The Girl Who Ran Off with Daddy

Stewart Hoag #7

by David Handler

The dandified ghostwriter Stewart "Hoagy" Hoag appears in his seventh mystery when his mentor and friend, a septuagenarian, becomes involved in a sensational affair with his stepdaughter that leads to murder. Reprint.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction

304 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published March 1, 1996

About the author

AKA Russell Andrews (with Peter Gethers)

David Handler, who began his career in New York as a journalist, was born and raised in Los Angeles and published two highly acclaimed novels about growing up there, Kiddo and Boss, before resorting to a life of crime fiction.

Reviews

[Kim Gasparini · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book seemed more intense than the others, and it definitely made me more uncomfortable. The early Hoagy books were almost light hearted. This one was darker.

[Julie Griffith Buckley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hoagy, Merilee, and Lulu are always great fun!

[Kay Hudson · Rating 4 out of 5]

In David Handler’s The Girl Who Ran Off With Daddy, the girl is 18-year-old Clethra Feingold, daughter of a famous feminist figure, who has indeed run off with Thor Gibbs, her 73-year-old stepfather. Thor is famous as a best-selling author in the Men’s Movement, so their escapades are fodder for the celebrity media.

Thor and Clethra show up at the Connecticut farm where Stewart Hoag is living quite happily with his ex-wife and their baby daughter, working on his third novel (the first was a major success, the second a total bomb, and Hoagy has been working as a ghost writer ever since). They want Hoagy to help Clethra write the memoir a publisher is clamoring for.

Needless to say, all does not go well.

This book is a bit darker than previous installments in the series, but it’s fun to see Hoagy and Merilee, the on-again off-again couple who can’t quite give each other up, in an on phase, as well as Hoagy’s bewilderment with the baby. Lulu the faithful basset hound is with them, of course, and she plays a bigger part in this book. She also meets a handsome K9 officer named Klaus.

As usual, there are lots of real life names (from the 1990s) thrown in, which both dates the book and makes it more fun. Another good entry in the series, even if Hoagy never actually gets around to any ghost writing.

[Conny · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have been a fan of David Handler since I won the last book in the series, surely the wrong way around, but I liked Hoagy and especially Lulu so much that I ordered the rest of the series immediately to see how it all got started. I do agree with other reviewers that this book was a bit darker, most likely due to the subject matter, but I still enjoyed the read. Plenty of mystery and dry humor and I was trying to guess until the end who might have been the killer, I like when its not too apparent, and actually I was glad when I found out who done it. What I also enjoy about the series that it is set in the 1980'is and is sure brings back some memories. Can't wait to get started on the next book.

[Becky · Rating 3 out of 5]

In an effort to stave off rating "inflation," I'm sticking with the old Goodreads rubric in which 3 stars mean "I liked it." This story is one in a formulaic series. However, the characters and "color commentary" are interesting, and the writing style is excellent. This entry is a good example of the type of books that David Handler writes (in my experience), and provides a good few hours of escape. I especially like the description of the interactions between Lulu the bassett hound and a highly trained police dog named Klaus.

[BRT · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book in the series was quite a bit more repulsive than any of the others due to the secrets revealed amongst the family members. just as you learn that the title might not mean the secret is as bad as you might think, a secret just as bad comes out. The mystery, however, is good. The characters, as always, are quirky and amusing. This book focuses quite a bit more on Hoagie's family and when he takes up his own writing at the end, it's rather poignant.

[Pat · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well I read it all

but I still think the old guy was to blame. How can you tell men to take what they want even if it hurts others and not be to blame? Is the author really telling us all men are children and it's only women that are adults? Could see nothing wonderful in the old guy.

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Parentified

We finally meet Hoagie’s parents in this one. And of course there’s the rumination over ‘what is a man?’ by his friend who shows up with his eighteen year old step-daughter. Most of all, it’s Hoagie’s coming to terms with being a parent. 😊

[Gene Borowski · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read the 1st 7 of the Hoagy (as in the cheesesteak, not Carmichael) novels and found this one to be the best of the series. I enjoy reading series with returning characters (who better than Romaine Very?) and I hope Trooper Slawski and Officer Klaus show up in future books.

[Araych · Rating 2 out of 5]

Stewart "Hoagy" Hoag #7. I like the series but this is the weakest entry so far. 138 pages until somebody gets killed! The plot is OK but the characters are weak and not believable. No better than OK -- 2 stars.

[Joan Baker-Young · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another surprise ending

Handler’s great at masking the perp, But when you think about it, it makes perfect sense. Love the humor and especially love Lulu.

[Rosemary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I listened to this book. These Stewart Hoag mysteries are enjoyable. Stewart is likable and I want to know what he is up to next.

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love the Stewart Hoag books. They follow a pattern and instead of getting boring, the reader looks forward to these familiar tropes. Lulu is the greatest.

[Carrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

There were some unanswered questions. And many references are dated but I will read the next book.

[Blane Worley · Rating 1 out of 5]

God. I wanted to believe the story was going to develop in some non-cliché manner. With the subject matter, the sheer absurdity of it, you'd think the writing would take care of itself--that the plot would supersede narrative structure. But even that couldn't be saved.

What you'll get if you read this is the same cheap set-up five times per chapter: Hoagy establishes setting/motivation, Hoagy finds person of interest, Hoagy shares witty banter with person of interest for 5 pages, Hoagy leaves. Repeat, of course. The distractor in this novel is just one: Lulu, the basset hound, who reacts negatively to almost all dialogue between Hoagy and anyone. Which is funny... at first. But she's utilized as comic relief oh so, so, so often, that she becomes downright annoying.

What undercuts any positive outlook I had towards the novel is the abundance of pop culture reference. And it's not just the presence of these mid-90s references, which I'd be fine with in a casual, uncritical sense. What turns me off is David Handler's disposition towards pop culture icons. If you like Mariah Carey at all, you will hate this novel because of one pretentious quip. And it'd be fine if it was obvious that these contrarian, mean-spirited opinions were written to establish a sense of negativity in the character, but you can really tell that Hoagy is meant to be an outlet for the author's personal opinions.

I didn't finish this, so I'm reviewing Lulu's attempted suicide instead. Since she failed to drown herself and escape her despair, 2/5. Next time, just commit.

UPDATE
i’ve read some 2/5 novels that I could at least finish this year and have some respect. I’ve since docked this down to one star. It’s awful. Awful awful awful

[Dale · Rating 4 out of 5]

Published in 1996 by Sunset Productions
Read by Gene Corbin
Duration: Approximately 3 hours (abridged).

Stewart "Hoagy" Hoag is a retired novelist and semi-retired ghost writer who, like the novelist Jessica Fletcher in the old TV show Murder She Wrote, has a remarkable ability to be around when someone gets killed.

In The Girl Who Ran Off With Daddy we find Stewart and his on again / off again relationship with his celebrity ex-wife in an on again phase. They have a baby and Hoagy is still adjusting to this reality. His basset hound Lulu is not happy having been removed from her position as the de facto child of the couple to being merely the family dog.

But, this small family's routine is thrown into an uproar when Hoagy's old literary mentor Thor Gibbs arrives on his motorcycle with his 18 year old stepdaughter on the back. Thor Gibbs is a an Ernest Hemingway-type character that is really into the mythopoetic men's movement-type stuff, except his version of it requires a whole lot more drinking and fighting and a lot less formal ceremony.

Read more at: http://dwdsreviews.blogspot.com/2012/...

[Vincent Darlage · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was completely disappointed with this, both as a story and as an audiobook. I knew who the killer was going to be before the first corpse showed up (which is well into the second half of the book), and the characters were generally so over the top as to be unbelievable. I didn't buy into the murderer's motivation, and the dialogue between the murderer and the investigator at the end was amateurish and over-long.

The reading was terrible - the main character had no emotion, and everything the main character said and thought was in a terrible monotone, robbing the story of any humor. It was as though the reader thought this was some kind of film noir or perhaps he was channelling a bad Sgt. Joe Friday imitation.

[Chi Dubinski · Rating 5 out of 5]

When chest-beating author Thor Gibbs runs off with his 18 year old stepdaughter Clethra Feingold, the story is splashed all over the media. It’s not only the five decades that separate their ages, but Thor’s former wife and Clethra’s mother is the high profile feminist and former congresswoman Ruth Feingold. So what brings the lovers to the Connecticut farm of celebrity ghostwriter Stewart “Hoagy” Hoag?
Clethra’s been offered a pile of money for her story, and she wants Hoagy to write it. It’s a tangled story of relationships, and Clethra is not being honest with Hoagy. Readers who enjoy Parnell Hall’s Stanley Hastings series, Stuart Kaminsky’s Toby Peters series, or Robert Randisi’s Rat Pack series will want to get to know Hoagy.

[Mike (the Paladin) · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Sort'a" interesting, "kind'a" weird mystery about Hoag and the step daughter of an old friend...who get's himself killed of course.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like David Handler books. He's a product of my generation so our references are the same. I like the Berger and Mitry books also, but for real 80s nostalgia, you can't beat Hoagy.