One on One

by Michael Brandman

Overview

"Another great read. Buddy Steel is my kind of Sheriff." —Tom Selleck

When legendary Sheriff Burton Steel summoned his son Buddy home from LAPD Homicide, a reluctant Buddy agreed. Burton is debilitated by ALS, Lou Gehrig's Disease. While Buddy is to cover his back, not an assignment he wants, the clincher is it's his last chance to connect with his proud, overbearing parent.

What Buddy didn't expect was to encounter crime in Freedom, a privileged coastal community a hundred miles north of Los Angeles, as vicious and challenging as that of the city.

One spring morning, the latest challenge erupts. The brutal murder of a prominent Freedom High School sports coach leads Buddy into a clandestine universe of sexual deception, play parties, unwitting athletes, over-privileged youths, treacherous bullies, and shocking malfeasance.

At the same time, a sudden scourge of graffiti is disfiguring both public and private property, despoiling the beauty and serenity of Freedom's unassuming landscape. Outraged, knowing he has few legal weapons to wield, Buddy is forced to find new and challenging ways to thwart the street artist, or artists, responsible. Irreverent and imaginative, not to say manipulative, Buddy is just the man for the job.

Buddy's plate is soon full and the stakes are enormous as he sets about bringing resolution to a glut of seemingly irresolute occurrences.

One on One follows Missing Persons, Buddy's first investigation in Freedom.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781464210273
Publisher:	Sourcebooks
Publication date:	08/07/2018
Series:	Buddy Steel Thrillers , #2
Product dimensions:	5.80(w) x 8.60(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Michael Brandman is the author of three Jesse Stone novels, each based on characters created by Robert B. Parker, all on the New York Times Best Sellers list.

With his longtime partner, Tom Selleck, he produced and co-wrote nine Jesse Stone movies and three Westerns.

His and Emanuel Azenberg's production of Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead won the Venice Film Festival's Golden Lion Award for Best Picture.

He has produced more than forty motion pictures including films written by Arthur Miller, Stephen Sondheim, Neil Simon, David Mamet, Horton Foote, Wendy Wasserstein; David Hare, and Athol Fugard.

He is the father of two sons and lives in Los Angeles with his wife, the actress Joanna Miles.

Editorial Reviews

"Another great read. Buddy Steel is my kind of Sheriff." — Tom Selleck

"Buddy is a likeable character who uses self-deprecating humor, sometimes acting like an overgrown schoolboy. He is easygoing and can handle people poking fun at him. Being smart, caring, and understanding of people's emotional pain, Buddy has a moral sense of right versus wrong. Readers will enjoy this fast-paced mystery. With well-developed characters and a plot that takes issues straight from the headlines, this is a good read." — Crimespree Magazine

From the Publisher

2018-05-15
Now that Buddy Steel, late of the LAPD, has come back to his hometown (Missing Persons, 2017), his second case takes him back to school.Officially, Buddy is the deputy sheriff of San Remo County. But everyone knows the real reason he's returned to Freedom, California, is to take care of his father, Sheriff Burton Steel Sr., who's been stricken with ALS, and to help the old man kill himself when life gets to be too tough to bear—a bargain Buddy's loath to keep. Fortunately, another fatality provides a welcome distraction: Hank Carson, assistant principal of Freedom High School, gets stabbed to death in his office. Who would have taken a steak knife to such a wonderful guy, an educator who principal Julia Peterson assures Buddy was doing a great job since arriving last year, a mentor who'd done his best to get close to every student in the school? Once Hank's widow, Kimber, hops on a plane to her parents' house in New Jersey before anyone from the sheriff's department can even sit down with her, she looks like the obvious suspect. But Buddy, who retrieves her and spirits her back to Freedom before you can say "red herring," can't believe she would have killed her husband or anybody else and reacts to her repeated come-ons with all the savvy of a blushing high school kid. Since Buddy's also faced with the case of a particularly self-promotional graffiti artist, it looks like Hank's murder will remain a mystery—unless of course he turns out to have been guarding a secret worth killing for, a secret so sordid that it makes three different suspects admit that they wish they'd been the ones who'd stuck in the knife.A modest, guileless, by-the-numbers whodunit with no more mysteries, twists, or surprises than the typical homecoming parade.

Kirkus Reviews

06/04/2018
At the start of Brandman’s smooth if superficial sequel to 2017’s Missing Persons, Deputy Sheriff Buddy Steele receives a call to go to a murder scene at the high school in Freedom, Calif., an upscale costal community just a couple of hours’ drive from L.A. For all intents and purposes, Buddy is the acting sheriff of San Remo County in place of his sheriff father, who has Lou Gehrig’s disease. Henry Carson, the popular assistant principal and coach of the Freedom High swim team, has been stabbed to death in his office. Buddy’s investigation takes him into murky waters, with sex games, bullying, and cover-ups bobbing to the surface. Meanwhile, he has to deal with a prolific graffiti artist who’s defacing property all over town. Buddy’s no-nonsense approach to crime solving gets results, but along the away some readers may lose patience with the repetitive dialogue. Brandman’s three Jesse Stone novels (Robert B. Parker’s Damned if You Do, etc.) were more satisfying. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly

"Another great read. Buddy Steel is my kind of Sheriff."

Tom Selleck

"...readers will relish this straight-ahead cop procedural, complete with an assassination attempt and a biker gang's money-laundering scheme..."

Booklist review of Missing Persons

"Buddy is a likeable character who uses self-deprecating humor, sometimes acting like an overgrown schoolboy. He is easygoing and can handle people poking fun at him. Being smart, caring, and understanding of people's emotional pain, Buddy has a moral sense of right versus wrong. Readers will enjoy this fast-paced mystery. With well-developed characters and a plot that takes issues straight from the headlines, this is a good read."

Crimespree Magazine