By Daniel Weizmann https://www.danielweizmann.com @danielweizmann
Published by Melville House https://mhpbooks.com/ @melvillehouse
342 pages ISBN 9781685891152
Publication date 30 May 2024
Cinnamon Girl is the first novel in the Pacific Coast Highway Mystery series. Click on the link to read my review of The Last Songbird the first book in the series.
I was sent a paperback Advance Reader Copy in exchange for a fair review. I would like to thank Nikki at the publisher for arranging this.
The Cover
Is it possible to fall in love with a book cover? This one is just perfection for the content of the novel. From the wistful expression on the photo of the girl taken at an unguarded moment, to the way her hair almost merges with the palm fronds, to the sunset being a metaphor for the passing of time and lives ending. Simply fabulous and fabulously simple.
My thoughts
Adam Zantz is still working as a Lyft driver, trying to make ends meet, but now he has a little more focus on his own life. After finally giving up on his dream of being a successful songwriter and performer, he has decided to study for his private investigator licence.
He is called to the bedside of his dying former piano teacher, Charles Elkaim, who has a job for him. Charles has pancreatic cancer and just months to live, but he is a tough and determined old man, a survivor of the Holocaust. He doesn’t care that Adam hasn’t got a licence yet and cannot wait until he does, so how can Adam refuse. Charles wants him to prove that his son Emil was innocent of the murder he was charged with when he himself was shanked and murdered whilst on remand. No easy task, made even more difficult by it taking place over thirty years ago.
Adam has mixed emotions and motivations for agreeing to do the job. There is the love and affection for an old family friend and personal mentor and the desire to give him a sense of closure in his final days. Charles was Adam’s uncle Hersch’s best friend and Hersch was as good as a father to Adam, taking him in when his mother went off the rails. Latterly they were estranged though and hadn’t made up before Hersch’s death, much to Adam’s shame and regret. Will establishing Emil’s innocence, or not, help salve Adam’s feelings of guilt?
When Adam was a young boy, he was in awe of Emil, the coolest dude on the block, his first hero. Emil’s girlfriend was Cynthia, known to everyone as Cinnamon, a girl to capture men’s hearts, the sort of girl who could make you happy. When Emil was murdered, she ran away and died a few years later of an overdose, a tragic end to a perfect couple. When Adam speaks to Cinnamon’s mother, he discovers a demo pressing of an LP by a high school garage band they were part of. An unexpected lead to the past, the Paisley Underground psychedelic scene and long buried secrets.
I don’t think I have read a novel with a constant earworm before, but for me the title immediately stirs up thoughts of Neil Young. This is a novel steeped in music, so relax and let it envelop you like a warm bath and enjoy. There is also a playlist included in the back to add to the enjoyment (and any list including Private Idaho can’t be bad).
The plot is straightforward, discovering who killed Reynaldo if Emil didn’t, but complexity is added with each layer of truth uncovered and the occasional red herring. The story arc is a journey into the past, well this is a Pacific Coast Highway story so buckle up and enjoy the ride, it’s a beauty. One that takes in the wealth and mansions of the successful and the ‘Tent Town’ of the lost and dispossessed pitched at the freeway underpass, and many steps between. A warts and all portrayal of ‘Tinsel Town’ but one written with an acutely observant eye and clear affection for the place.
Zantz may be an unlikely Seamus, but he has the DNA of the classic Fictional West Coast PI. His accommodation is low rent, he lives in a studio in a studio having taken a room in a recording studio as a crash pad. He eschews guns, is prone to fall for a Micky Finn and comes off worse in any violent exchange. He is determined though and has a clear moral compass. Comparisons to Raymond Chandler are obvious but to me this is not a homage but something entirely different, the author has captured the spirit but within an unusual setting, which is a much greater achievement.
Some characters make a welcome return like Ziva the wheelchair bound artist and Fry the lawyer come paparazzi, but there is a wonderful cast of oddballs too. These include health and wellness hucksters and a pair of cheesy/sleazy radio DJs who help to put the trope one step behind clowns in the list of the disturbing. This is one author who manages to nail a character no matter how small the appearance.
There is humour but not the wise cracking of Philip Marlowe but a rich seam of gentle Jewish humour, self-depreciating but with the neurosis dialled down, being quirky and quite affecting. There is something quite life affirming with the gentle banter particularly between Zantz and Fry, and I love the throwaway Jewish expressions which pepper the excellent dialogue.
This is a novel set largely in the Jewish community and wears its Jewishness very much on its sleeve. However, it’s not the strictly religious kind, some appear barely observant, so after a couple of chapters it fades in the background of consciousness. We are left with a story rich in family relationships, commitments, trust and support, where elders are loved and respected. A tight-knit community of families and friends where the pain of disappointment and rejection is deeply felt, but as Adam discovers where redemption is always possible.
A road trip down the Pacific Coast Highway into the past, with noir in its soul, this Cinnamon Girl is simply stunning.
Cinnamon Girl can be purchased from the Bookshop.org here
The author
Daniel Weizmann is a writer and editor whose work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Billboard, the Guardian, AP Newswire, and more. Under the nom de plume, Shredder, Weizmann also wrote for the long running Flipside fanzine, as well as LA Weekly, which once called him “an incomparable punk stylist.” Most recently, Weizmann co-authored Game Chang
Peter turns the page 