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Quinn #1
Homicide My Own
Fiction. "Wry humor, straight-talking characters, and shades of the supernatural flavor this cleverly written debut police procedural. Two Spokane cops named Quinn and Odd, a female/male team, drive to an island in the Northwest Indian Territory to pick up a bail-jumper wanted for statutory rape. While there, Odd becomes suddenly psychic after reading about the 30-year-old unsolved murder of an Indian boy and his white girlfriend. Since their bail-jumper is sick, they have just enough time to investigate; and it soon becomes evident that Odd's visions come from the murdered girl"--Library Journal.
220 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 2005
75 people want to read
About the author
Anne Argula
10 books6 followersAnne Argula is a pen name used by Darryl Ponicsan for several mysteries set in the Pacific Northwest. He was born in Northeast Pennsylvania and currently resides in Seattle, Washington.
The first novel in the series, Homicide My Own (2005) is about a cop who solves his own murder from a previous life. It was nominated for an Edgar Award.
The second in the series is Walla Walla Suite (2007), which follows Quinn, who narrated the first book. Now she is in Seattle and working for a mitigation investigator until she is drawn into an unusual murder case.
The third in the series is Krapp's Last Cassette, in which Quinn is hired by a screenwriter to verify the existence of a writer whose book he is adapting for HBO. The title is a play on the title of Samuel Beckett's Krapp's Last Tape.
Ponicsan's Quinn novels are marked by humor and coal regions idiom.
The first novel in the series, Homicide My Own (2005) is about a cop who solves his own murder from a previous life. It was nominated for an Edgar Award.
The second in the series is Walla Walla Suite (2007), which follows Quinn, who narrated the first book. Now she is in Seattle and working for a mitigation investigator until she is drawn into an unusual murder case.
The third in the series is Krapp's Last Cassette, in which Quinn is hired by a screenwriter to verify the existence of a writer whose book he is adapting for HBO. The title is a play on the title of Samuel Beckett's Krapp's Last Tape.
Ponicsan's Quinn novels are marked by humor and coal regions idiom.
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
May 11, 2009
This is the second novel featuring Quinn. The setting appears to be a mutated Lummi Island. It is called 'Salish Island', a name which doesn't seem to exist. The fictional island is near Bellingham, reached by a small car ferry. It has an Indian reservation on it, as if Argula combined the Lummi peninsula with Lummi Island.I read Argula's second book first - Walla Walla Suite (A Room With No View) - awhile ago. I recall liking the Quinn character. In the first book she's still a cop. In the second, she's left the police, and her husband, moved to Seattle and starting working as a private detective. I don't recall anything paranormal in the second book.In this first book, there's a whole lotta paranormal going on. She and her partner are sent from Spokane to pick up a fugitive arrested on Salish Island. On the island, her partner starts having odd flashes of memory, and they end up investigating a murder that happened shortly before he was born. On the one hand, you've got past life memories. On the other, you've got the very mundane of cars breaking down, paperwork, and those damn hot flashes. I liked Quinn, and the quirky characters.'Anne Argula' is a pen name for Darryl Ponicsan.
November 5, 2013
I hated almost everything about that book, mostly because I felt that everything about it was offensive. The main character and narrator seems like what a man who doesn't have much women around him or who never listen to them would come up with. She is supposed to be a somewhat educated person being a cop but still confess to not having known what menopause involved. She makes offensive remarks to people for no reason. She is okay with the idea of submitting a 14 years old to a virginity test, had she been of a culture other than strictly American I might have not thought it offensive but such is not the case. She also says Da Frik at the most random moments for no apparent reasons, which makes the book redundant and annoying to read. All Native Americans are depicted as gross caricatures. Everyone in the book just accept that the male cop is the reincarnation of a long dead teen very rapidly which appears as preposterous.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 26, 2007
A funny, engaging story of a tough female cop who's inadvertenly dragged into solving a murder that happened out of her jurisdiction. Great airplane reading!
October 17, 2020
"The plan was highly suspect. It was short-sighted. It was underboard. It was irresponsible, unprofessional, and insupportable. It bordered on the irrational, the other-worldly, the insane. Worst of all, it was extremely dangerous, and it probably wouldn't work anyway. I bought into it."
HOMICIDE MY OWN, by Anne Argula — a pseudonym for novelist and screenwriter Darryl Ponicsan — is a loopy, shaggy, fever dream of mystery novel with a gonzo Seventies throwback appeal. Think James Crumley, whose novels use the wobbly guardrails of the private-eye genre before crashing down the embankment into uncharted territory. Those accustomed to tight plots, characters that don't stray too far outside the formula, and neat restorations of moral order will be challenged to the point that they'll either give up or succumb to the story's offbeat charms.
The story: It's 2000. Quinn is a Spokane cop, pushing fifty and in the full flame-broil of hot-flash menopause. She's has no interest in having sex but is obsessively interested in why, and why anybody might think of her as a sexual creature, and why people let sexual desire drive them off their cranial rails. With her younger partner, Odd, who proves to be aptly named for reasons other than the obvious, Quinn is assigned to travel west across Washington state to pick up an accused statutory rapist on Shalish Island. But almost from the minute they cross over from the mainland ferry, their quick-turnaround job is delayed and they find themselves drawn into the island's lone unsolved murder: the shotgunning death of a couple parked at a lover's lane. To say more would be spoil the surprises to come, but suffice it to say that the story takes a funky but matter-of-fact turn into the paranormal as the pair find they can't quite quit the island, even if it means their jobs might no longer be waiting for them once they return to Spokane. Not exactly the stuff of Ross Macdonald or Robert Parker.
HOMICIDE MY OWN, nominated for an Edgar Award, could get away with its peculiar conceit in 2005, when it was published, than it could in 2019: a female-character POV written by a male author masquerading as a female one. That's dicey enough, but add in the fact that the character in question talks a lot about herself as a sexual being, talks about her body parts a lot, and frequently strips down in and out of mixed company. Spelled out that way, it sounds bad, but there's really no prurience here. You can complain that a man probably shouldn't try to inhabit a woman in this way, but it seems clear to me that Argula/Ponicsan is making an honest effort to understand this kind of woman from the inside out, and have a little fun with it while he's at it, but never at the expense of Quinn or of women in general. Consider this exchange:
"Yes," he said. "She used him, thinking that would be all right for him, with any older man. Have you ever used a man just for sex, Quinn?"
Why deny it, there were a lot of men in the late sixties, early seventies, just because I could, the right had finally been seized, including one memorable one-night stand with a Japanese aikido instructor., but I had always had some mutual connection under the skin. Maybe not the thing sonnets are made from, but nothing so simple as using someone to satisfy a need.
"No," I told him. "I never have."
HOMICIDE MY OWN isn't a comfortable read. It takes some patience to slide into its peculiar slipstream. And unlike other gonzo novels of the era this story harks back to, there are no grand cosmic epiphanies or mind-blowing revelations on a thematic level. But there are some pretty good-sized ones on the level the story sets for itself. Interesting locals are encountered, many with secrets that need the disinfectant of sunshine. Questions are pressed; a trap is set; the killer is flushed; moral order of a highly relative sort is reestablished. But Odd, Quinn and the other principals in this story's cast will never be the same, and not for the usual lingering-residue-of-homicidal-trauma reasons. They have undergone some fundamental tectonic shift in their plates of perception, and their personalities will be altered as a result in a way that many genre readers may not like. I didn't always like it, either. But I feel better for having hung in there with HOMICIDE MY OWN. Oddly better. So might you.
(I'm going to ding HOMICIDE MY OWN one star for violating a tenet of crime fiction that should apply regardless of how else genre conventions are contorted — a solution to a murder is only as compelling as its villain. And, without giving away too much — I hope — this story does not invest much in its primary villain. It made the reveal more underwhelming than I suspect its author intended. I know plot is not the driver behind the wheel of this story, but this particular part of it could and should have been handled better, for deeper impact.)
HOMICIDE MY OWN, by Anne Argula — a pseudonym for novelist and screenwriter Darryl Ponicsan — is a loopy, shaggy, fever dream of mystery novel with a gonzo Seventies throwback appeal. Think James Crumley, whose novels use the wobbly guardrails of the private-eye genre before crashing down the embankment into uncharted territory. Those accustomed to tight plots, characters that don't stray too far outside the formula, and neat restorations of moral order will be challenged to the point that they'll either give up or succumb to the story's offbeat charms.
The story: It's 2000. Quinn is a Spokane cop, pushing fifty and in the full flame-broil of hot-flash menopause. She's has no interest in having sex but is obsessively interested in why, and why anybody might think of her as a sexual creature, and why people let sexual desire drive them off their cranial rails. With her younger partner, Odd, who proves to be aptly named for reasons other than the obvious, Quinn is assigned to travel west across Washington state to pick up an accused statutory rapist on Shalish Island. But almost from the minute they cross over from the mainland ferry, their quick-turnaround job is delayed and they find themselves drawn into the island's lone unsolved murder: the shotgunning death of a couple parked at a lover's lane. To say more would be spoil the surprises to come, but suffice it to say that the story takes a funky but matter-of-fact turn into the paranormal as the pair find they can't quite quit the island, even if it means their jobs might no longer be waiting for them once they return to Spokane. Not exactly the stuff of Ross Macdonald or Robert Parker.
HOMICIDE MY OWN, nominated for an Edgar Award, could get away with its peculiar conceit in 2005, when it was published, than it could in 2019: a female-character POV written by a male author masquerading as a female one. That's dicey enough, but add in the fact that the character in question talks a lot about herself as a sexual being, talks about her body parts a lot, and frequently strips down in and out of mixed company. Spelled out that way, it sounds bad, but there's really no prurience here. You can complain that a man probably shouldn't try to inhabit a woman in this way, but it seems clear to me that Argula/Ponicsan is making an honest effort to understand this kind of woman from the inside out, and have a little fun with it while he's at it, but never at the expense of Quinn or of women in general. Consider this exchange:
"Yes," he said. "She used him, thinking that would be all right for him, with any older man. Have you ever used a man just for sex, Quinn?"
Why deny it, there were a lot of men in the late sixties, early seventies, just because I could, the right had finally been seized, including one memorable one-night stand with a Japanese aikido instructor., but I had always had some mutual connection under the skin. Maybe not the thing sonnets are made from, but nothing so simple as using someone to satisfy a need.
"No," I told him. "I never have."
HOMICIDE MY OWN isn't a comfortable read. It takes some patience to slide into its peculiar slipstream. And unlike other gonzo novels of the era this story harks back to, there are no grand cosmic epiphanies or mind-blowing revelations on a thematic level. But there are some pretty good-sized ones on the level the story sets for itself. Interesting locals are encountered, many with secrets that need the disinfectant of sunshine. Questions are pressed; a trap is set; the killer is flushed; moral order of a highly relative sort is reestablished. But Odd, Quinn and the other principals in this story's cast will never be the same, and not for the usual lingering-residue-of-homicidal-trauma reasons. They have undergone some fundamental tectonic shift in their plates of perception, and their personalities will be altered as a result in a way that many genre readers may not like. I didn't always like it, either. But I feel better for having hung in there with HOMICIDE MY OWN. Oddly better. So might you.
(I'm going to ding HOMICIDE MY OWN one star for violating a tenet of crime fiction that should apply regardless of how else genre conventions are contorted — a solution to a murder is only as compelling as its villain. And, without giving away too much — I hope — this story does not invest much in its primary villain. It made the reveal more underwhelming than I suspect its author intended. I know plot is not the driver behind the wheel of this story, but this particular part of it could and should have been handled better, for deeper impact.)
April 20, 2020
so....this was an odd one for me. It was a quick read. Good mystery with weird, left field, surrounding story. Normally I'd have probably put it down after the first few chapters, but I stuck with it because while the story was a bit loopy the characters were engaging.
February 18, 2014
After so thoroughly enjoying the author’s second book, “The Other Romanian” (published in June 2012 by Pleasure Boat Studio), I was anxious to go back to her first novel, “Homicide My Own,” and am pleased to report that this book was equally delightful. Displaying the same consistent wit and clever prose, it introduced the protagonist, Quinn (the only name used by the author for this character), when she was still a cop in Spokane (after having served in the LAPD) and before becoming a private detective in Seattle, Washington, where the second book takes place.
Quinn is assigned, along with her colleague, Odd Gunderson (he’s Swedish, but also odd), to drive up north to Shalish Island, which is about as far as one can go in Washington State and still be in America, to pick up a man who had been charged with rape of an under-age (14-year-old) girl and bring him back to Spokane. The two make an unusual pair: Quinn is from the coal regions of Pennsylvania, 49 years old, and self-described as a “menopausal madwoman,” has a 20-year-old son in the Navy and a shaky marriage to a pharmacist. Odd is in his early 30’s, rather taciturn: “Unless something truly amuses him, at which time he cracks half a crooked smile, his face remains a blank.” Once they arrive at the tribal police station to pick up the prisoner, they somehow become involved in a 33-year-old double murder, the only unsolved murder still on their books. Although why they do is another matter. As Quinn tells Odd, “You ain’t a detective. You’re a cop, and not even a cop from around here. We issue citations, we quell domestic disputes, we roust hookers and dope smokers, and we are sent on s*** details like this that no one else wants.” But they definitely do get involved, and at some point the book veers off into “paranormality at its spookiest.” But while this more often than not turns me off as a reader, it only made this book more intriguing, and it’s a wonderful mystery.
Quinn, who admits to having a “Pennsylvania coal-cracker accent,” also has a language all her own, some of it translatable, and some not, e.g., “ain’t,” translating to “true?”; a “boonda” guy and “yonkos” (I have no idea); “the arfy-darfy” (ditto); and the ubiquitous “da frick” (that one I could understand) and “Woi Yesus” (ditto). Her Native American characters have names like Seth Shining Pony, Sidney Everybodytalksabout, and Bobby Young Elk, and the Northwest apparently has points of land named Point Deception, Point No Point, Point Doom, and Point Sinister (you get the picture), and a street called Pullorbedamned Road.
I frequently found myself laughing out loud, and read this book in one day. It is an absolute delight, and is highly recommended.
Quinn is assigned, along with her colleague, Odd Gunderson (he’s Swedish, but also odd), to drive up north to Shalish Island, which is about as far as one can go in Washington State and still be in America, to pick up a man who had been charged with rape of an under-age (14-year-old) girl and bring him back to Spokane. The two make an unusual pair: Quinn is from the coal regions of Pennsylvania, 49 years old, and self-described as a “menopausal madwoman,” has a 20-year-old son in the Navy and a shaky marriage to a pharmacist. Odd is in his early 30’s, rather taciturn: “Unless something truly amuses him, at which time he cracks half a crooked smile, his face remains a blank.” Once they arrive at the tribal police station to pick up the prisoner, they somehow become involved in a 33-year-old double murder, the only unsolved murder still on their books. Although why they do is another matter. As Quinn tells Odd, “You ain’t a detective. You’re a cop, and not even a cop from around here. We issue citations, we quell domestic disputes, we roust hookers and dope smokers, and we are sent on s*** details like this that no one else wants.” But they definitely do get involved, and at some point the book veers off into “paranormality at its spookiest.” But while this more often than not turns me off as a reader, it only made this book more intriguing, and it’s a wonderful mystery.
Quinn, who admits to having a “Pennsylvania coal-cracker accent,” also has a language all her own, some of it translatable, and some not, e.g., “ain’t,” translating to “true?”; a “boonda” guy and “yonkos” (I have no idea); “the arfy-darfy” (ditto); and the ubiquitous “da frick” (that one I could understand) and “Woi Yesus” (ditto). Her Native American characters have names like Seth Shining Pony, Sidney Everybodytalksabout, and Bobby Young Elk, and the Northwest apparently has points of land named Point Deception, Point No Point, Point Doom, and Point Sinister (you get the picture), and a street called Pullorbedamned Road.
I frequently found myself laughing out loud, and read this book in one day. It is an absolute delight, and is highly recommended.
Want to read
November 3, 2019Synopsis: Quinn is with the police force. Weird things happen while she and her partner are picking up a prisoner on an island off Spokane.
October 16, 2007
HOMICIDE MY OWN (Police Proc-Washington-Cont) – VG
Argula, Anne (aka Daryl Ponicsan) – 1st book
Pleasure Boat Studio, 2005- Trade Paperback
Spokane Police officers Odd Gunderson and Quinn are sent to Shalish Island, near Canada. There they are to pick up fugitive Charlie T. Houser, charged with having intimate relations with a 14-year-old girl. Once there, they find Charlie, his young girlfriend, and her mother. But they also find the Odd is strongly attracted to the pictures of two murder victims, killed over 30 years ago. Why is it Odd knows things about people he has never met?
*** …and now for something completely different. Quinn is a grouchy 40+ year-old woman suffering of deadly hot flashes. Odd is a 20+-year old Swede who seems to be the reincarnation of a murder victim. Quinn and Odd are saddled with Charlie, his young girlfriend Stacey and her mother Gail, while trying to solve an old murder. The result is a strange, funny, and highly unusual mystery that I thoroughly enjoyed.
Argula, Anne (aka Daryl Ponicsan) – 1st book
Pleasure Boat Studio, 2005- Trade Paperback
Spokane Police officers Odd Gunderson and Quinn are sent to Shalish Island, near Canada. There they are to pick up fugitive Charlie T. Houser, charged with having intimate relations with a 14-year-old girl. Once there, they find Charlie, his young girlfriend, and her mother. But they also find the Odd is strongly attracted to the pictures of two murder victims, killed over 30 years ago. Why is it Odd knows things about people he has never met?
*** …and now for something completely different. Quinn is a grouchy 40+ year-old woman suffering of deadly hot flashes. Odd is a 20+-year old Swede who seems to be the reincarnation of a murder victim. Quinn and Odd are saddled with Charlie, his young girlfriend Stacey and her mother Gail, while trying to solve an old murder. The result is a strange, funny, and highly unusual mystery that I thoroughly enjoyed.
March 23, 2010
This book gets high marks for originality. I loved the reincarnation thing, and the plot was pretty well crafted. Lots of coincidences, but they're pretty easy to believe because the book is set on an island where everyone knows everyone else. It's also pretty funny in places. All in all, an odd-ball kind of mystery. The reason I haven't rated it higher is that I didn't really get the protagonist. The story is told by her and I found her "voice" very jarring. I think some of her exclamations are supposed to be regional, but I can't hear them as anything authentic. I also got really tired of hearing about her hot flashes. They didn't really play a part in the story, and I didn't think they made her any more real.
March 2, 2012
I read this book last December and liked it enough to pre-order the second book, "Walla Walla Suite," which is just as good. The slightly supernatural twists in both books set them somwhat apart from the run-of-the-mill PI stories. And Quinn, a menopausal cop, is a unique creation, especially in her insights into the male mind and psyche. A woman who understands (although she may not like it) that sometimes men think (NOT!)with the wrong parts of their anatomy. A fascinating character in so many ways. So, yeah, like li'l Oliver once said, "Please, may I have some more?"
July 10, 2008
This book begins in Spokane and then the action moves to Salish Island in the San Juans. It was fun and quirky. The main character and narrator is a female cop suffering through menopause. The two cops from Spokane help solve a 30 year old murder mystery. I enjoyed the characters and the fact it takes place in the Northwest, my neck of the woods. I am looking forward to reading the other books in this series.
November 6, 2007
Maybe it wasn't as terribly written as I think it was... but I couldn't get past the first few pages to find out. Perhaps it was talking about self in the third person, and then moving into a first person narrative... I don't know. Felt like a Sophomore in HS's "clever" language (and I would know ;)
April 27, 2016
da frick did I just read? Woi Yesus. That's about all I can say. The phrases "da frick" and "Woi Yesus" are used so gratuitously throughout the book, you just want to scream. And the story might of had some redeeming qualities if the whole Hauser/Stacey/Gwen side story was left out. That just made this book repulsive.
November 10, 2009
I liked this short novel that was an Edgar nominee. It includes an old island mystery. There are Native Americans & whites, a casino, fireworks, and a mystical element that gives it a touch of originality.
August 13, 2010
I read Walla Walla Suite first, and then reached back for this first book because I liked the bumpy angular writing style, the menopausal main character, and the Pacific Northwest setting. If anything I liked this one better, partly because of the reincarnation angle.
September 23, 2013
Weird. Very weird. Menopause and reincarnation as the central themes? This is hardly a traditional mystery and the writing can be confusing. Still , I finished it and will probably check out the next book, if only to see how much weirder it can get.
June 22, 2009
good writing and characters, some magical stuff
June 30, 2009
Liked...it....
October 17, 2010
Fun little read - great narrator
April 6, 2011
Hated the first person narrative. The writing was confusing. Couldn't finish it (though I did read the last chapters to see who the murder was, eh).
January 11, 2016
Cute little story, pretty quick reading.
June 2, 2016
Enjoyed this - homicide and reincarnation.
January 15, 2011
Entertaining crime novel recommended by a friend who knows the author.
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews