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Suburban Detective #1
Death by Station Wagon
Christopher "Kit" Deleeuw is a soft-boiled private detective in affluent Rochambeau, New Jersey. He’s got a wife and two kids, a mortgage and a station wagon, and an office in the American Way Mall tucked between a furniture store and a sneaker emporium. And he’s got a modest caseload of the kind a quiet suburban town generates: deadbeat dads, insurance malingerers...until now. Two popular high school students have been found dead on a deserted estate. The police call it murder-suicide, a case of love gone sour, but the dead boy’s friends think otherwise—and they’ve hired Kit to prove the cops wrong.
Soon bizarre acts of violence and murder terrorize the town, and Kit begins to uncover corrosive secrets beneath suburbia’s placid surface. The closer Kit comes to answers, the more perilous the case becomes, till Kit stands in danger of losing his detective license... and his life.
Soon bizarre acts of violence and murder terrorize the town, and Kit begins to uncover corrosive secrets beneath suburbia’s placid surface. The closer Kit comes to answers, the more perilous the case becomes, till Kit stands in danger of losing his detective license... and his life.
303 pages, Mass Market Paperback
Published March 1, 1994
2 people are currently reading
88 people want to read
About the author
Jon Katz
56 books469 followers Jon Katz is an author, photographer, and children's book writer. He lives on Bedlam Farm with his wife, the artist Maria Wulf, his four dogs, Rose, Izzy, Lenore and Frieda, two donkeys, Lulu and Fanny, and two barn cats. His next book, "Rose In A Storm" will be published by Random House on October 5.
He is working on a collection of short stories and a book on animal grieving.
He is working on a collection of short stories and a book on animal grieving.
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
January 29, 2022
This is one of those books that I picked up randomly at a book sale months ago. Might even be longer ago than that. I liked the premise and I liked that it took place in suburbs in the early 1990s. It sat on the book shelf, my wanting to read it, but it was continuously overshadowed by something different or some new interest or mine.
The Suburban Detective is the perfect narrator for his adventures in detecting. It works so well to hear his inner dialogue, to experience his fears and insecurities right from his point of view rather than an omniscient storyteller.
The story is dripping with social commentary about how adults used to live and compare themselves to one another. This felt very reminiscent as I was a kid who got to experience these parents: my own, their friends, and my friends’ parents, too.
I liked the nods of the 90s that popped up occasionally: Mario and Nintendo games, sneakers that needed to be pumped, and kids browsing CD stores after school at the mall.
Easily identifiable this book accurately recreates early 90s living in suburbia in the town of Rochambeau. It’s believable and as the reader, I enjoyed my “stay” there throughout the case.
The case itself is where the book struggles. It’s familiar and maybe too familiar to many other avid readers of the genre. I had it solved before the denouement, which surprisingly happens with more than 30 pages left in the book. Fans of Grafton will, like me, find this startling. If you’re lucky, Kinsey may spare a page or two after the fact to bring everything in her narrative to a close.
The drawn out exposition and explanation of the case and it’s finer points reminded me of a cartoon from the same period where some one will say “but what I still can’t figure out is why …”
The book earns its 4th star from me because of the setting, and the nostalgia for that bygone era of arcades and malls but before the Internet and Amazon and home consoles made them more or less irrelevant.
The Suburban Detective is the perfect narrator for his adventures in detecting. It works so well to hear his inner dialogue, to experience his fears and insecurities right from his point of view rather than an omniscient storyteller.
The story is dripping with social commentary about how adults used to live and compare themselves to one another. This felt very reminiscent as I was a kid who got to experience these parents: my own, their friends, and my friends’ parents, too.
I liked the nods of the 90s that popped up occasionally: Mario and Nintendo games, sneakers that needed to be pumped, and kids browsing CD stores after school at the mall.
Easily identifiable this book accurately recreates early 90s living in suburbia in the town of Rochambeau. It’s believable and as the reader, I enjoyed my “stay” there throughout the case.
The case itself is where the book struggles. It’s familiar and maybe too familiar to many other avid readers of the genre. I had it solved before the denouement, which surprisingly happens with more than 30 pages left in the book. Fans of Grafton will, like me, find this startling. If you’re lucky, Kinsey may spare a page or two after the fact to bring everything in her narrative to a close.
The drawn out exposition and explanation of the case and it’s finer points reminded me of a cartoon from the same period where some one will say “but what I still can’t figure out is why …”
The book earns its 4th star from me because of the setting, and the nostalgia for that bygone era of arcades and malls but before the Internet and Amazon and home consoles made them more or less irrelevant.
August 5, 2021
This author just loves to repeat himself over and over again about what it is like to live in NJ suburbia circa 1993. The mystery is tepid and the resolution is one of those where the detective suddenly knows stuff that you didn't read in his narrative. Also, some cringy stuff of him getting attracted to a High school student involved in the case. Mr. Katz, the author, enjoys talking about how wrong it is but keeps referring to the urge.
May 1, 2022
If Harlan Coben had written the Stay at Home Dad Mysteries.
Kit Deleeuw is a disgraced former Wall Streeter struggling to establish a second career as a private detective in his adopted home of Rochambeau, New Jersey. He's pretty much taking every case that comes his way - mostly deadbeat dads and insurance fraud - when a local high schooler hires him to clear his best friend's name. Ken Dale was found dead alongside his girlfriend, Carol Lombardi, at the top of the hill of the old Brown estate, and it looks to all the world like a murder-suicide. Kit has his doubts, but finds himself intrigued by the case and the strange parallels it holds to a similar case from the last century, of a young farmhand accused of killing his girlfriend - and several other women - before basically being lynched in the same place where the modern-day victims were found.
Kit doesn't have a lot of support in town beyond his family - Rochambeau is a bedroom community over the bridge from Manhattan, and Wall Street disgrace carries a long distance - but he does have (grudging) cooperation from the local police chief and a couple of savvy friends, former Cuban lawyer (now fast-food franchisee) Luis and what passes for the local gentry, an eighty-year-old Quaker named Benchley. Pretty soon everyone becomes involved in the case, trying to hunt down a strangely idealistic murderer before he strikes again.
This book was published in 1993 and verily wallows in it. Kit's office is on the second floor of a local mall (close to Luis's Lightning Burger joint). The beginnings of the helicopter parent generation are unfolding, along with suburban Super Moms, elite craft boutiques, and air-pump sneakers. There's nary a cell phone in sight. Its very dated, but not necessarily in a bad way.
The plot doesn't *quite* hang together in the end (the suspect was the most obvious candidate but his means/motives didn't really make sense), but this was a fun read and I'd definitely pick up the rest of the series if I ever find it. This was a random thrift-store find and I always enjoy it when those turn out to be gems!
Kit Deleeuw is a disgraced former Wall Streeter struggling to establish a second career as a private detective in his adopted home of Rochambeau, New Jersey. He's pretty much taking every case that comes his way - mostly deadbeat dads and insurance fraud - when a local high schooler hires him to clear his best friend's name. Ken Dale was found dead alongside his girlfriend, Carol Lombardi, at the top of the hill of the old Brown estate, and it looks to all the world like a murder-suicide. Kit has his doubts, but finds himself intrigued by the case and the strange parallels it holds to a similar case from the last century, of a young farmhand accused of killing his girlfriend - and several other women - before basically being lynched in the same place where the modern-day victims were found.
Kit doesn't have a lot of support in town beyond his family - Rochambeau is a bedroom community over the bridge from Manhattan, and Wall Street disgrace carries a long distance - but he does have (grudging) cooperation from the local police chief and a couple of savvy friends, former Cuban lawyer (now fast-food franchisee) Luis and what passes for the local gentry, an eighty-year-old Quaker named Benchley. Pretty soon everyone becomes involved in the case, trying to hunt down a strangely idealistic murderer before he strikes again.
This book was published in 1993 and verily wallows in it. Kit's office is on the second floor of a local mall (close to Luis's Lightning Burger joint). The beginnings of the helicopter parent generation are unfolding, along with suburban Super Moms, elite craft boutiques, and air-pump sneakers. There's nary a cell phone in sight. Its very dated, but not necessarily in a bad way.
The plot doesn't *quite* hang together in the end (the suspect was the most obvious candidate but his means/motives didn't really make sense), but this was a fun read and I'd definitely pick up the rest of the series if I ever find it. This was a random thrift-store find and I always enjoy it when those turn out to be gems!
March 22, 2015
This is the first in A Suburban Detective Mystery.
This book had a good premise, but it seemed Mr. Katz kept telling us stuff we already knew. Every third or fourth chapter we were told his wife was not a domestic goddess but was very good at be a psychiatric social worker. I think once would have been enough for me on that score. Kit was a likable character, but he too got on my nerves. He did a lot of moralizing and especially at the end. I really thought this was a mystery and if it would have stuck to that point, I think the book would have been a lot better.
When he got to the end, we rehashed all the salient points of the investigation, like we had not figured these things out for ourselves.
I am giving this 3 out of 5 stars and am not sure if I would read the next one or not.
This book had a good premise, but it seemed Mr. Katz kept telling us stuff we already knew. Every third or fourth chapter we were told his wife was not a domestic goddess but was very good at be a psychiatric social worker. I think once would have been enough for me on that score. Kit was a likable character, but he too got on my nerves. He did a lot of moralizing and especially at the end. I really thought this was a mystery and if it would have stuck to that point, I think the book would have been a lot better.
When he got to the end, we rehashed all the salient points of the investigation, like we had not figured these things out for ourselves.
I am giving this 3 out of 5 stars and am not sure if I would read the next one or not.
May 26, 2018
I don't remember where, when, or why I bought this mystery, but I know it came from a used bookstore and that I have had it for awhile. So I finally chose it to read now, just arbitrarily to get it off my shelf. I am glad I did! I really enjoyed it, BUT, it was written 25 years ago so even though it is contemporary, it is totally out of date. This is a detective who does not use the web, or a cell phone, or anything like that. He actually has to interview suspects in person, go to the library to look things up, and do real research. Imagine, ha! So that made it much more interesting in some ways.
The summary on Goodreads is pretty good. Basically a teenage girl and boy are found dead in a car and it is assumed to be a murder-suicide by most. But the boy's best friend doesn't buy that and hires a local detective to try and figure out what really happened and clear his friend's name. Kit is a little new at the job and makes mistakes along the way. But in the end he of course solves the case and figures out who the bad guy really is. You have to love a happy ending, even if during the course of the investigation a lot of dark things come to light.
The summary on Goodreads is pretty good. Basically a teenage girl and boy are found dead in a car and it is assumed to be a murder-suicide by most. But the boy's best friend doesn't buy that and hires a local detective to try and figure out what really happened and clear his friend's name. Kit is a little new at the job and makes mistakes along the way. But in the end he of course solves the case and figures out who the bad guy really is. You have to love a happy ending, even if during the course of the investigation a lot of dark things come to light.
February 5, 2018
The title clearly dates this book to its 1993 copyright, but it's lost none of it's cutting edge in analysis of life in the 90s in New Jersey and in the US. I think Katz is a gifted writer who has a fine touch on the pulse of society and the ensuing mystery in his adopted little town. This may be the first is what became a small series known as THE SUBURBAN DETECTIVE MYSTERY, followed by LAST HOUSEWIFE that I read and reviewed sometime ago, and followed by THE FATHER'S CLUB and DEATH ROW. There may have been another, but I couldn't find it in our system.
Sometime after this series, I think Katz changed his life significantly, moved to a Maine farm where he writes about his animals and other life.
Sometime after this series, I think Katz changed his life significantly, moved to a Maine farm where he writes about his animals and other life.
February 14, 2023
I read this thriller because it was set in a fictionalized version of the town where I live, and in addition to enjoying the vignettes of 90s life in my 'burg, for the first time I really got into the middlebrow murder-mystery genre, finding myself thinking "MAYBE IT'S HIM" etc. However, I'm not sure others would find it at all worth the trouble.
July 31, 2020
A rather formulaic mystery novel that nonetheless kept me turning pages. Full of commentary--both hilarious and poignant--on the affluent suburban life. Would recommend.
October 24, 2020
I really enjoyed this story. My only disappointment is that he didn't completely solve the 100 year old mystery.
March 13, 2017
Katz portrays people and suburban life very well. He is a philosopher, and even though several decades have gone by since the book was written, his observations about families ring true. Unfortunately the plot of this book was rather convoluted and not entirely credible. But I would read more of his books, though he seems to write more about dogs than people now.
April 3, 2008
This was the first book of a series and the first book that I have read by Jon Katz. I thought it was ok, might have given it 2.5 stars if it would let me do that here.
It just seemed very heavy and didn't flow well for me. I found myself skimming the pages. I would have put it down but I was halfway through and wanted to know "whodoneit". I could have skipped to the end but there was some other details that I would have missed, so finishing the book at least tied it all together.
The main character is a former Wall Street trader. He lost his job when the FBI wanted him to have coworkers incriminate themselves so they could bring them down. He refused and while he didn't do anything wrong, he was out of a job. So now he is a private detective mostly handling small cases such as deadbeat dads. Then there are 2 deaths of high school students, believe to be a murder/suicide. However, the friends of the students don't think this is what happened and hire him to find out the truth.
It just seemed very heavy and didn't flow well for me. I found myself skimming the pages. I would have put it down but I was halfway through and wanted to know "whodoneit". I could have skipped to the end but there was some other details that I would have missed, so finishing the book at least tied it all together.
The main character is a former Wall Street trader. He lost his job when the FBI wanted him to have coworkers incriminate themselves so they could bring them down. He refused and while he didn't do anything wrong, he was out of a job. So now he is a private detective mostly handling small cases such as deadbeat dads. Then there are 2 deaths of high school students, believe to be a murder/suicide. However, the friends of the students don't think this is what happened and hire him to find out the truth.
April 25, 2011
I've read Katz's books about dogs and had no idea he wrote mysteries first. Kit, the husband and dad, lost his high-pressure job on Wallstreet and is now a stay-at-home father and beginning detective in a wealthy suburban community. High school students hire him to prove that a popular student did not kill his former girlfriend and then himself in a car on the old estate. Contemporary topics of land use plans, carpooling parents of over-protected children. TOO MUCH REPITITION on Kit's background on Wall St I got it all the first second and third time!!!!!
Other than that a good read with characters I came to like.
Other than that a good read with characters I came to like.
August 27, 2007
I've been reading like mad lately. I've got all these books I bought at a Friends of the Library sale, and I feel guilty about buying new books until I have less old ones sitting around.
Anyway, this is by far the best book I've read recently. Very well-written, entertaining, not too fluffy, and it wasn't crystal-clear who the bad guy was until the end.
This same author writes for Slate [http://www.slate.com] and has written several non-fiction books about dogs. He's not to be confused with "Dr Katz", the cartoon...
Anyway, this is by far the best book I've read recently. Very well-written, entertaining, not too fluffy, and it wasn't crystal-clear who the bad guy was until the end.
This same author writes for Slate [http://www.slate.com] and has written several non-fiction books about dogs. He's not to be confused with "Dr Katz", the cartoon...
July 9, 2008
DEATH BY STATION WAGON - Ex
Katz, Jon - 1st in series
He's a disgraced ex-Wall Streeter, hired by some kids to prove that a murder-suicide isn't what it seems. He's the Suburban Detective--and he's about to learn just how deadly the suburbs really are.
This is a very interesting, different protagonist. It's a traditional mystery, but not a cozy. There is much more here than one first thinks.
Katz, Jon - 1st in series
He's a disgraced ex-Wall Streeter, hired by some kids to prove that a murder-suicide isn't what it seems. He's the Suburban Detective--and he's about to learn just how deadly the suburbs really are.
This is a very interesting, different protagonist. It's a traditional mystery, but not a cozy. There is much more here than one first thinks.
September 13, 2013
The hero, a former money market guy still suspected of insider trading and not a private detective is a really good character...even though I'm baffled how a man with the FBI still on his case got a PI license. As for the case it features a method of faking an alibi that manages to be clever without being too clever, so that was pretty good too.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 8, 2009
First book my husband bought me after we were married and he knew I liked quirky musteries
July 28, 2010
Writing and characters are good for genre stuff, but the mystery itself sort of dragged.
December 29, 2010
This was good but a bit dated. Who uses pay phones anymore?
January 28, 2017
Having enjoyed Katz's nonfiction, I was prepared to be disappointed by his fiction, but I was pleasantly surprised. He continues to write interesting material, no matter what his subject. Good job!
April 14, 2008
It was a fun light mystery.
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews