Sunday is for beginnings, when we take a look at the start of a Peter Abrahams novel, including those written under the Spencer Quinn moniker™. I hear there’s an election coming up this week. One of the Chet and Bernie novels its about politics. Kind of. So here’s the start of Tender Is the Bite (available in all possible formats with the exception of me showing up to read it to you):

“I think we’re being followed,” Bernie said.

That had to be one of Bernie’s jokes. Have I mentioned that he can be quite the jokester? Probably not, since we’re just getting started, but who else except Bernie would even think of saying that? We were creeping along at walking speed on the East Canyon Freeway at rush hour, stuck in an endless river of traffic – of course we were being followed, followed by too many cars to count! Not only too many for me to count – I don’t go past two – but also for Bernie. And Bernie’s always the smartest human in the room, one of the reasons the Little Detective Agency is so successful, leaving out the finances part. It’s called that on account of Bernie’s last name being Little. I’m Chet, pure and simple, not the smartest human in the room, in fact, not human. I bring other things to the table .