Fletch Mysteries

Book one in the bestselling mystery series that brought to life an iconic literary antihero of subversion and schemes. Fletch, investigative reporter extraordinaire, can't be bothered with deadlines or expense-account budgets when it comes to getting his story. Working undercover at the beach to dig up a drug-trafficking scheme for his next blockbuster piece, Fletch is invited into a much deeper narrative. Alan Stanwyk, CEO of Collins Aviation and all-around family man, mistakes the reporter for a strung-out vagabond and asks him for a favor: kill him and escape to Brazil with $50,000. Intrigued, Fletch can't help but dig into this suspicious deal he's being offered. Dodging the shady beach police as his case begins to break open, and with his temperamental editor Clara pushing for his article, he soon discovers that Stanwyk has a lot to hide and this plan is anything, but what it seems.

"A girl jumped off the motel's roof. Five minutes ago.""Give it to me straight. Does the girl have anything to do with us? I mean, with the campaign? The presidential candidate?""It's your job, Fletch, to make damned sure she didn't."When Fletch arrives as the new press representative for Governor Caxton Wheeler's presidential campaign, he isn't sure which mystery to solve first-what his new job actually is, or why the campaign has been leaving dead women in its tracks.He finds himself on the other side of the press, a human shield, deflecting the same questions he is asking himself. Are the murders just coincidence, or is a coldhearted killer looking for a job in the White House?When the campaign shifts into high gear, Fletch's skills are working overtime in a desperate bid of his own to find the killer and to make sure the governor doesn't lose any more votes.

Fletch's trip to Brazil wasn't exactly planned. But it's Carnival time in Rio and he has plenty of money, thanks to a little arrangement he made stateside. And it took him no time to hook up with the luscious Laura Soares. Fletch is beginning to relax, just a little.But between the American widow who seems to be following Fletch and the Brazilian widow who's fingered Fletch as her long-dead husband, he suddenly doesn't have much time to enjoy the present or even get a wink of sleep.A thirty-year-old unsolved murder, a more recent suicide, an inconvenient heart attack-somehow Fletch is connected to all of them and one of those connections might just shorten his own life. From Rio to Bahia and back again at the height of Carnival, Fletch has to keep moving or get stopped cold.

As a fledgling reporter, Fletch is doing more flailing than anything else. That and floating around from department to department trying to figure where he fits in. His managing editor's got him pegged for the society pages, but the kind of society Fletch gets involved with is anything but polite.His first big interview, a millionaire lawyer with a crooked streak and an itch to give away some of his ill-gotten gains, ends up dead in the News-Tribune's parking lot before Fletch can ask question number one. So Fletch goes after the murderer instead, and ends up learning a thing or two about crime and punishment.At the same time, he's supposed to be covering (or maybe uncovering) a health spa that caters to all its clients needs, and gets hired as a very personal trainer. Never mind that he's supposed to be getting married at the end of the week; Fletch has a few other engagements to take care of first.

After a few delays and without the benefit of a rehearsal, it looks like Fletch is finally getting hitched. It's a small affair-just a few friends, the bride's parents, the groom's mother, and, just maybe, his father. Except Fletch's father is supposed to be dead.But somebody delivered the letter, signed Fletch Senior and containing an invitation (and a pair of plane tickets) to visit the old man in Nairobi for the honeymoon. Never mind Fletch and his bride were planning a ski trip to Colorado.No sooner does the couple land in Africa, then the search for Fletch's father begins. There's a murder at the airport, reports of the old man's incarceration, and the hospitality (and evasiveness) offered by Pop's best friend, who flies them across the continent, just a step or two behind-or maybe ahead of-the old rascal.

When Fletch learns there are four ex-cons on the loose in his part of the county, little does he suspect that one of the scruffy and very dangerous men will claim to be the son he never knew-in fact, was never even told about. But when a muddy and bedraggled young man accosts him in his study, it doesn't take our wily reporter and investigator long to surmise this kid might well be his son. And when Fletch meets the kid's compatriots, he wonders how either of them is going to get out of this situation unscathed.

Fletch's newfound son Jack has just heard from an old flame who's about to marry a billionaire's son-that is until her future father-in-law suffers several near-fatal accidents.The potential victim-the inventor of the perfect mirror, which allows people to see themselves exactly as others do-lives in his own secluded compound, so Jack gets a job as pool hand on the estate to get closer to the action.Now Jack's life may be in danger, and he will need his inimitable father's help to discover-before it's too late-whose reflection hides a killer's heart.