and a columnist for the San Diego Reader.
With Alan Russell, in Road Kill and No Cats, No Chocolate, he has chronicled the madness of book promotion tours.
Ken's novels are Midheaven, chosen as finalist for the Ernest Hemingway Award for best first novel and the Tom Hickey California Century series:
The Loud Adios, San Diego and Tijuana, 1943 (Private Eye Writers of America/St. Martin's Press Best First PI Novel); The Venus Deal, San Diego, Mount Shasta, and Denver, 1942; The Angel Gang, Lake Tahoe and San Diego, 1950; The Do-Re-Mi, rural Northern California, 1972 (a January Magazine best book of 2006 and finalist for the 2006 Shamus Award); The Vagabond Virgins, rural Baja California, 1979; The Biggest Liar in Los Angeles, Los Angeles, 1926.
