Libby Klein's Gimme Shelter: A Review by E. B. Davis

  

For Vader, my emotional support puppy. And Tony, my emotional support human.

I’d thank the cat but she’s really just in it for herself.

                                                                        Libby Klein, Gimme Shelter, Dedication

 

As the song says, you can’t always get what you want. Maybe that’s why, instead of fulfilling her youthful dream of being a rock star, Layla Virtue is living in a trailer park while playing third-rate gigs, including a stint at a seventies ABBA brunch. Given everything else she’s been through lately, she’s not complaining (much) about satin ruffles and go-go boots. She has a squad of supportive new BFFs, and she’s reclaimed a relationship with her famous rocker dad. His recent diagnosis has brought them even closer—sharing the trailer park’s lake house, which he’s had remodeled in typically over-the-top style.

Layla’s dad loves his new community and the feeling seems mutual. So, why is one of them blackmailing him? It’s a mystery almost as baffling as the assignment Layla receives from her former commissioner. Look into the brutal murder of a mild-mannered school teacher. Archie Wilkins was bludgeoned with a candelabra, shot up with drugs, and stuffed into a church confessional. Not the kind of outcome expected for a guy reputed to be the world’s nicest.

Perhaps Archie had secrets. Perhaps everyone does, including Layla’s one-time cop colleagues. She’s been blaming herself for a deadly ambush that destroyed her career and her peace of mind, but as her new friends help Layla regain her memories, a different picture emerges, and it’s one that forces her to question so much that she’s taken as truth . . .

Amazon.com

 

There’s something about Libby Klein’s humor that just hits my funny bone. I laughed through most of Gimme Shelter starting with the above dedication. I was happy to see that Libby had started a new series, although I was also dismayed that I missed the first book, Vice and Virtue, which was released April, 2025.

 

In this book, the backstory and plot intersect for character-driven mystery resolution and provides the impetuous for the next book’s plot. Because Libby has two other subplots, those are solved, but while the character-driven main plot comes to a head, the truth isn’t fully revealed.

 

Libby’s main character, Layla Virtue, is the daughter of a rock star, a former police detective, and she is an alcoholic—like her father. In Gimme Shelter, we get the backstory of how Layla was thrown off the force when her sting operation ended in disaster, an explosion that ended the lives of her team. Layla wasn’t killed because she was dead drunk in a bar during what was supposed to be the takedown of a drug syndicate. She’s down on herself big time—and yet—what she thinks happened may not be the truth. Her posse of gals she met at Alcoholics Anonymous prod her to find out the truth. In addition, her old police commissioner asks her to get information about the murder of an elementary school teacher who seemed to be everyone’s friend.

 

In her personal life, rock-star Dad has dementia and has moved from Malibu to the Northern Virginia trailer park that he bought for Layla. He fixes up the one real house on the property by bringing in his CA designer. She turns the house into a fairy tale/Hobbit house. His dementia is coming on fast, which is worrisome to Layla. But the other man in her life, an ex-marine fresh from three tours in Afghanistan suffers from PTSD. They are attracted, but the time is not right for fresh starts. Not until each of them can slay their demons. Hopefully, they will help each other’s conquests.  

 

Layla is a strong character, and the secondary characters display a variety of human pitfalls that beleaguer mankind from dementia, alcoholism, PTSD, drug abuse, criminality, and the frailty of human relationships. I hope this series takes off. Libby’s writing is superb.