Naked Addiction by Caitlin Rother

Naked Addiction by Caitlin Rother

Tired of working undercover narcotics, police detective Ken Goode wants a transfer to homicide. After the Camus-reading surfer finds the body of a beautiful woman in an alley, he is assigned to head a team of relief detectives with the hopes of proving he is homicide-worthy. As Goode explores the underbelly of the affluent coastal enclave of La Jolla, California, and its hipster neighbor, Pacific Beach, he clashes with the patrons and employees of a neighborhood bar: real estate agents and beauty school students who have possible ties to an escort service and a drug ring - and keep turning up dead. The untimely disappearance of Goode's sister proves a worrisome distraction as he chases suspects and a dogged cub reporter chases him. In this intricately-layered plot, Rother's characters use substances or other people to try to fill the empty spaces within themselves, with addictions ranging from sex, alcohol, cocaine and cigarettes to Goode's own, caffeine and damaged women.

From the book: Goode's eyes followed the ivory feet up a pair of long legs to see it was not a mannequin, but the crumpled body of a raven-haired young woman, stunning even in death. Goode kneeled down to take a closer look. She was wearing a man's shirt, white with red pinstripes. And nothing else. Her lower abdomen was marked with purple blotches, as if two hands had grabbed her and squeezed. Her neck was bruised and patches of skin were ripped away, as if she'd been strangled. The red fingernails on one hand were ragged at the ends, like they'd been broken off during a struggle. The kid suddenly reached out to touch the girl's shirt, but Goode grabbed his wrist before he could make contact. 'Don't touch anything, ' Goode said. 'This is a crime scene now...'

From the author: While I was still a full-time working journalist, I can't tell you how much I dreamed of getting a book published. It became an obsession. I wrote and rewrote and resubmitted until it finally came true. And then after all that hard work, the book went out of print all too quickly. So you can imagine how excited I am to be able to share my baby with you once more, the very first book that I ever wrote, which encompasses many of the same themes in the true crime cases I have written about since: sex, addiction, mental illness, and murder. One day, with your encouragement and support, I may even finish the sequel.

Caitlin Rother has written for Cosmopolitan, the Los Angeles Times, the Daily News of Los Angeles, the Chicago Tribune, the Boston Globe, and the San Diego Union-Tribune, among other publications. She was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and now works full-time as a writer. Rother's books include Poisoned Love, a definitive account of the Kristin Rossum murder case, and Naked Addiction, a novel. She has won three honors in the Best of the West competition, which evaluates stories from major metropolitan newspapers throughout thirteen western states. She also received five honors for a story that followed the progress of all five organ recipients from a twelve-year-old donor, including the Associated Press News Executives Council's Best Feature award and the Los Angeles Press Club's Best News-Feature award. Rother is a resident of San Diego.