Loren Estleman is the quintessential noir detective writer， and Amos Walker is his quintessential noir detective. Walker has made a lot of friends--and a few enemies--in his years as a detective in Detroit， but he has never had to deal with quite the trouble he finds when he agrees to grant the death-bed wish of Beryl Garnet. Beryl was a madam， but she had a son a long while ago， and asks Walker to make sure that her son gets her ashes when she s gone.He finds her son， who has been in Canada since the 1960s， evading the law since he was a Vietnam War protester. A simple favor， melancholy， but benign. Except that before he can get settled back in Detroit Garnet s son is dead， with him as the prime suspect.He has little choice but to find out who might have done the deed and tried to pin the blame on him. . . and in the process he discovers another murder， of a boxer from the 1940s， Curtis Smallwood， who happens to have been the man s father. If that wasn t bad enough， his task is made much more complicated by the fact that the two murders， fifty-three years apart， were committed with the very same gun. And in a place where it was impossible for a gun to be.