The Dawn Patrol-Don Winslow

The Dawn Patrol
Don Winslow
Knopf, Jun 2008, $23.95
ISBN: 9780307266200

Once Boone Daniels was a police officer for the SDPD, but when a young girl disappeared he refused to let his partner torture the suspect to learn if she still lived. His fellow officers turned their backs on him eventually forcing him to resign. Now he lives to ride the next wave while working as a private investigator to earn money to surf. He looks forward to the big waves expected to shortly arrive due to a storm, but lawyer Petra Hall needs him to work a paying case.

She hires him to find stripper Tammy Roddick who works for Dan Silver who torched one of his establishments. She gave a deposition before vanishing. Boone discovers she was staying in a hotel with another stripper who was thrown off the terrace to her death. There is no sign of Tammy, but Boone notices a child’s toothbrush in the hotel room. Boone and Petra track her down and bring her to his apartment where she asks permission to make a phone call. Boone has a bad feeling that there is more than just an insurance scam and a dead stripper involved in this case and soon his life is on the line affirming his hypothesis.

This is a great thriller filled with eccentric characters who make up the DAWN PATROL, a group of fanatical surfers riding the waves before work. It is hard to determine who the villains are as they hide their transgressions behind nice personalities. There is also a lot of historical information pertaining to San Diego interwoven into the plot while the surfing scenes are vivid so mush readers will think there are at the Pacific. Still the bottom line is Don Winslow writes an engaging mystery that focuses on depravity.

Harriet Klausner