Misery Bay Politics

When Garrett’s mammoth cousin Lonnie calls him to report a suspicious death on the Halifax waterfront, Garrett has no idea the can of worms he is about to get into. The man killed was a good friend of Lon’s and a leader in the Longshoreman’s union. He appeared to have been killed by falling from the top of one of the towering cranes on the waterfront, more than a hundred feet high. The mysteries pile up, along with the political connections. Garrett soon figures out that the man who fell was known to Garrett’s boss, Alton Tuttle, and to a notorious businessman in Halifax who has plans to run for mayor of the city in order to consolidate his own power by replacing Alton as Deputy Commissioner. But no one wants to talk to Garrett, especially Alton, who is acting very strangely. Meanwhile, another series of unexplained deaths has taken place over the past couple of years, likely suicides of young women who jumped off one of the city’s high bridges. The connections between the crimes are too obvious to ignore, however. The young women were never identified, leading Alton and Garrett to believe they must have been undocumented immigrants. It eventually becomes clear that the man who seemingly fell from the cranes did not do so as a result of an accident or suicide. He was murdered in a most unusual manner. Garrett discovers the man’s fifteen-year-old daughter at the site of the cranes, as the grief-stricken girl tries to understand what happened to her father. Soon, the girl is also embroiled in the tragedy, and Garrett is called upon to use all of his skills to save the girl and to determine what is going on.