The Doctor's Dog
Other Works by Richard F. Venti
Henry’s Wife
Less than a full year into his newfound career as a private investigator, Boston native Dean Cello still feels more like the high school teacher he was for nine years. But that perception is about to change forever when his services are retained to find a missing person—the wife of old college friend, now bank president, Henry Witfield III. Dean tracks down the unsuspecting Amy Witfield at a Vermont country inn, engages her in conversation, and finds that he is immediately attracted to her. But wrestling with his conscience becomes the least of Dean’s worries when Amy is found dead and the local police chief suspects Dean as her murderer.
Back home in the Boston area, Dean’s search for Amy’s real killer leads him to, among other places, a homeless shelter and a prestigious tennis club in an affluent suburb.
The mystery unfolds amidst the backdrop of Dean and oldest-and-best friend, police detective Sergeant Peter Perry, exchanging frequent barbs, and Dean’s growing romantic involvement with new upstairs neighbor Nicole.
The usually reserved Dean continues to display a dry sense of humor as he gradually accepts the fact that, if he’s going to solve the case, he’s going to have to break a few rules. And break a few rules he does as he brings the entire matter to its riveting, startling conclusion.
The Purgatory Fugitive
Up until now, Michael Andraeson has spent all twenty-two years of his life on a two hundred and eighty-six-acre compound in the Allagash wilderness of northern Maine. He and the other residents of Purgatory have been led to believe that they are the only known survivors of the Last War, which took place in the mid 1980s. But a recent series of events has now caused Michael to become increasingly curious, and when he finds a letter typed on an old TV-type screen in an office at the hospital, he has all the reason he needs to embark upon a journey to learn the truth about who and what he is.
Ignorant about the modern world, and unsure of who he can trust, Michael makes his way from the Allagash to Boston, where he befriends a homeless man and finds work outside a North End restaurant while continuing to search for the truth.
Meanwhile, back in Purgatory, Drs. Schaffer and Williams have a vested interest in seeing that the escapee remains naïve, as do the father and brother he has never met. But when Michael finally does learn the truth, the stakes are raised even higher still.
With everyone after him from all sides, Michael continually manages to stay one step ahead as he races clear across the country to San Francisco, where the conflict is finally resolved in a riveting, action-packed conclusion.
Story Ideas & Backgrounders
