Last of the Independents

2015 Kobo Emerging Writer Prize - Winner, Mystery * 2015 Crime Writers of Canada Awards of Excellence Best First Novel - Nominated * Unhanged Arthur Award - Winner, Best Unpublished First Crime NovelWhat do a necrophile, a missing boy, and an unsavoury P.I. have in common? Private detective Michael Drayton is about to find out....Twenty-nine-year-old Michael Drayton runs a private investigation agency in Vancouver that specializes in missing persons - only, as Mike has discovered, some missing people stay with you. Still haunted by the unsolved disappearance of a young girl, Mike is hired to find the vanished son of a local junk merchant. However, he quickly discovers that the case has been damaged by a crooked private eye and dismissed by a disinterested justice system. Worse, the only viable lead involves a drug-addicted car thief with gang connections. As the stakes rise, Mike attempts to balance his search for the junk merchant's son with a more profitable case involving a necrophile and a funeral home, while simultaneously struggling to keep a disreputable psychic from bilking the mother of a missing girl.