Where Phantoms Tread

Murder Mystery! Detective series! Crime-drama and who-done-it? These phrases describe this novel penned by The Master Storyteller, Mr. Paul John Hausleben.

Homicide Detective Lyle Odell subsists by eating pizza from his local pizza shop. He sucks down endless cups of black coffee, chain smokes cigarettes, has such a short-term memory for things that he has to remind his own mind where he places things, and to top it all off, he consumes gallons upon gallons of Irish whiskey. Odell is disheveled, eccentric, and seemingly absent minded. Often, he is stumble-drunk, haunted by his enemies and by the horror of homicide; but he is a super-genius. Beyond brilliant. Odell is a modern-day Sherlock Holmes that does not miss a trick. His enemies dismiss him as a has-been-an alcoholic shadow of his former self. That is their second mistake. Their first mistake is committing what seems to be the perfect crime in Odell's city. A city where Odell treads along with the phantoms.

In gritty Mohawk City in upstate New York, there has been yet another death. A wealthy and beautiful young socialite, who is from one of the richest families in Mohawk City, turns up dead on a weekday night in a hotel room in the fanciest hotel in the old city. It seems as if she is the victim of her hard partying-lifestyle and her promiscuous and risky past and present. Outwardly, her sad passing is a cut and dry case of mixing drugs and alcohol . . . a terrible tragedy. Adding to the tragedy and the intrigue, the young woman works in Washington D.C. for the popular federal senator from New York. A senator who is a rising star in politics with his goals set upon the White House. Yet, is it a cut and dry case? Or is there more to it? Homicide Detective Lyle Odell knows all too well the horrors of Mohawk City, and he knows how and why it earned the nickname of "Sin City." The phantoms of crime, evil and death haunt him and even gallons of whiskey cannot end their constant invasion into his heart, soul, and mind. As the case unfolds, Odell digs in and finds there is nothing cut and dry about this case. At all. As the good detective unravels the mystery and the case deepens in evil and in tragedy, he dives in where phantoms tread to solve much more than just the young woman's tragic death.

Plucked out of the pages of the novel O'Malley by his creator, Homicide Detective Lyle Odell proved to be a hugely popular character with readers. In O'Malley, the good detective helps the principal character solve the mysteries of his past and the brutal homicide of a fellow police officer. The character proved to so popular with readers that Paul John Hausleben wrote a novel starring Homicide Detective Lyle Odell. Here in his first solo adventure, the eccentric, systematic, teetering on alcoholism gumshoe detective proves why his creator earns the title of "The Master Storyteller" as the author weaves a masterpiece of murder mystery and crime-dram...