96 Tears

Jack is hired by the doyenne of Big D's nouveau riche, Sherri Plunkett, to stalk whoever is stalking her daughter, Sandra. As always for Jack, what first seems straightforward turns out to be dizzyingly complex. Sherri has a shady background she'd rather not dwell on and an even shadier new husband, who was her pool boy before the wedding. Sandra, the stalkee, doesn't seem to mind the attention, and Jack (who should know better) doesn't mind Sandra's attentions - or her appetite for high-speed exhibitionism. While Jack's stalking the stalker, he's being stalked himself by splendidly stupid thug Teddy Tunstra II, whom Jack put in prison for what may prove to be a dangerously short sentence. Jack thinks he's ahead of the game when he gets wind of a plot to stage Sandra's kidnapping, but it turns out he's one step behind Teddy and his hulking jailhouse crony, Frederick Mertts. Everyone's intent on feeding Jack a steady diet of misinformation, disinformation, and flat-out lies, and he'll choke to death unless he can dig up some harsh truths about Sherri's past, Sandra's, and his own. Helping him dig is a welter of outlandish and utterly convincing characters, from a few well-placed eels to a lovable old arsonist.