True detective / Max Allan Collins.

What do Ronald Reagan, George Raft, Walter Winchell, and Al Capone have in common? They're all present in Collins's 1983 crime novel, which introduced his now famous detective, Nathan Heller. As would become the norm for this popular series, Heller winds up in the middle of a real-life historic event-this time he witnesses the fatal shooting of Chicago Mayor Anton Cermak, who was chatting with President Franklin D. Roosevelt at the time of his death. And while most people think assassin Giuseppe Zangara missed his real target, Heller has his own ideas. Narrator Dan John Miller handles the fast action and even faster patter with an authentic, 1930s tough-guy-with-a-heart-of-gold delivery. Although his renditions of Winchell and Roosevelt bear traces of their real-life speech patterns, Miller shies away from full-out impressions of the famous folk Heller bumps into during his quest for justice. Young "Dutch" Reagan, for example, sounds like any eager novice reporter. In this way, Miller keeps his focus-and that of the listener-on the star of the show, the hard-boiled but humane and irrepressible Heller.