Solomon City runs on secrets, and Jake Bishop has made a profession out of finding the ones people would rather keep buried. Justice, Or Something Like It, the second installment in Doc Blalock’s The Jake Bishop Files, drops its private investigator into a murder that appears almost insultingly simple: an old drunk is discovered with a corpse and the weapon that killed him. The problem is that Bishop knows appearances rarely tell the whole story. What begins as a suspiciously convenient arrest opens into blackmail, organized crime, divided loyalties, and the uncomfortable question at the heart of noir fiction—how far can a man bend his own rules before justice becomes something else entirely?
A private eye with a badge, a bottle, and a little bit of magic…
Justice, Or Something Like It
The Jake Bishop Files Book 2
by Doc Blalock
Noir Paranormal Sleuth Suspense
In Solomon City, everybody keeps secrets. Secrets are Jake Bishop’s job.
When a harmless old drunk is caught standing over a corpse, murder weapon in hand, the case looks open and shut—but he won’t say why he pulled the trigger. Just that it had to be done.
Bishop knows better. Digging deeper, he uncovers a blackmail scheme, a shadow war in the Irish underworld, and a threat aimed at the one person his old friend has left to lose—forcing Bishop to bend the law, and his own conscience, to see something like justice done.
The intriguing tension in Justice, Or Something Like It comes from placing a classic private-eye problem inside a world where the supernatural belongs alongside guns, blackmail, and organized crime. The central mystery is not simply who committed the killing—Bishop begins with a suspect standing over the body—but why it happened and what that apparent certainty is hiding. That reversal lets Blalock concentrate on secrets, motive, loyalty, and the moral compromises behind Bishop’s search for answers.
As the investigation reaches into Solomon City’s Irish underworld, the question shifts from whether Bishop can solve the case to what he is prepared to do once he understands it.
“Secrets. Everyone has them. Some folks keep them for good and noble reasons, others, not so much. All kinds of secrets. Personal, professional, valuable, harmful or embarrassing. People will go to extremes to keep them safe. Some folks have been willing to die for them. Some will kill to protect them. I’m Jake Bishop, private investigator. Secrets are my job.”
Justice, Or Something Like It is aimed squarely at readers who like their paranormal elements served with hard-boiled detective fiction rather than sweeping fantasy. Bishop’s world mixes private investigation, criminal organizations, morally complicated choices, and supernatural abilities, making the series particularly suited to readers who enjoy noir atmosphere with an urban-fantasy edge. Those who prefer mysteries in which uncovering the motive creates a harder ethical problem than identifying the culprit should find Bishop’s latest case especially appealing.
A Damned Dirty Thing
The Jake Bishop Files Book 1
The explosion should have killed him . . .
Jake Bishop is back on the streets of Solomon City, ten months after a mob bombing destroyed his office and murdered his partner and secretary. But Bishop isn’t just any private detective—he’s a “ditch wizard” able to step through shadow and bend reality to his will.
When the beautiful and mysterious Portia Vance answers his ad for a new secretary, Bishop thinks his luck might finally be changing. Together, they begin hunting Vito Morelli, the mob boss who ordered the hit that nearly ended Bishop’s life.
Their investigation leads them through the city’s darkest corners—from strip clubs to shadow banking operations, from corrupt cops to magical wards. But in a world where bullets and spells are equally deadly, and where everyone has secrets worth killing for, Bishop discovers that the line between hunter and hunted is thinner than he thought.
Some cases require a gun. Others need magic. This one demands both.
In the shadows of Solomon City, justice comes with a price—and revenge wears a beautiful face.
A gritty noir fantasy that proves sometimes the most dangerous magic is the human heart.
Christopher “Doc” Blalock is a US Navy veteran Corpsman and retired counselor. He is a prolific fine artist, illustrator, musician, sculptor and writer, cursed with the itch to create. He draws inspiration from sources ranging from JRR Tolkien to Tom Clancy. He additionally draws from his love of classic black-and-white noir films, infusing their moody aesthetic and storytelling into his writing. A helpless coffee addict, he lives in the Atlanta suburbs with his childhood sweetheart and a dog of dubious moral character.
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Justice, Or Something Like It
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A Damned Dirty Thing
Amazon
Edgeweaver Books
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Enter the Justice, Or Something Like It Giveaway
Jake Bishop occupies the kind of territory where a clean solution would almost feel dishonest. Justice, Or Something Like It begins with a crime that appears solved and then uses everything hidden beneath it to complicate what “solved” should actually mean. Blalock’s combination of noir investigation and paranormal ability gives Bishop unusual tools, but none of them eliminate the harder problem of deciding what justice demands when law, loyalty, and conscience point in different directions. That moral friction, set against the secrets and shadows of Solomon City, gives this second Jake Bishop case its strongest hook.
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