MIDNIGHT CLIMAX

In Kageyama’s historical thriller, a Japanese American detective confronts government secrecy and the dangerous San Francisco underworld while investigating a murder.

This fast-paced sequel to Kageyama’s Hunters Point (2023) takes readers back to 1959 San Francisco, where private eye Katsuhiro “Kats” Takemoto is investigating the brutal killing of Mai Su Han, a Chinese American sex worker. It turns out that the murder is connected to a secret Cold War government program called Midnight Climax, in which CIA agents test psychedelic drugs, including LSD and mescaline, on unwitting subjects. During the tests, women entice male subjects into special safe houses, where agents film them behind one-way glass; the men are given drug-laced drinks, and the effects are carefully monitored and analyzed. This time, government agents mistakenly lured an extremely dangerous ex-soldier, Steven Epps, into their web—and his violent reaction left Mai and a CIA agent dead. Now, an unstable murderer is loose in the city: “He was already a trained killer,” says the key official in charge of the project. “The drugs made him stronger, faster and more unpredictable than anyone else would believe.” Soon, Kats finds out that Lin Tai Lo, the leader of the Hop Sing Tong and a powerful force in San Francisco’s criminal world, is also determined to find Epps. He’s related to the dead girl and believes that a rival Tong may be behind her murder. Kats, along with his amateur sleuth girlfriend Molly Hayes, his close friend Shigeyoshi “Shig” Murao, and soon-to-be-famous real-life author Ken Kesey, scour the city’s underworld of clubs, bars, and hideouts. This tightly written novel will appeal to those who enjoy tales of Cold War–era intrigue, San Francisco history, and 20th-century Asian American cultural life. Readers are quickly drawn into the story as the author successfully moves back and forth between the powerful forces determined to cover up the secret drug program and the intrepid but vulnerable team of investigators drawing closer to the truth. Kats, Molly, and Shig are all well developed and likable, and their interactions feel authentic and true to the story’s historical setting.

An exciting P.I. tale with intriguing thriller elements.