Hunt Club (Lescroart)

The Hunt Club
John Lescroart, 2006
Penguin Group USA
544 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780451220103

In Brief  
A federal judge is murdered, found shot to death in his home—together with the body of his mistress. The crime grips San Francisco. To homicide inspector Devin Juhle, it first looks like a simple case of a wife’s jealousy and rage. But Juhle’s investigation reveals that the judge had powerful enemies...some of whom may have been willing to kill to prevent him from meddling in their affairs.

Meanwhile, private investigator Wyatt Hunt, Juhle’s best friend, finds himself smitten with the beautiful and enigmatic Andrea Parisi. A lawyer who recently has become a celebrity as a commentator on Trial TV, Andrea has star power in spades, and seems bound for a national anchor job in New York City. Until Juhle discovers that Andrea, too, had a connection to the judge, along with a client that had everything to gain from the judge’s death.

And then she suddenly disappears....

Andrea becomes Juhle’s prime suspect. Wyatt Hunt thinks she may be a kidnap victim, or worse...another murder victim. And far more than that, she’s someone with whom he believes he may have a future.

As the search for Andrea intensifies, Hunt gathers a loose band of friends and associates willing to bend and even break the rules, leading to a chilling confrontation from which none of them might escape. (From the publisher.)

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About the Author 

• Birth—January 14, 1948
• Where—Houston, Texas, USA
• Education—B.A., University of California, Berkeley
• Currently—lives in El Macero, California

John Lescroart has made a name (albeit an unpronounceable one!) for himself as the author of crime thrillers, most notably an acclaimed series starring the San Francisco lawyer-and-cop team of Dismas Hardy and Abe Glitsky. But the road to bestsellerdom has been paved with more than a few unexpected detours for this hardworking novelist, who has been writing all his adult life but who only started to chart big around the mid-1990s.

Lescroart (pronounced les-KWA) grew up with an equal interest in music and writing. After college, he concentrated his energies on the former, performing alone and in bands around the San Francisco Bay area and scribbling in whatever spare time he could find. But he set a deadline for himself, and when he had not "made it" by age 30, he quit music to focus on writing. Within weeks he finished up a novel-in-progress based on his experiences living in Spain. He submitted it to a former high school teacher who was less than dazzled; but the man's wife loved it and entered the manuscript in a local competition. Although it would not formally see print for another four years, Sunburn won the prestigious Joseph Henry Jackson Award, beating out Anne Rice's Interview with a Vampire for the best novel by a California author.

To support his art, Lescroart held down a dizzying succession of jobs — from house painting and bartending to working as a legal secretary. At one point, just as he was ready to enroll in the creative writing program at Amherst, he was offered a lucrative gig he could not afford to pass up, and graduate school fell by the wayside. As the years passed, some of his books were published, but he never felt financially secure enough to write full-time. Then, in 1989, he contracted spinal meningitis after body-surfing in contaminated seawater. He emerged from his life-threatening ordeal with a new resolve, quit the last of his day jobs, and became a real working novelist.

It took a few tries for Dismas Hardy to become the fully realized character Lescroart's fans have come to know and love. Debuting in 1989's Dead Irish, Hardy began life as an ex-cop/ex-attorney turned bartender and did not return to the practice of law until his third appearance in Hard Evidence (1993). From then on, interest grew in the series, which has snowballed into a lucrative franchise for the author. In 2006, Lescroart introduced another San Francisco-based dynamic duo, private investigator Wyatt Hunt and homicide detective Devin Juhle, in The Hunt Club. Slightly younger than Hardy and Glitsky but drawn with the same humanizing brush, the protagonists of this series have proved immensely popular with readers.

Incidentally, Lescroart's writing success has allowed him to return to his other love: He has founded his own independent label, CrowArt Records, which showcases some of his own music and produces CDs by a number of artist/friends. At long last, John Lescroart is able to enjoy the best of both worlds.

Extras
From a 2004 Barnes & Noble interview:

• First, it's Less-KWAH. Here's a tip—don't have that name. Get a pen name that people can pronounce and remember. Just this Saturday, I gave a talk at a well-attended writers' conference. There were probably a hundred people in the room, and the talk went very well. Five minutes later, I was in the bathroom washing my hands and around the corner, I heard a guy tell another that he'd just heard the greatest talk by John le Carré. "You know, The Tailor of Panama and the Smiley books? Good stuff. I'm going to go buy all his books."

• Second, I didn't have to quit the day job to keep writing. One of the most productive times in my early writing life was while I had a full-time job as a word processor in a law firm and also worked part-time at night, often working until 11:00 p.m. How did I do any writing, you might ask? Well, I did it between 6:00 and 8:00 in the morning, four pages a day, and published five books in six years. But because a) I was making some money doing 'regular' work and didn't have to be scrounging for coin and b) I was panic-stricken at the little time that was left in the day to write, I wound up becoming more efficient.

• Third, I don't wait on inspiration, and I refuse to acknowledge 'writer's block.' I simply sit down and put words on the paper. It's like being a carpenter — writers build things. Carpenters don't wake up and say, 'Hmm, I'm not in the mood to drive nails today.' No, they go to work and do the job. It's not very romantic, but that's how I approach writing.

• If you have a good relationship, nurture it. The great god of Writing with a capital "W" isn't the only thing in life. It can be a great part and a big part, but it shouldn't consume you on a daily basis and shouldn't make your life miserable all the time. Try not to get nuts about the greater success of other writers — we're really not in competition with other writers. We're only trying to outdo ourselves, to get better at our jobs. Go on dates. Spend some time outside (fishing is good, so is skiing, hiking, swimming, jogging). Stay in shape — writing is a marathon. Don't drink too much. Have as much fun as you can.

• Lescroart used to perform as "Johnny Capo" in a group called Johnny Capo and His Real Good Band. Although he no longer performs with that outfit, he still pursues music as the founder of his very own independent label called CrowArt Records. The first project on the label was Date Night, a CD of his own compositions performed by master pianist Antonio Castillo de la Gala. Followers of Lescroart's writing may recognize the in-joke in the album's title. As he explains on his web site, "Fans of Dismas Hardy will know that Diz and Frannie (Dismas's wife) set aside every Wednesday night for some time alone together— it's their date night."

• When asked what book most influenced his life as a writer, here is his response:

The single most important book for my life and my career as a writer is actually a connected group of four books: The Alexandria Quartet (Justine, Balthazar, Mountolive, and Clea) by Lawrence Durrell. These works are not "mysteries." They are profoundly "literary," and yet there is plenty of intrigue and suspense. Character development — with dozens of main and hundreds of ancillary characters — is the glue that holds the stories together. But even important is the conceit that binds these books—the idea, based to some extent on chaos theory and quantum mechanics — is that the act of viewing an event changes the event itself. Point of view becomes, then, in some respects, as much of a "character" in these books as any of the people who inhabit them. This shifting point of view, even sometimes within individual chapters, has become a hallmark of my own writing, and has enabled me to enlarge my palette to include many elements in my work that are "novelistic" rather than genre-specific. And perhaps to give the books, although set in San Francisco, something of a universal flavor.

(Author bio and interview from Barnes & Noble.)

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Critics Say . . . 
Lescroart...inaugurat[es] a new San Francisco series, starring private investigator Wyatt Hunt and homicide detective Devin Juhle. Longtime Lescroart fans can relax: these pals are at least as interesting and enterprising as Hardy/Glitsky. Hunt's eccentric pack of friends and associates (aka the loose organization known as the Hunt Club) are investigating the murder of a federal judge and his young girlfriend. What would normally be a job for the police becomes personal after Hunt's love interest, who has connections to the judge, goes missing. Both Hunt and Juhle have appropriately troubled pasts: Hunt was forced out of a career as a child protective services officer, and Juhle is trying to live down a shoot-out that killed his last partner. As a PI, Hunt is free to detect in unorthodox and entertaining ways, while Juhle brings to bear the technical and logistic resources of official law enforcement. Most readers will agree that it's a great combination, both on the job and on the page.
Publishers Weekly

In recent volumes of his popular Dismas Hardy/Abe Glitsky courtroom series (Second Chair and The Motive), Lescroart has flirted with the addition of new characters and subplots, but here he takes a fully fledged leap into the previously uncharted territory of private investigator Wyatt Hunt. Lescroart introduces Hunt as a caseworker for Child Protective Services (CPS) in San Francisco, follows him through an incident that ends his CPS career, and sets him up as a new protege of Dismas Hardy's ever-expanding law firm. Four years later, the staff and associates of Hunt's team, aptly named the Hunt Club, are drawn into a baffling investigation of the murder of a federal judge and his mistress that has surprising connections within the Bay City's power strata. Lescroart is to be applauded for recognizing the need for a fresh viewpoint in his narrative and for the creation of the energetic, streetwise Hunt, who certainly fills that bill. Hardy/Glitsky fans and new Lescroart readers alike will most assuredly want to join the Hunt Club. —Nancy McNicol, Ora Mason Branch Lib., West Haven, CT
Library Journal

Lescroart takes a break from the long-running adventures of San Francisco attorney Dismas Hardy and Lt. Abe Glitsky (The Second Chair, 2004, etc.) to audition a new detective hero. Wyatt Hunt worked for Child Protective Services until a politically connected boss forced him out even though he loved the work and was good at it. When he saw his chance for revenge, Hunt took it, shifted gears to get his p.i. license, opened an agency called the Hunt Club, with an unofficial annex of justice-minded friends—and never looked back. But his interest in the murders of aging federal judge George Palmer and Staci Rosalier, the much younger waitress His Honor had just given a diamond necklace, is more personal than professional. While Inspector Devin Juhle, a Hunt Club veteran from SFPD Homicide, is running around trying to pin the shootings on either the judge's widow or the hardnosed prison guards' union he was investigating, Hunt rescues TV lawyer Andrea Parisi from an embarrassing night on the town and takes her to bed hours before she vanishes from the face of the earth. What connection could her disappearance have with the double murder and the spreading stain of corruption Juhle finds beneath it? Lescroart's eye for Bay Area graft is as far-reaching and unerring as ever; conspiracies seem to lurk under every parked car in the city. Though well-connected complications keep slipping in, however, the solution is disconcertingly simple, disappointingly limited in scope and impact and readily spotted from as far away as the Golden Gate Bridge. Inside a story as big and loose-limbed as any of Dis and Abe's cases, Lescroart has hidden an uncommonly detailed story of his hero's origins and a much smaller case of double murder.
Kirkus Reviews

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Book Club Discussion Questions 

Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:

• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)

Also consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for The Hunt Club: 

1. Discuss Wyatt Hunt's character...what kind of man is he? Why was he removed from his former job in Child Protective Services?

2. Same with Wyatt's friend Devlin Juhle. What kind of character is he...and on what is the two men's friendship based?

3. Talk about the meaning of the "Hunt Club" that Wyatt establishes. What is the club based on?

4. How does Wyatt's relationship with Andrea Parisi strain the friendship with Devlin? After she disappears, both men want to find her, but they proceed in divergent ways. How do they differ in their detection/police work—and why? What are each man's goals? Do you side with one man's method over the other's?

5. What makes Staci Roaslier's murder so baffling to the police? Where are her friends or family?

6. What complications arise with the prison guard union (CCPOA) and what is/was Andrea's connection with that investigation?

7. Overall, there are three distinct plotlines within the story? Does Lescroart do a good job of interweaving them...or does he keep the strands separate, pursuing each independently? Is there too much going on in the book, making it confusing? Or do the divergent plots add to the excitement?

8. Do you find the legal issues of this novel interesting? Have they enlightened you on how our court and legal process operate? Or do you find them tiresome, weighing down the pace of the plot? Are you disappointed that the book contains no courtroom scenes?

9. Point out some of the passages that move away from the legal/thriller aspect of the plot and concentrate on the ideals of love? Which ones do you find insightful...or moving? How do these passages contribute to the novel? In what way do they deepen character?

10. All in all, does this book deliver? Did you find yourself on the edge of your seat, rapidly turning pages, unable to put the book down? Or did you find it disappointing, dragged down by too many plots, uninteresting characters...too much legalese? Does Lescroart tie up all the loose ends to your satisfaction?

11. Have you read the other Lescroart series, based on Hardy and Glitsky? If so, how does this new effort compare with that first series? If you haven't read other Lescroart books, are you inspired to do so after reading The Hunt Club?

(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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