Fever City

by Tim Baker

Nick Alston, a Los Angeles private investigator, is hired to find the kidnapped son of America's richest and most hated man.

Hastings, a mob hitman in search of redemption, is also on the trail. But both men soon become ensnared by a sinister cabal that spreads from the White House all the way to Dealey Plaza.

Decades later in Dallas, Alston's son stumbles across evidence from JFK conspiracy buffs that just might link his father to the shot heard round the world.

Violent, vivid, visceral: FEVER CITY is a high--octane, nightmare journey through a Mad Men-era America of dark powers, corruption and conspiracy.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Thriller, Crime, Mystery, Noir, 20th Century

408 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 10, 2016

About the author

Born in Sydney, Tim Baker lived in Rome and Madrid before moving to Paris, where he wrote about jazz. He has worked on film projects in India, China, Mexico, Brazil and Australia, and currently lives in the South of France with his wife, their son, and two rescue animals, a dog and a cat.

His debut novel, the neo-noir thriller FEVER CITY, was published in 2016 and went on to be shortlisted for the CWA’s John Creasey New Blood Dagger award as well as being nominated for the Private Eye Writers of America’s Shamus Award for best first novel.

His new novel, CITY WITHOUT STARS, an epic thriller set in Mexico, is out with Faber & Faber January 2018.

Praise For Fever City

Some fine novels have explored the assassination (of JFK) including Stephen King’s “11/22/63” . . . To this list we can now add Tim Baker’s remarkable first novel “Fever City.” Baker tells his story in three related plots set in 1960, 1963 and 2014, and he constantly moves back and forth among them. Keeping up can be a challenge, but it’s one repaid by inspired writing, memorable characters and an exhilarating, all but overpowering story . . . Baker enhances his daring plot with vivid prose . . . “Fever City” delights in sex, hypocrisy and political conspiracy, but finally it’s about a tragedy that reverberates down through the years – Patrick Anderson, The Washington Post

This is a novel packed with tough-guy poetry, deeply felt emotions and startling images . . . The story twists and turns at speed like the famous ‘magic bullet’ that may or may not have killed the president . . . A superb debut novel. A direct hit – Jeff Noon, The Spectator, UK

A “what-if” thriller about America’s favorite idée fixe, the Kennedy assassination . . . In this ambitious debut, Baker gives us a bare-knuckle take on the president’s murder and adds two other plotlines, connecting them solidly with the equivalent of a jab-jab-cross combination . . . All three narrative threads turn out to wrap around Philip Hastings, a tormented hit man who stands at the center of a noirish storm of corruption, violence and depravity . . . At the core of “Fever City” is the sorrowful, all-too-real geography of Dealey Plaza, the terrain of history, “one huge killing field” that lends this alternative tale its heft. – The New York Times Book Review, USA

Reviews

[Veronica ⭐️ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fever City is a rollicking 60’s noir crime beat ‘em up, shoot ‘em, throw ‘em off cliffs thriller.
The main story is PI Nick Alston’s investigation of a child kidnapping with side stories of Baker’s take on the JFK assassination and a current day story of Alston’s son, a journalist, researching for a book on the Kennedy killing.

The two stories and multiple timelines blend beautifully with many of the same characters appearing in both. Amazing revelations are dropped in casual conversation which had me OMGing through the whole book.

Some more astute mystery readers may guess the big twist but it took me completely by surprise.

Hastings, the self deprecating ex military hit man would have to be the best anti-hero I’ve come across in a long time. He definitely had my allegiances torn.

[Greg · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you took James Ellroy at his most imaginative and Oliver Stone at his most conspiratorial, and mixed them up in a supersized martini shaker, you would produce the vivid writing, explosive events, and irresistible entertainment of Fever City.

Sometimes the people writing copy for books should tone things down a bit.

Even without this blatant nod at Ellroy, the book screams Ellroy territory. You've got early 60's LA, the JFK assassination and the whole cast of characters from Howard Hughes and the various mob bosses down to anti-Castro militants, Hoover and his henchmen and the CIA.

I had high hopes for this one.

The one problem is the writing is ok but not great. There is nothing I can really complain about except that it's not Ellroy. And maybe it's unfair to think that it should be him, even if there are nods to his style from time to time, and there are word choices here and there that sound like they might have come from American Tabloid. Even scenes like when one of the characters dance with another one in a kitchen on the night of November 21, 1963 it feels a little too similar to the closing of American Tabloid with the sad music playing waiting for the inevitable magic bullets to ring out.

I'm about 99 percent certain that the main player in the conspiracy is made up, and I don't think he's made up as a nod to a real person. I could be wrong, but having so important of a player in the whole story be totally fictional (and an awful lot of the plot hanging on who this person is) also made the book feel less impactful, and I guess technically beats Ellroy in the imaginative department it also makes it feel like a safer version of the conspiracy.

There are also parts of the book that just kind of made me groan. The moralizing of one of the main characters, who is in on the assassination, about what would be saved if it were possible to save Kennedy is a little bit too starry-eyed hindsight 20-20 vision of what the world would be like in the half century after Dallas and quite possibly overly optimistic about what Kennedy would have actually achieved. (one of the big problems is that if there was this triangulation of collusion. this death trip of power and capital H History running through so many different parties, then if it weren't one bullet it would be a different one. Hard determinism. Calvinistic Ultra-Right wing inescapable (I have no idea what's going on with my choice of capital letters here) Eschatology. Our potential for escape would be as laughable as the hero of a Greek tragedy avoiding his or her fate...)

My last big problem was about the 24 hours surrounding the Kennedy Assassination. And maybe this is real, I'm not really that well versed in the real live conspiracy community. Were all of these characters in history all present in Dallas that day? And if they were all present and accounted for would they have all gathered together in one place? Would conspirators looking to establish a killing field in Daley Plaza all be meeting so openly in the hours right before the assassination, like in front of places like the School Book Depository? Maybe I'm just making my own bad judgments here, with the idea of living in what is almost a panopticon of cameras and devices that so many players in a very very very major crime would risk being together like this (and similarly, it makes me wonder about a conspiracy being as big as this was made out to be there not being a weak link somewhere in it, it's just too big, like an evil Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Harts Club Band LP cover with a who's who of power and/or evil players of the early 60's. Too, too, too many people all working together)

Now that I'm through being a dick I did enjoy reading the book when I could turn off my 'but it's not Ellroy' filters.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fever City – An Interesting Debut

Fever City is the debut thriller from new author Tim Baker, which the publicity for has been trying to build a head of steam since October 2014. Well researched, Baker has had to delve into the many numerous conspiracy theories relating to the assassination of JFK, while weaving in to the story a heady cast of famous figures to provide the side show. As well as knowing what the Warren Commission had it right with one shooter who was executed by Jack Ruby.

There are three stories carefully woven together, that seem rather separate until we reach the ending of the book rather interestingly. The first story is Nick Alston, who is a Los Angeles private investigator, who has been hired by Old Man Bannister to find his kidnapped son, it does not matter that Bannister also happens to be the most hated man in America at the time.

Hastings is a mob hitman, and he has been killing people since he got back from the war in the Pacific, but he is in search of redemption. What becomes clear that both Hastings and Alston become ensnared with a very rich and powerful cabal that is sinister spreads from the White House lawns to the death of a President in Dallas, Texas.

Decades later Nick Alston’s son is back in Dallas investigating the Kennedy assignation for a book and that means he has to talk to every conspiracy nut possible. It takes him from bar rooms to the homes of the rich and it seems like none of the theories were likely, but he carries on all the same. At the same time he can remember his father’s tears when Kennedy was killed as he watched it on TV at the time, but he may also discover some of the truth about his father from that time.

Fever City is an interesting and complex thriller dealing with the many conspiracies of the time and dismisses them equally as fast, it is an entertaining read. I am not sure calling this book a thriller will totally do the book justice as it is a more complex story well researched and well written. It is not a page turning thriller, but a good story wrapped up in a conspiracy that has captured the imagination of time.

There are many grand ideas and themes in the story as we see some famous femmes fatales, with the ultimate one in Marilyn Monroe; as well that of men who carry much baggage that it haunts them. Baker is a master of detail and description which aids the story well with his excellent use of prose. His description of the corruption of money and power could almost be a biblical one, but all the themes are in this story. An enjoyable conspiracy theory and a pleasure to read.

[Liz Barnsley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bloody fantastic. Full review to follow nearer publication.

[Tripfiction · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thriller set in Dallas and Los Angeles (a new take on the JFK assassination of 1963…)

Fever City is a brilliant debut novel by Tim Baker that will go down well with aficionados of conspiracy theories surrounding Jack Kennedy’s assassination.

In his research for the book Tim studied all the theories and came to the conclusion that the one he goes with in Fever City is more likely to be true than any other (or, indeed, than the ‘official’ lone gunman explanation…). If he is correct, then the world was / is a very scary place. US big business (oil and arms), the CIA, Cuban exiles, the Mafia, and right wing politicians – Lyndon Johnson paving the way for Richard Nixon – conspired to murder Kennedy. The detail surrounding the events in Dallas on 22nd November 1963 is convincing… even in novel form.

Though Tim Baker clearly believes he may have found the answer to the question of why and how Kennedy was killed (and this is fascinating in itself…), Fever City is a well crafted thriller that excites and has a life away from the assassination theories. It opens in 1960 with a child kidnapping at the Los Angeles estate of Rex Bannister – a much hated and extremely rich businessman. The kidnapping (and its investigation) bring together for the first time Hastings, a hired assassin, and Nick Alston, a private investigator. The two cross paths again in 1963 in the run up to the assassination. The final part of the story is in 2014 when Alston’s son, an investigative journalist, travels to Dallas with the intention of debunking some of the conspiracy theories surrounding Kennedy’s death… only to find evidence that his father may well have been involved on the fringes the plot. The book is not for the faint hearted (it contains a lot of pretty graphic violence), but it is extremely well worked. It is a book that it is best not to dip in and out of… far better to read it in sizeable chunks. In small bites it could be confusing… Each chapter is titled with the location and the date, but the story moves quite rapidly across the decades with the same characters appearing in the differing time lines (especially 1960 and 1963). Attention is needed! As indeed is the case with the characters themselves. A number of seemingly fairly similar villains vie for our attention – distinguishing them is not always easy. The plot is complex but very convincing, and has a surprising last page revelation.

Tim, an Australian, now lives on the French Riviera – and used to work for the Australian Embassy in Paris as their Head Of Consular Services… a role that involved liaising with international police and law enforcement agencies in cases of murder, kidnapping, and hostage taking. The experience he gained feeds through into the book and adds to its authenticity.

Fever City is a good and very thought provoking work. I recommend it as an excellent read…

This review first appeared on our blog, where we chat to author Tim Baker: http://www.tripfiction.com/thriller-s...

[Robin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent and highly recommend

[Janine · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found this to be confusing with unlikeable characters. I didn't enjoy the writing style.

[Linda Boa · Rating 5 out of 5]

WOW! Review to follow.

[Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

(3.5) Too many time lines at the beginning for my gin soaked lockdown brain to process. Could have been shorter but all came together at the end

[Gordon Mcghie · Rating 4 out of 5]

My friends will groan when they find I have read a book with a conspiracy theory element to it as I love ‘em. Roswell, the Moon Landings, JFK and Nessie all provide hours of fascination. Obviously from the 4 I listed one is a total fabrication of the truth but I am quite happy to believe that there was a UFO at Roswell, JFK was not killed by Lee Harvey Oswald and I have seen pictures of Nessie so she clearly is a real thing too.
In Fever City Tim Baker has crafted a phenomenal story around the JFK assassination - putting forward new observations and casting more suspicions over the ‘official’ story on the death of a President. Many famous names crop up through the story and relationships, alliances and adversaries are explored. It is a compelling read and as I reached the end of the book I could not turn the pages fast enough to see how everything would resolve.
The narrative is handled from three viewpoints and events cover three different points in history. 1960 when the child of one of America’s richest (and most loathed) men is kidnapped – Private Investigator Nick Alston is called in to help locate the kidnapped boy.
Jumping forward to 1963 when Alston is reunited with a hitman called Hastings (the two had first met during the kidnap investigation). Obviously 1963 is of huge significance and we follow events which will eventually build up to that fateful day in Dallas.
Then the narrative jumps forward to 2014 when the son of one of the key players (that of Nick Alston) is looking into all the theories which surround the assassination of JFK. As Fever City progresses Alston (junior) comes to realise that his father may have been very close to some of the key players who are implicated in one of history’s greatest cover-ups.
The switching narrative is brilliantly handled and the way the story flits across the time periods works really well. I initially had fears that this may fragment the story but these fears were short lived as Baker builds so much tension into the story you don’t mind being drawn through the years.
Fever City should come with a ‘dark’ or ‘gritty’ warning. The male characters can come across as hard, uncompromising or aggressive and the females are brilliantly balanced initially appearing to be femme fatales but ultimately showing more depth and inner steel than most of their male counterparts.
A deeply enjoyable story. Compelling, twisty and downright nasty at times. All plus points for me – definitely a bit of a favourite.

[Gram · Rating 4 out of 5]

A cracking conspiracy thriller with the action careering along, switching from the years between 1960 and 1964, occasinally fast forwarding to 2014. There are several main characters and a host of minor players - mostly Mafia gangsters and cops, shadowy figures from the CIA and FBI and billionaires behind the scenes pulling the strings. And there are a lot of dead bodies. The story begins with a hired assassin known as Hastings - a man with a back story steeped in war and murder - fighting off men sent to kill him because he knows too much. It switches to the kidnapping of a young boy, the son of Rex Bannister, America's richest and most hated man - a man who has the power to decide the political future of the USA for the next 50 years. Private eye Nick Halston is brought in and tries to solve what turns out to be an incredible case, involving Bannister's alluring wife and variety of people most of whom are never what they appear to be. In tandem with this tale, we have the major conspiracy angle - most of it centering on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, with stops along the way covering the death (suicide or murder?) of Marilyn Monroe. The book's author, Tim Baker, does a marvellous job of threading together various lesser known conspiracy theories concerning the Kennedy assassination and making them all seem totally plausible. Meanwhile, in 2014, the journalist son of Nick Alston tries to uncover the real story behind the kidnapping of Bannister's son, simultaneously discovering links to that fateful November day in Dealey Plaza. If you're at all interested in conspiracy theories, this book is for you.

[Dave · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fever City is an extraordinarily ambitious work which combines a hardboiled pulp story about a Lindbergh baby style kidnapping with an exploration of the JFK shooting. In doing so, you can hear echoes of fifties-style pulp stories as well as revisit some of the ground Max Allan Collins explored with Nathan Heller in Bye Bye Baby and Ask Not.

Baker, though, tacked it in his own way with chapters alternating between three different narratives, that of the detective in 1960 investigating the kidnapping, that of his son in 2014 looking at various conspiracy theories regarding the Kennedy assassination, and the 1963 point of view of a hardened killer, Hastings. All three narratives obviously connect at some point.

There is quite a bit of really good stuff here from the femme fatales, the undead body, the talk of the JFK being a womanizer, the story of Marilyn, and more. But the constant meandering back and forth between narratives takes a toll on the reader and the tension simply gets lost along the way, leaving but a string of interconnected vignettes, many of which are powerful on their own.

[Studvet · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting in an outlandish, cartoonish way because of the history and characters involved, but really second-rate crime novel thriller. The characters became jumbled at times as kept moving back and forth in time and scenarios with different characters are happening out of sequence and we were meeting characters who had already previously been murdered etc, etc. It was too clever by half and in the end laborious having to recalibrate your thinking continuously. It's not a patch on James Ellroy unless seen as a parody pastiche. The story itself was so over the top and the conspiracies so obviously wrong and bringing in all the fabled characters and anecdotes to form one supposed whole was frankly just too much. The real facts about supposed parties in the assassination are readily looked up and disproved and it lent such an air of schlock to it all I had to read it as like a cartoon noir.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quote:
She gives me the kind of look people would love to give a cop but never dare. But with a private dick-that's another matter. A PI is a man with a tarnished badge, a crooked rep and a pocketful of flashbulbs. Someone you don't have to pretend to respect. 'I want a lawyer.'
Quote:
It was as if Los Angeles were no longer a city but a sepulchre; a mausoleum metropolis where the only signs of movement were the rigor mortis contraction of locking muscle. And the lisp of smoke from the funeral pyre, caught in the Santa Ana winds.

An impressive debut. Tim Baker channels Raymond Chandler, James Ellroy & Norman Mailor's "Oswald's Tale" in this 'JFK-Marilyn Monroe-Mafia/Anti-Castro-CIA-Oswald-Howard Hughes-FBI, etc' conspiracy tale, weaving the kidnapping of a rich man's son into the JFK assassination conspiracy (?).
As i say, an excellent debut. Not without it's faults, but overall, an entertaining read.
4 stars from me.

[Maggie Hesseling · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant debut novel by Tim Baker. I love the story and the historical characters that pop in from time to time. But I especially love that though it reads a little like Ellroy, Baker has managed to put something in it that makes it all his. There's a voice there that is going to become a go-to for me in the crime genre. I'd recommend this novel to anyone who loves a fantastic historical noir. A fantastic read that I just couldn't put down.

[Bibliophile · Rating 2 out of 5]

What a disappointing read! The plot was tortuous and depended on some insane conspiracy theories, the characters were both unlikeable and lacking in personality, and by the end I was just skimming to the finish. Blah! The physical quality of the book, though, as with all Europa Editions, was superb.

[Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

A bit too much happening in this book. A lot of switching between times ( although the time switches were clearly marked ). I have read a few ' Kennedy conspiracy' theory books and felt that this one doesn't measure up to some.

[Conwild · Rating 5 out of 5]

I highly recommend this. Well crafted and suspenseful tale of power and corruption in JFK era America. Can't give away any more!

[ItchyFeetReader · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting multi generational conspiracy / mystery thriller slowed down by an over complicated cast of players and some interesting language choices. The story pulled me in but it was hard, hard work.

Plot
Nominally three stories – the missing young son of a wealthy, if unlikable magnate in 1960, a contemporary journalist writing a book about the Kennedy assassination and the assassination itself.

Thoughts
The plotting of the three story lines is really very clever (if not also very complex) and Baker shifts between them effectively building tension and interest as characters reappear and themes merge and then diverge again. In some instances characters and themes are introduced only to be ignored and not revisited.

The cast of characters is enormous and, for someone not incredibly well informed on the early 1960s mob culture or the Kennedy assassination, at times confusing to keep track of who is entirely fictional versus fictionalised. That said both Nick Alston – the private eye tasked with finding the missing boy back in 1960 and Hastings, the main character through the Kennedy storyline are well drawn and intriguing.

I enjoyed a number of the themes included in the novel; the corrupting influencing of money and power was impressive whilst the long shadow of the Second World War in the Pacific on many of the characters was also powerful. The reimagining of the Kennedy assassination was a fascinating hypothesis and I also enjoyed the selection of conspiracy theorists listed in the contemporary chapters of the book.

What let this novel down for me was the long and flowery sentences that did little to move the story forward. It is a testament to the plotting that I picked it up again a number of time after putting it down in frustration! Also it is not a novel full of strong positive female characters and this along with the language may well be a homage of sorts to Ellroy but it did not work for me and distracted from what was a pretty good storyline.

Overall I think I am glad I finished it and it has left me wanting to know more about any number of the topics covered but can not help feel that is was perhaps too ambitious for a first novel.

[Sean Kottke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Last of the books I started on vacation. It earns its comparisons to James Ellroy, particularly "American Tabloid." The prose is a bit more baroque and introspective than Ellroy's, and the core characters have more redeeming virtues than the central trio of cynics in the Underworld novels. The weaving together of a 1960 kidnapping plot, a worm's eye unpacking of the JFK assassination, and a 2014 investigation into both by the son of the PI who narrates the first thread is well-paced for gradual revelation of the larger machinations running behind the scenes.

[Jason H · Rating 3 out of 5]

An noir take on events preceding the JFK assassination, replete with mobsters, rogue LAPD officers, an ex-marine PI/hitman, and a classic femme fatale.

I liked it, but didn't love it... it could've been about 100 pages shorter, and it was also difficult to follow because it covers three events, over three periods of time, told through three characters' perspectives in those times. But Baker showed promise and his writing is extraordinarily ambitious.

I'll give his next book a try (if isn't so long).

[Sam Soule · Rating 3 out of 5]

A book for noir nerds written by the nerdiest of noir nerds and that fact, plus the fact that I'm just interested enough to see where the story goes to be inclined to pick up the next book in this series, justifies three stars instead of two. FEVER CITY seems to inhabit the same fictional space as comic book writer Ed Brubaker and novelist James Ellroy, both of whom do hard boiled revisionist conspiracy / horror crime tales to much greater effect. Which, even in fledgling hands, is still pretty appealing territory ... as long as the telling doesn't become too heavy-handed, convoluted, and boring. Words to the wise, Mr. Baker. Please, continue on.

[Maggie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is debut novel by author. The book spans decades with the assignation of John F Kennedy at its core. It is part conspiracy theory and kept me gripped. A child is kidnapped some years before that faithful Dallas day shows the efforts of the LA investigator who tries to solve the case and that of his son many years later trying to bring light into the facts. I found it fast paced and personally really enjoyed it.

[Christina Hannan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book seeped noir and conspiracy. It was an easy to follow yet wild book that threw twists at you that it foreshadowed ever so gently beforehand. I liked the characters and I loved the plot, it was constantly moving and displaying the pieces that would eventually fit into the rest of the puzzle. It was a joy to read, even if the constant jumping between three perspectives and three different years was confusing at first.

[Marc Diepstraten · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is ingenious, beautifully written. A nice bold take again on the JFK assassination. It has a lot of James Ellroy in it, and that is not the worst comparison to make. Very strong for a debut novel. The whole time sequence thing bouncing to and from is complicated at times and confusing. It of course adds lots of cliffhangers and keeps you reading, but once you're back in a different time I was at times confused of which story I was reading. All that aside I thoroughly enjoyed it.

[Christopher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Aptly titled. Plot is preposterous. It lost me once I started seeing the bigger picture of where it was heading, which was frankly and blatantly obvious. Too much effort to align the alt-history, too much investment in conspiracy — the novel worked better as a noir where the history was window dressing. I consumed this but with a feeling of emptiness after.

[David J Freeman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked a copy of this book from my local library and I am really pleased that I did.
Hastings and alston are terrific characters as is Mrs Bannister.
What I found remarkable is that this was a debut novel, it certainly doesn't read like one. fast paced, witty, powerfully violent without being so brutal as to lose its realism.
a great read and I will be looking out for more by Tim Baker.

[D. Durst · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good story, but confusing

This is a very interesting book and the premise will keep you glued to it, unless all the jumping around confuses you. The author presents the story, which spans multiple decades in a non linear format. You definitely need to pay attention while reading this book, but you will be rewarded.

[Viv (Sempronia) · Rating 1 out of 5]

"It is so bad... I wanna give it a 0. But that's not possible. So I give you. A 1."
Why. I had to quit this book, it was just too much.
So much racism, and I saw that he was trying to make it part of the book but it just took me out of it. Not to go all PC teen, but there were a few too many uses of the hard r.
There was more, I don't care enough. Just know, I rage quit.

[Deborah · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 timelines told at once

An interesting story &compelling in places but a bit hard to follow at times with different chapters jumping between 1960, 1963 and 2014. The final twist is good.