The Governor's Wife

April 6, 2015
Reviewed by Richard A. Lupoff. PI Michael Kelly, Harvey's Chicago ex-cop, is back in this tightly written page-turner. With Illinois's real ex-governor Rod Blagojovich impeached, removed from office, convicted by a federal jury on corruption grounds, and sent to the slammer, it may have been inevitable that a crime novel would be inspired by (if not entirely based on) this sensational case. It's fortunate that a writer as highly qualified and skillful as Harvey is the one to write it.The ex-governor in Harvey's version, however, is not behind bars. Rather, having been convicted and facing 30 years in the penitentiary, he leaves the courtroom with his wife, enters an elevatorâand simply disappears.Enter Kelly. Hired by an anonymous client to find the missing ex-governor, Kelly enters an ever-deepening world of swirling emotions, corruption, and ultimately violence. The Governor's Wife is deeply rooted in Chicago: its neighborhoods, its ethnic communities, its politics. Harvey creates a cast of vivid characters, including the eponymous and seemingly ice-cold wife, her old-style ward-heeler father, the governor's alleged paramour, Kelly's closest cop friend, and his contact at a major Chicago daily.Harvey uses standard hard-boiled characters and situations, perhaps in a deliberate nod to his many forerunners (especially Nelson Algren) and possibly with his tongue ever so slightly in his cheek. But the book is replete with surprises. Every time the reader turns the page and thinks he knows what he's going to encounter, there's Harvey waiting to wallop him with a sandbag.And for all the hard-bitten grittiness of this book, Harvey is capable of writing with touching tenderness. Consider this paragraph:"I put on some music and we settled on the couch. Karen scooted close, and I put my arm around her. The music was Elvis Costello. Mellow Elvis. I listened to him sing about a girl named Alison and thought about one named Rachel . Then I thought about the one beside me. I could feel the rise and fall as her breathing slowed. When the music was finished, I got up carefully. Karen mumbled something and curled up on my couch. I got some blankets out of the closet and slipped a pillow under her head. Then I turned off the lights. I called to Mags , but she was laid out on the floor and not moving. I made my way back to my room and crawled into bed. The night was mostly quiet. I listened to the traffic below and the wind in the trees until I fell asleep."Reread that paragraph. Just when you think Harvey's PI is about to bed a new sweetieâsurprise, he doesn't!Harvey does that: he surprises you. Repeatedly. As for the requisite crime and its solution, they are bafflingly complex and ingeniously resolved. Read this book. You'll enjoy it a lot.Richard A. Lupoff's most recent books are Rookie Blues (a novel) and Writer, Vol. 1 & 2 (collected nonfiction).

Starred review from April 15, 2015
A seasoned PI tackles Chicago corruption head-on when he's hired to look into the disappearance of a popular but dirty governor. Harvey (We All Fall Down, 2011, etc.) brings back his crack private eye, Michael Kelly, who's still smarting from his last case, a bioterrorism disaster that not only cost hundreds of lives, but also precipitated the demise of Kelly's relationship. Leery about new assignments, he's nonetheless intrigued when an anonymous email arrives asking him to track down former Illinois Gov. Ray Perry, who vanished-literally-two years earlier from the courthouse minutes after being sentenced to 37 years in prison for racketeering. The case attracted national media attention, and everyone from the Chicago PD to the FBI grilled Perry's wife, Marie, about her husband's disappearing act and came up empty-handed. Kelly isn't sure what more there is to do, but since his mysterious client is offering $200,000, he's willing to take a look. Marie is the obvious place to start: she was with Ray the day he disappeared, and no one believes that one half of a couple so in sync would have no idea what the other half was planning. Kelly also digs into the exact mechanics of Ray's escape and-in a series of twists worthy of the power-hungry cast of House of Cards-a political scheme involving a construction project and some of Chicago's wealthiest and most influential players. Harvey makes political corruption personal: this isn't a story of anonymous millions being shuffled between various offshore accounts. The consequence of every decision in Kelly's gritty world bleeds.

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January 1, 2015

After The Innocence Game, Emmy Award-winning author/journalist Harvey returns to the series starring PI Michael Kelly, offered nearly a quarter million dollars to find an Illinois governor who vanishes from the courthouse after being convicted for corruption.

Copyright 2015 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from March 1, 2015

When Illinois Gov. Raymond Perry is sentenced to prison for fraud and racketeering, he enters an elevator in Chicago's Dirksen Building and disappears. Soon afterward, PI and ex-cop Michael Kelly gets an anonymous email offering him $200,000 to find Perry, no questions asked. Naturally, he begins with Mrs. Perry, an enigma who fears that her husband is dead. Further probing, with help from a cop friend, leads to a mysterious construction conglomerate where Kelly is violently warned off. It appears that a shadowy political cabal is behind a decades-long skimming of road construction funds with the governor so much involved that $60 million has gone missing with him. The ruthless pols are eliminating anyone involved while they pressure Kelly to find the money. VERDICT Harvey, a journalist and cocreator of TV's Cold Case Files, knows Chicago like Raymond Chandler knew Los Angeles, and these mean streets come alive even as bodies pile up. Wisecracking Kelly continues asking questions while keeping a gun handy. Following his stand-alone The Innocence Game, Harvey returns to his PI series (We All Fall Down) with a tale that gains power with its familiar city and political scenes, but it's the characters and action, often shifting, brutal, and surprising, that will keep readers enthralled and willfully suspending disbelief. [See Prepub Alert, 12/15/14.]--Roland Person, formerly with Southern Illinois Univ. Lib., Carbondale

Copyright 2015 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.