IQ and the Hounds of Bakersfield

Sherlock Holmes updates are a plenty in the early 21st century. Guy Ritchie’s take has RDJ as a bare-fisted fighter. Steven Moffat’s Sherlock, like any Millennial, is glued to his Smartphone while Watson is married to a superspy. Then comes author Joe Ide whose eponymous character is a young, black man in LA solving crimes for the poor folk of the ‘hood for payments of blueberry muffins. IQ drives a maxed out Audi while Watson, this time going with the rhyming handle Dodson, is a Tupac-loving, ex-drug dealer. And brother it works.

Hardly your typical noir LA PI, Isaiah Quintabe is a quiet man who has the gift of observation. As a means of absolution, he simply wishes to help, while his former roommate, Dodson, who sets himself up as IQ’s business manager, gets him involved in a case involving a rapper targeted by a hitman who specializes in breeding pit bulls. Ide provides a hip-hop soundtrack as the unlikely duo works the case while the b-plot reveals the friends’ former criminal ways that breaks IQ away from the genre and into an untapped realm.

Ide’s dialogue is fresh and, typical of the Sherlock genre, revealing as IQ proves himself, distances himself, from mundane, particularly those in his community who see happiness by way of Benjamins and bling. The plot is fast and fun if even the solution runs on the convenient side. Best yet, Ide has a follow-up planned. Having more IQ is always a good thing.


As always,
theJOE