Alki Point

by Henry L. Walton

The body of a young woman is discovered in a submerged car at the base of a boat ramp on Seattle's Elliott Bay. Initial indications of an opioid overdose point to accidental death or suicide. That is until the coroner determines that the frontal lobe of the girl's brain was impaled by a sharp object that had been inserted next to her eyeball.

One week later, a second girl is found washed up further down the shore, also with opioids in her blood and also with her brain pierced. Neither girl is from the Seattle area.

It is a race against time for Reed Carver to determine if there is a link between the two seemingly unconnected victims that can lead him to their murderer, of if there is a serial killer loose on the streets of Seattle that must be stopped before he strikes again.

The twists keep coming as Reed is drawn into the worlds of emotional disorders, self-mutilation, incest, illicit pharmaceuticals, psycho-surgery, and others' family secrets that led to a chain of dire consequences. The twists keep unfolding up to the last page.

211 pages, Paperback

First published May 21, 2020

About the author

Henry Walton is author of the popular humorous Steampunk adventure series The Journals of Thaddeaus Shockpocket. He attended the University of Washington with the intent of becoming a full-time writer but ended up with a science degree. During a career of managing industrial product development and marketing teams for global organizations, Henry honed his writing skills in the form of award winning marketing campaigns.
He returned to creative writing with the internationally popular young reader series, The Journals of Thaddeaus Shockpocket, a tongue-in-cheek account of the misadventures of a turn-of-the-century English family of inventors and explorers. .
In 2020, Henry introduced the adult reader Reed Carver Mystery series with Alki Point, a murder suspense thriller that takes amateur sleuth Reed Carver into the worlds of mental disorders, self-mutilation, illicit pharmaceuticals, psycho surgery and more.

Reviews

[Footie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Having grown up in Seattle, the name grabbed my attention right away. Yeah, a locally based crime novel. And it was a very very good read. Walton introduces the reader to most of the the main characters early in the book and does an excellent job of revealing their individual psyche and role in solving this murder mystery. The first deceased young women (oh you mean there is a second? read the book to find out), the amateur private homicide not a detective-detective, the real detective on the case, the boss officer, the teenagers (yes this book is a great read for teen and twenty-agers as well as older adults) and the criminals. The story weaves several threads of sexual abuse, family dysfunction, murder, cover ups and more. Walton fills in almost all the missing pieces as the book moves to the last chapters...almost all the pieces because, well, read the book to see why there is most likely a sequel. I highly recommend Alki Point. It is not a difficult book to read or follow if you don't put it down for more than a day. So I encourage you to social distance yourself from your work for a few hours and escape into the salty waters of Alki Point. You will be glad you did.

[Heidi Newman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed this book! The story began with a body found in a vehicle submerged in Elliot Bay in Seattle. The author wove a story building the characters and connecting events and the outcome had a totally unexpected macabre twist! The city of Seattle was vividly brought to life by the author. I am from the area and could picture the settings and events clearly based on the descriptions and Mr. Walton clearly knew his local history and lore. After I started couldn’t put the book down until I was done! I will definitely read the next book if the author continue this series.

[DTSchranck · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mysteries are my favorite genre and this one checked all the boxes. Once started, it was difficult to put down. The story starts by laying out the crime as well as several characters, teasing you to start your own sleuthing and draw conclusions. But you soon realize there is more to the story than you thought. As additional characters come into play, the twists and turns just keep coming. When the mystery is finally resolved, the author throws on a dollop of suspense that sent chills down my spine.
A great suspenseful journey. Can't wait to see what follows for Reed Carver.

[Debra Jardine]

I enjoyed reading Alki Point, The book kept me guessing all the way through till the finish. The story was well executed and was accurate on the settings. The book was filled with twist and turns with a surprised ending. There characters were believable and it was fun to see where everyone ended up. I recommend this book to all.

[Pamela Kehrberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

My early childhood was spent in the West Seattle/Seattle area. Alki Point is part of who I am so reading this book was right up my alley. I enjoyed my time spent with the characters and the author kept me guessing until the end. A good read and one that I’m looking forward to picking up again on a good rainy Washington afternoon.

[Tom J]

I enjoyed the book and would read more of Henry Walton books. It is in my back yard where I grew up and can relate to the location. Len does take the time to fill you in on characters along the way and did keep my interest as to who done it.

[Jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading Alki Point, we read it in our book club its a nice book to read for mystery book lovers like me

[Tyler · Rating 1 out of 5]

Henry Walton’s first attempt at adult mystery writing and it was painfully obvious. The writing was amateurish and bland. It appeared that he wrote a basic character sketch and then added some unimportant details to buff up the page count. There was nothing riveting, suspenseful, or thrilling about this mystery - not much mysterious either, for that matter.

This is also an attempt at creating an ongoing character for more stories - Reed Carver, the brother of a police officer that enjoys solving crimes on the side. However, he managed to do very little of the solving, in fact, his wife solved the final few clues at the climax of the story. The whole time I’m wondering why we are not following McManus, the actual lead detective. All Reed seemed to do was awkwardly talk to teenagers, google some info the cops should have had anyway, and mismanage evidence. The details of the case were given to him by his brother, but his brother had to wait for the actual lead detectives and coroners to do the work first.

Almost no one spoke with contractions, so most of the dialogue felt robotic, like an AI was writing human speech. Clearly the author has little to no interactions with actual teenagers because they talked suspiciously like all of the adults. People’s actions throughout didn’t match the scene frequently as if everyone was bipolar. Far too many cliches and odd details and then missing details in other locations and even a total mixup of character names at one point.

Every bad guy immediately cracked when questioned at all, which was annoying. The evidence all seemed to fall together real nice with no real twists or turns about who did things. It was as if someone who has never experienced crime was writing about the underbelly of the crime world, very superficial and amateurish, as I mentioned before.

Overall, a super disappointing read that I only read because of the location being around where I live. It just makes no sense. The reading level is junior high or high school level, but the topics are more adult, though not too detailed or raw. I wouldn’t recommend reading this and I will be avoiding anything else by this author myself.