The year is 1978. British native Charles Bateman is living in New York City when he is approached on the street by a vagrant woman who asks him for fifty dollars. When he doesn’t respond right away, she brandishes a gun. A struggle ensues. He falls and hits his head on the pavement. A shot is fired, and the woman lies dead on the ground. Charles doesn’t recall all that happened that evening, but a brief police investigation into the incident determined Charles to be nothing more than a victim and witness. Soon afterward, Charles returns to his English homeland.

In 1996, Charles returns to New York after accepting a one-semester lectureship at NYU, but more importantly to try to deal with the demons the mugging-gone-wrong incident has inflicted upon him over the years. In the process, his life becomes entangled with an array of curious characters—a sexy real estate agent, a college student who sings in clubs and cleans peoples’ houses for needed income, an enticing woman he meets in a bar, and a string of good and not-so-good law enforcement officers. Author A.I. Fabler skillfully intertwines into the narrative details of both time periods—the 1978 mugging and when Charles returns to the scene of the crime eighteen years later. As the story unfolds, Charles tries very hard to remember exact circumstances surrounding the incident but can’t always rely on his memory to realize the truth. Complicating the situation, antagonists in the story go to great lengths to stop him from remembering anything more than what was in the original police report.

A SONG FOR LEONARD has enough drama, tension, and conflict to keep readers engaged. The plot is deepened with a few subplots that further complicate the story and reveal interesting personality traits for some of the characters. Fabler does an exemplary job creating a variety of compelling backdrops that anchor each scene and establish distinct and memorable settings that contribute to the mood and tone of the moment. To tell the story, and to some extent solve the mystery, the author delves deeply into the psyche of the dead woman and the college student by focusing on the emotion and authenticity of their songwriting talents which reveal their vulnerabilities through the lyrics of their songs and demonstrate what power words can have. Accomplishing characterization in this manner—reflecting the raw emotion of the human soul through the song lyrics they write—is a clever and effective way to show what matters in life to the characters, the emotions they most prominently feel, and personality traits that may be otherwise difficult to convey. Whereas the plot guides the external conflicts, this deep characterization provides insight as to how the characters deal with the conflicts.

A.I. Fabler’s A SONG FOR LEONARD is a well-written, intriguing mystery with a unique plot, deep characterization and descriptive settings that contribute to its appeal.

~Florence Osmund for IndieReader