Continuing the noir bromance of last year's Hope Never Dies, Andrew Shaffer again plucks Joe Biden and Barack Obama out of retirement and into their new roles as detectives. Hope Rides Again is another action-packed mystery rife with close calls.
While their first case was in Biden's Delaware, this time there's trouble in the Windy City, starting at Obama's Rising Hope Economics Forum. Joe arrives amid the hoopla of St. Patrick's Day, uneasy with the crowds of leprechauns clogging the streets. At the Forum, instead of the anticipated intro to a potential campaign supporter, there's a shooting--of a young "Rising Star" volunteer.
"There was no injustice too small to right if I had the chance," Joe thinks, and he sets out to confirm his suspicions: this was not gang related, which means sleuthing is in order. His BFF Barack joins the chase, and their investigation propels them to the sketchiest neighborhoods in Chi-town, a bizarre trek through a University of Chicago tunnel, a visit to a "strip club" (with "Gal Capone") and a speedboat pursuit on Lake Michigan (interrupted by "pirates"). Hope Rides Again and so does the intrepid team, but tensions are high on the path to justice. So, too, are wisecracks, puns and plenty of observations on the current state of White House affairs.
Shaffer writes slapstick noir that plays off of the Obama-Biden friendship, dropping names along the way (Rahm and Michele appear), yet doesn't require serious thought about 2020. In this light novel, Joe Biden is just a former veep with a passion for mystery. --Cheryl Krocker McKeon, manager, Book Passage, San Francisco