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The Highly Effective Detective
The Highly Effective Detective Series Book #1 of 4  
Author: Rick Yancey
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| Published on June 27, 2006 | | Age Group: 14 years and up | | Reading Level: | AR: 5.1 (11.0 Points, Quiz #107708) |
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Excerpt/First Sentence(s):
I'd had this dopey idea to be a detective ever since my mother gave me an illustrated Sherlock Holmes book for my tenth birthday. For months, I walked around the house with a bubble pipe and two baseball caps on my head, one turned backward so I would have that double-billed look. I outgrew the ball caps and the pipe, but never my dream of being a detective.
Then when I was twelve, somebody gave me one of those Encyclopedia Brown books, about a boy detective who was smarter than his own father, the chief of police no less, and solved all the crimes for him. The answer to each mystery was in the back of the book for those people like me who wanted to play detective but could never figure out what the solution was. I liked that kid detective so much, I started calling myself "Dictionary Ruzak," because "Encyclopedia" was already taken.
After high school, I went to the Police Academy, but they kicked me out. I couldn't run fast enough, and I never could pass the driving and the marksmanship tests. Then they put me in what they called "scenario training" and the bad guy always killed me. I must have a died a hundred times, and would have died a hundred more, but the Academy concluded I wasn't cut out for police work.
After I flunked out of the Academy, I took a job as a guard with a company that provided security for a local bank. I wore a black uniform with a gold badge embroidered on the shouler. I had the midnight shift, which I liked. It was quiet, I had a chance to read or listen to the radio, and nothing ever happened. I worked there for fourteen years. For ten of those years I lived with my parents, until Dad died of a heart attack and Mom told me if I didn't move out, I never would, because with him gone, the temptation would be too great to live with and take care of her as an excuse not to strike out on my own. She kept on me to go to college. I worked nights, so my days were free, but somehow, like a lot of things people plan for, I never got around to it. I also could never figure out how I was going to work a full-time job, go to college, and sleep.
Publisher Description:
From the critically acclaimed author of Confessions of a Tax Collector and The Extraordinary Adventures of Alfred Kropp comes this hilarious and thrilling series debut featuring a lovable but bumbling private investigator.
Meet Teddy Ruzak, the oversized, over-his-head P.I. whose first case begins with the hit-and-run killing of a gaggle of goslings.
After his ailing mother dies, Teddy quits his job as a night watchman to fulfill his childhood dream of being a detective. With little planning and even less foresight, he hangs up his shingle and hires his favorite waitress from the local diner to be his Girl Friday.
And his first case? Bringing to justice the thoughtless driver who mows down six baby geese. Not the most exciting assignment - until Teddy's "wild-goose chase" quickly evolves into an investigation of a vicious murder.
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