{"id":5992,"date":"2016-08-17T07:49:55","date_gmt":"2016-08-17T11:49:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=5992"},"modified":"2016-08-17T07:49:55","modified_gmt":"2016-08-17T11:49:55","slug":"the-kennedy-connection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=5992","title":{"rendered":"****The Kennedy Connection"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Kennedy

photo: Eric Golub, creative commons license<\/p><\/div>\n

By R.G. Belsky – <\/strong>Author Belsky was most recently managing editor of news for NBCNews.com and is a former managing editor for the New York Daily News<\/em>, among other journalistic posts. He has ample experience to write authoritatively about his main character and first-person narrator, Gil Malloy, a down-on-his luck Daily News<\/em> reporter, and about the book\u2019s Manhattan setting. The Kennedy Connection<\/em> is the first in the Gil Malloy series and takes place in 2013, as the 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy\u2019s assassination approaches.<\/p>\n

When we meet Malloy, he\u2019s been disgraced after a serious breach of journalistic ethics. Though he kept his job, he\u2019s assigned to the newsroom dregs, while he watches another young reporter, Carrie Bratten, acquire the mantle of up-and-comer that he once wore. Frustrated with his second-class citizenship, he\u2019s a little too quick to latch onto a story he thinks will redeem him.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, his former agent asks him to help her get publicity for a new book. The hook? The author claims to be Lee Harvey Oswald, Jr., illegitimate son of Kennedy\u2019s assassin. Oswald, Jr.,\u00a0 believes the book will clear his father’s name.<\/p>\n

And a police buddy asks him to investigate the death of a young ex-gang member from the South Bronx, Victor Reyes. Reyes was shot 15 years earlier, left a paraplegic, and finally died when the bullet lodged in his spine worked loose and traveled to his heart. The unknown malefactor who shot him is now a murderer. Malloy\u2019s friend is killed by a drunk driver before the reporter can do more than conduct a few initial interviews with family and cops on that case. Now one is a serious drunk and another\u2019s a deputy police commissioner.<\/p>\n

These distractions are soon cut short when a series of murders begins, each with a Kennedy half-dollar left at the scene. These deaths seem too much of a coincidence, taking into account the revelations of the new book by Oswald, Jr., especially when someone sends Malloy a letter promising more mayhem. In the envelope, a Kennedy half-dollar.<\/p>\n

Malloy is teamed up with Bratten to cover this high-profile story and again riding high in his journalistic world. Author Belsky does a good job making Malloy a likeable character who could use a little more personal insight. The other newsroom characters are also well drawn, and there\u2019s some engaging banter.<\/p>\n

Just like Jake Epping in Stephen King\u2019s 11\/22\/63<\/em>, the character of Oswald, Jr., is trying to rewrite the history of JFK\u2019s assassination and, like Jake, ends up having second thoughts about meddling with the past. Efforts to deconstruct what Malloy calls \u201cthe greatest murder mystery in history\u201d have a substantial literary pedigree, from King\u2019s work to Don DeLillo\u2019s Libra<\/em>, to James Ellroy\u2019s American Tabloid<\/em>, to Tim Baker\u2019s Fever City<\/em><\/a>. Belsky has made an engaging contribution to this lineage.<\/p>\n

A longer version of this review appeared on CrimeFictionLover.com<\/a>.
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