BELVATOWN

by J. Lea Koretsky

Paperback / $18.00 / isbn: 978-1-58790-244-4 / 303 pages / 5.5 x 8.5” 

Fiction / Mystery / Detectives

In the swarthy desert metropolis of San Bernardino a robbery of a diamond drawer and subsequent shooting of three shoppers at the then new J.C. Penny department store leaves two dead and a heist ring on the loose. The year is 1957. A close confidante of one dead takes up the investigation into the sundry behind-the-scenes lifestyles of predominantly teen predators who rob and murder as they go. The glamour of violence with scheming females and spiteful male counterparts who cruise the scene from the burned-out suburb of Canyon Vista all the way across the county to the remote cement city and along Highway 1 to Goleta for reckless intimidation in hotel hideaways and coastal trailer parks.

 In The Hood, a second novella packaged with Belvatown, San Francisco Appeals Judge Ray Fellow contends with a destructive power hungry wife in a story about the bombings of the 27th police precinct station, Mercy Hospital and the Civic Center Science Hall. Law review takes the stage on proof of the series of crimes. Crooked liaisons square off against the city’s best detectives whose reputations excel by the docket. Tawdry sex, taut drama, silky femme fatales and chivalrous cops line up for action packed courtroom trials.

 J. Lea Koretsky worked twelve years in non-profit hospital management under the state health and safety code before she switched careers to investigative social work in the milieu of child abuse and county public welfare. Voir dired as a witness expert she has given testimony for the county and worked with FBI on cases. Belvatown is her twelfth novel of detective fiction. She resides in the San Joaquin Delta. Koretsky was nominated by Berkeley National Poets for best poems appearing in a novel, Trojan Park. She remains an avid reader of Creeley, Snyder, Rilke, Frost and Yeats.