Debut Novel Out Now
Substantial Justice chronicles the 1985 misadventures of Spider Lacey, a laconic Citroen mechanic, and Siobhan Mollenkopf, a lawyer who has reappeared in Spider’s life after a ten-year hiatus. Things start well, then devolve when Spider’s best friend, a marijuana grower and controversial talk-show host, is murdered. Spider and Siobhan spiral into a world of white supremacists, political activists, lumber tycoons, motorcycle gangs, early online geeks, tree-spikers and law enforcement. The terrain is San Francisco, Mendocino County, New York City, and Arizona. A cross between Carl Hiaasen and E. L. Doctorow, Substantial Justice is a comic thriller and a surprising love story that delights in the vicissitudes of the era.
SUBSTANTIAL JUSTICE
“A deftly composed and highly enjoyable crime story.”
— Kirkus Reviews
“Raymond Chandler meets Jane Austen in post-Vietnam America. Excellent stuff.”
— William Finnegan, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Barbarian Days
“a joy to read―who can resist a mix of intrigue, cannabis, and fraught romance?”
— Joan Silber, PEN/Faulkner Award–winning author of Improvement
About DANIEL
Daniel Ben-Horin made his literary debut as editor of the Fountain Pen literary magazine of McBurney Junior High School in New York in 1960, but detoured in favor of a career as a journalist, early online flaneur, and social entrepreneur. He has written nonfiction for the New York Times, Mother Jones, the Nation, and other periodicals. He attended Bronx Science and the University of Chicago, was fired by the Arizona Republic, edited the Arizona New Times, organized tenants and media workers in San Francisco and built, over the course of thirty years, a global nonprofit called TechSoup.
