Fixit

In Smoke (2021), Isaiah "IQ" Quintabe left the not-so-friendly confines of East Long Beach to put himself back together after his lover and soulmate, Grace, reluctantly broke up with him, his ever-fraught lifestyle as a PI for the disenfranchised having left her permanently afraid and overwhelmed. Isaiah's attempt to distance himself from his peril-plagued career was a spectacular failure, of course, and now matters are even worse. Grace has been kidnapped by one of Isaiah's many enemies, hitman and all-around psycho Skip Hanson. With the action jumping between Grace's attempts to escape the clutches of both Skip and his addlepated mother, a Ma Barker--type with parenting issues, and Isaiah's equally determined efforts--aided by his running buddy, the irrepressible Dodson--to rescue Grace, Ide ably manages his usual trick of mixing comic turns (Dodson carrying most of the water in that regard) with ramped-up tension (the RPMs are at shrieking level pretty much from the get-go). And, yet, there is something new here, fighting to be heard: a deep note of all-prevailing sadness, whether in Isaiah and Grace's failing struggle to avoid the ignorant armies clashing by night all around them, or Skip and his mom, poised for battle but wondering "how did they get here in this fucked-up kitchen with wrecked bodies and the reek of spoiled food in their nostrils and dried blood on their clothes?"

Ide's sixth crime thriller featuring genius Isaiah "IQ" Quintabe (after 2021's Smoke) disappoints in its shift from deduction to full-tilt action. IQ, an "underground PI" who helps those in need "find justice when the police wouldn't or couldn't," now struggles with PTSD from his years in the field. His desire to retire from catching bad guys is thwarted when hit man Skip Hanson, whom IQ sent to prison, abducts IQ's girlfriend, Grace, and sends the PI taunting messages about her whereabouts and condition. The bulk of the plot centers on IQ's efforts to free Grace, but Ide tosses in another villain eager for revenge on the investigator, which dilutes, rather than increases, the tension, given this new villain's general lack of intelligence and motives that aren't all that different from Hanson's. Awkward prose (Grace is described as having "will" that's "equivalent to the Grand Canyon") and plot contrivances don't help. IQ is a strong character, but the PI's adventures feel like they're running out of steam. Agent: Esther Newberg, ICM. (May)