Daniel Babka

Meet Dylan Blake, a tough police detective who minds his own business and is currently enjoying a well-deserved camping vacation after solving a particularly difficult crime. He enjoys the freedom of the outdoors, but as he is preparing to return to his northern California home, he receives a request from his police chief asking that he take a look at a nearby crime scene before returning home.

What follows is a non-stop, action-packed adventure as Blake overcomes several attempts on his – and his loved ones – lives and becomes deeply entwined in investigating two murders, a litany of sexual assaults, lies, charges, counter-charges and outright hatred. Blake takes the investigation in stride while fighting for answers from northern California, to Salt Lake City to a small town on the Georgia/North Carolina/Tennessee border.

In the first volume of this California-based mystery series, middle-aged rookie cop Dylan Blake gets pulled into a murder case that recalls his own painful past. . .First-time novelist Babka weaves a multilayered tale that has shades of California noir à la Chinatown. Blake’s desire for connection as well as escape through nature is affectingly portrayed, and his interactions with the damaged Allison are particularly touching. . .There’s rich material to mine in this strong start to a new series. Accomplished, ambitious crime fiction launching a sensitive, complex hero and a promising array of supporting characters. — Kirkus Reviews

No More Illusions “…is a murder mystery in the style of Elmore Leonard, complete with puffed-up, larger than life characters, a full cast of beautiful women, and a hard-boiled detective, Dylan Blake, at the center of it all...Babka is clearly a talented writer, and he's given us a compelling, well paced story, with some excellent characters -- some we root for, and others we're happy to see in a body bag. A fun story, perfect for a day at the beach, or a long rainy weekend at home. Watch out for the next iteration in the Detective Dylan Blake series.” — San Francisco Book Review

Lonon Smith, Author, Wise Men

In Dylan Blake, the health conscious cop of “No More Illusions,” Daniel Babka has created a protagonist caught in the duality of our time. Blake — a small town northern California cop — keeps his gun in a bread box, munches on raw almonds, and listens to NPR like a good liberal, but his anger at old injustices and a new rich-makes-right social order is as fundamental as a black eye.

Checking on a businessman’s suspicious suicide off the cliffs of Big Sur, Blake barely escapes an attempt on his own life. It won’t be the only time Blake is nearly killed to stop his dogged pursuit. At its heart is Kathryn Winslow, the outwardly devout business partner of the murder victim. Winslow is a worthy opponent to Blake, more than willing to use Blake’s attraction to her to stop Blake from peeling back the layers of duplicity that surround not only Winslow but her treacherous ex-husband and her billionaire brother James Kilmer. The husband is one version of corruption and hypocrisy, a man so self-indulgent that he can’t care if the daughter he molested becomes a whore. The brother is his flip side, a religious Puritan who thinks his superior position makes his judgment of others absolute while providing an excuse for his own greed, manipulation and lust for power.

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for mature audiences Purchase at Amazon and read more reviews!	Dylan Blake has had some losses in his life — a brother who committed suicide, a father killed by a drunk driver, a marriage that didn’t work. The scars have stayed with him. A rookie cop at age 40, promoted to Detective lst Grade after 18 months, Blake finds his vacation interrupted when the Chief of Police calls and asks him to take a look at an accident scene along the Pacific Coast Highway near Big Sur. Blake’s discovery pulls him back to his own painful memories and sets a chain of events in motion that unearth a family’s secrets about murder and the way morality can be made to bend. “The story deals with themes of family, morality, love, loss, marriage, and murder. It’s an ambitious book in that regard, while still established in the mystery genre. Blake’s girlfriend, Julianna, a former high stakes baccarat dealer turned second-grade teacher, is a twice-divorced woman with two young daughters. Their romance and the sexual tension between different characters weaves in and out of the narrative." — Daniel Babka Quotations from the book: "They have different fingerprints, a house on the hill, a yacht in the harbor, housekeepers to clean up after them, and when they’re threatened and they have enough money, they’ll use other people to push back. Remember that Blake.” — Chief Cooper “Just be who you are, not what you think I want. One of the things I like most about you Dylan, is that you tell me how you feel without filtering it. That’s everything to me.” — Julianna “Don’t spend too much time philosophizing about good and evil, leave that to the comic book heroes.” — Jameson, Captain of Detectives

Reviews: As the author, I’d prefer you just jump into these stories with no preconceived ideas about what to expect — more discovery, more surprise. But most of us lead busy lives. We have to make decisions about how to spend our time. We need some clues. Sometimes we get spoilers too. So maybe cut it short with some of these reviews, but if you’re sitting on the fence . . . read on . . .
5 Stars NO MORE ILLUSIONS…A MYSTERY - BY DANIEL BABKA Meet Dylan Blake, a tough police detective who minds his own business and is currently enjoying a well-deserved camping vacation after solving a particularly difficult crime. He enjoys the freedom of the outdoors, but as he is preparing to return to his northern California home, he receives a request from his police chief asking that he take a look at a nearby crime scene before returning home. What follows is a non-stop, action-packed adventure as Blake overcomes several attempts on his – and his loved ones – lives and becomes deeply entwined in investigating two murders, a litany of sexual assaults, lies, charges, counter-charges and outright hatred. Blake takes the investigation in stride while fighting for answers from northern California, to Salt Lake City to a small town on the Georgia/North Carolina/Tennessee border. See more *Kirkus Reviews* In the first volume of this California-based mystery series, middle-aged rookie cop Dylan Blake gets pulled into a murder case that recalls his own painful past. . .First-time novelist Babka weaves a multilayered tale that has shades of California noir à la Chinatown. Blake’s desire for connection as well as escape through nature is affectingly portrayed, and his interactions with the damaged Allison are particularly touching. . .There’s rich material to mine in this strong start to a new series. Accomplished, ambitious crime fiction launching a sensitive, complex hero and a promising array of supporting characters. — Kirkus Reviews See more of the full review No More Illusions “…is a murder mystery in the style of Elmore Leonard, complete with puffed-up, larger than life characters, a full cast of beautiful women, and a hard-boiled detective, Dylan Blake, at the center of it all...Babka is clearly a talented writer, and he's given us a compelling, well paced story, with some excellent characters -- some we root for, and others we're happy to see in a body bag. A fun story, perfect for a day at the beach, or a long rainy weekend at home. Watch out for the next iteration in the Detective Dylan Blake series.” — San Francisco Book Review Lonon Smith, Author, Wise Men In Dylan Blake, the health conscious cop of “No More Illusions,” Daniel Babka has created a protagonist caught in the duality of our time. Blake — a small town northern California cop — keeps his gun in a bread box, munches on raw almonds, and listens to NPR like a good liberal, but his anger at old injustices and a new rich-makes-right social order is as fundamental as a black eye. Checking on a businessman’s suspicious suicide off the cliffs of Big Sur, Blake barely escapes an attempt on his own life. It won’t be the only time Blake is nearly killed to stop his dogged pursuit. At its heart is Kathryn Winslow, the outwardly devout business partner of the murder victim. Winslow is a worthy opponent to Blake, more than willing to use Blake’s attraction to her to stop Blake from peeling back the layers of duplicity that surround not only Winslow but her treacherous ex-husband and her billionaire brother James Kilmer. The husband is one version of corruption and hypocrisy, a man so self-indulgent that he can’t care if the daughter he molested becomes a whore. The brother is his flip side, a religious Puritan who thinks his superior position makes his judgment of others absolute while providing an excuse for his own greed, manipulation and lust for power. See more
© Daniel Babka
The cast of suspects include an over-sexed divorcee named Kathryn "Kate" Winslow, who, in addition to holding clues that may solve the murders, is constantly making passes at Blake; her alcoholic, shady ex-husband, Phillip – an investment counselor who could be involved in shady dealings; her multi-millionaire self-righteous and controlling brother, James Kilmer, and her oldest daughter, Allison, who ran away from home after dropping out of college, and now works as a hooker and blames her parents for the way her life turned out. Along the way, Blake shows his toughness getting information through legal and illegal gains as well as his kind-hearted side - in one case teaching a young boy named Freddie Roosevelt why it’s wrong to steal pencils and paper from a local convenience store, making Freddie apologize and giving him a job washing his Audi turbo and walking his dog, Watson. Blake befriends people throughout the novel – showing kindness and respect all the while keeping his own family’s cold, hard secret below the surface. Author Daniel Babka’s characters are real, gritty and in one particular case, farcical. For example, his portrayal of Tony Moriano, an ex-mobster with a shady background but a heart of gold, is so over-the-top, it almost makes him believable. Moriano and his son, Tony Jr., know how to intimidate and get the answers Blake can’t – and often do, but they use their former background and a bit of a comic touch – like seeking jelly donuts or steak dinners as fees for doing jobs Blake requests. Babka gives them some flavor, but is careful not to be too outrageous. The novel is split into mostly short chapters and each chapter is divided into separate sub-chapters, marking easy breaking points to stop reading when necessary and still stay interested in the novel, however; is difficult to put down because readers want to know what will happen next to Blake and learn more about him and his life. NO MORE ILLUSIONS is a well-written, action-packed police mystery with a likeable and believable lead character and a cast of shadowy characters living in a world of wealth and privilege with deep, dark secrets. But those secrets may one day rip apart their lives and the lives of those around them. *Reviewed by Jack H. Durschlag for* *IndieReader.com*

Both men will be happy to see Blake crushed like an annoying bug. Babka uses Blake’s investigation to introduce us to Blake’s life: the schoolteacher girlfriend Julianna with as many buried demons as Blake; Freddie Roosevelt, the would-be delinquent boy he befriends; Tony, the aging mafioso with a yearning for a good fight; Cooper, the small town police chief; even a shaggy mutt of a dog appropriately named Watson. If there is a flaw in this introduction to Dylan Blake, it’s that Babka references a previous case too often, leaving us wondering if we should have read that novel first. It’s a minor complaint that holds the promise that Babka has more planned for Dylan Blake and his interesting band of sidemen.” — Lonon Smith, Author, Wise Men