When police fail to solve the murder of a Guatemalan groom on the backside of Churchill Downs during the Kentucky Derby festival, the victim’s hotwalker son hires local private investigator Jim Guthrie to bring the killer to justice. In doing so, Guthrie uncovers other crimes including blackmail, extortion, and illegal drug use but still finds time to romance a seductive veterinarian. Several violent encounters occur during the investigation as the private eye uses a racetrack tip sheet to provoke the killer into making a mistake. Guthrie’s debut in Hotwalker is a fast-paced classic private detective mystery featuring a complex storyline, surprising twists, quirky characters, off-beat humor, and a vivid sense of place. The book is extremely topical, as well. Many characters are Central American immigrants who must live in fear of being deported by ICE. The plot also mirrors real-life crimes for which two top trainers were recently charged by prosecutors in New York. |
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| “Want to sample the Kentucky Derby scene? Mount up with author Rick Neumayer's splendid Jim Guthrie, P.I. mystery, Hotwalker. This riveting, action-packed novel made me laugh out loud even as the suspense spurred me to read on. Neumayer’s characters and Louisville life along the Ohio River seem amazingly real, and his witty, tough, carefully ethical detective someone you’d like to know.” - Sena Jeter Naslund Author of Ahab's Wife, Four Spirits, Abundance, The Fountain of St. James Court & The Disobedience of Water: Short Stories |
“Fast paced, action packed, and intricately plotted, Rick Neumayer’s Hotwalker is a winner straight out of the gate. If you like the Kentucky Derby, smart-mouth detectives, and plenty of fisticuffs and gunplay, this novel is a must read. The finely crafted story, vivid characters, and sharp dialog make Hotwalker one of the best detective novels I’ve read in years. In fact, it’s so good that I wish I’d written it.” - Chris Helvey Author of novels The White Jamaican, Flowers for Sergeant Schiller, Dancing On The Rim, and The Yard Man |
| PATE MERWIN both uses his head and longs for magic in resolving his questions about how-to-live meaningfully (and simply how to survive). Like Huck Finn, he lights out for the territory—thumbs his way with a faithful friend from midAmerica to the prairie, to the mountains, cross the deserts, to the sea, San Francisco & Haight-Ashbury, after its heyday. His and ours is a country scarred by its original sins of both the deep past and the present: the treatment of African Americans, Native Americans, women, children, and all those who would speak peace to unwarranted foreign wars. And, what's more: structurally, this book is a two-layer cake of past and present--just like the lives we live, right? This honest, funny, and heartbreaking novel delivers everything a reader could wish for in the way of action, characters who are convincing and engaging and ideas worth pondering. Journeyman could well join the ranks of classic, always-need, must-have literature. - Sena Jeter Naslund Author of Ahab's Wife, Four Spirits, Abundance, The Fountain of St. James Court & The Disobedience of Water: Short Stories Journeyman is available at the website of my publisher Fleur-de-Lis Press, and the other booksellers listed below.   |
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| “Two intrepid young men set out from Kentucky to retrace the westward peregrinations of Kerouac and Cassady, twenty years after the fact, with tragic results for one and life-changing consequences for the other. Journeyman is the survivor’s stirring, multi-layered account of their travels and travails, interwoven with recollections of the life he left behind. Rick Neumayer’s writing is direct and purposeful, and it propels us through these misadventures as though we were along for the ride.” - Ed McClanahan Author of The Natural Man, Famous People I Have Known, and other titles |
“Rick Neumayer's Journeyman immerses the reader viscerally in the America of 1970-71, with a quixotic hitchhiking pilgrimage from Louisville to a San Francisco commune at its narrative center. It's a moving and provocative story of initiation during a time, not unlike our own, when the energy and possibilities of youth rub up against the complicated realities of a country divided by racial mistrust, generational misunderstanding, political fractiousness, and domestic and international instability.” - K. L. Cook Author of The Art of Disobedience, Marrying Kind & other titles |
| “If you lived through the Vietnam War era, you will recognize the deep truth of this novel; if you were not alive then, you will fathom the chaos and hope and heartbreak of those years and how they laid the foundation for the world we’re living now. This is a timely, generous book that deftly captures a powerful, heady, mind-bending time.” - Eleanor Morse Author of the novels Margreete’s Harbor, White Dog Fell From The Sky, Chopin’s Garden & An Unexpected Forest |
“Journeyman is a coming-of-age novel and part of a grand tradition of travelers-seekers. Idealistic, alienated young Pate Merwin teaches troubled inner-city students and falls in love with an African American woman who is a single parent. When his relationship and career founder, Pate hitchhikes to Haight Ashbury with a Navy vet who is now against the Vietnam War. They have romanticized the idea of being hippies—turning on, tuning in, and dropping out—but their dreams bring results they could not have foreseen.” - Mary Popham Author of Emmalene of Landing Run |
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Hotwalker (2021) is Rick Neumayer’s second published novel following the debut of Journeyman. Rick has also published short fiction in many literary magazines, and three of his full-length Broadway-style musical collaborations have been produced. He co-edited River City Review literary magazine and has reviewed books for the Louisville Courier Journal. The Louisville native, resident, and Male High graduate has had a wide variety of experiences, including early work as a newspaper reporter and a thirty-year teaching career. After retiring in 2004, he began writing full-time while earning an MFA in creative writing at Spalding University. He also holds degrees from the University of Louisville (MA) and Western Kentucky University (BA). |
| journeymanpate [at] gmail [dot] com |
