Amuse Bouche
by Anthony Bidulka
Summary
A gay wedding gone bad. A missing groom. An unsullied reputation at risk. Enter Russell Quant, cute, gay and a rookie private detective. With a nose for good wine and bad lies, Quant is off to France on his first big case. From the smudgy streets of Paris, he cajoles and sleuths his way to the pastel-coloured promenade of Sanary-sur-Mer. Back in Saskatoon, Quant comes face to face with a client who may be the bad guy, a quarry who turns up in the most unexpected place, a cast of colourful suspects, and a personal life brimful of captivating personalities.
Excerpt
I have to believe that Hercule Poirot and Jessica Fletcher along with the current slate of mystery novel and television detectives had to start somewhere. Somewhere unworthy of a book or possible syndication rights. They didn’t all begin with “The Case of the Smoking Gun” or by tracking down an ingenious serial killer. Or did they? I’m assuming they didn’t, but I don’t know that for a fact. Yet, that assumption gives me some comfort when I look back on the last twelve months since I began my life as a private detective. If someone were creating a TV show about some of the cases I’ve had in the past year, they’d have to resort to episode titles like “The Case of the Hiding Pussy Cat” or “Midnight Surveillance Sucks.”
To celebrate my one-year anniversary, I drank passable champagne from a bottle I’d chilled in the small fridge that holds up one end of my office desk, and then finished the paperwork on my most recent case. My client had been a local woman who vacations in Arizona from late fall to early spring every year. She had hired me to track down a couple whose motor home had sat next to hers in the trailer park the previous winter. Apparently the next door neighbours had forgotten to return a favourite piece of Corning Ware and my client wanted it back. I mailed a bill for fifty-three dollars and fifty cents, for time and expenses, and closed the file on “The Case of the Missing Casserole Dish.”
My name is Russell Quant. I’m thirty-one and a former police constable for the city of Saskatoon in the province of Saskatchewan. At about 215,000 people and smack in the middle of the Canadian prairie, Saskatoon is not action central, but neither is it the end of the world. It’s safe and clean. It has four distinct seasons, some of the friendliest people on the globe, and it’s home.
Reviews
“…a first rate goose chase.”– Quill & Quire (Toronto)
“Bidulka unravels his tale with skill and gentle humour...”- The Voice (Ottawa)
“… Bidulka shows a certain je ne sais quoi.” – in newsweekly (Boston)
Author's Biography
Anthony Bidulka’s mystery series tells the story of a half-Ukrainian, half-Irish, gay, ex-farm boy, ex-cop, Canadian, prairie, world-travelling, private detective living a big life in a small city.
The Russell Quant series is a multi award nominee and was awarded the Lambda Literary Award for Best Men’s Mystery.