Cinnamon Girl

Lyft driver-turned-sleuth Adam Zantz returns in a neo-noir dive into the dark side of rock and roll dreams.

Adam Zantz is still driving Lyft for a living, struggling to make ends meet while training to get his PI license, but he’s falling behind in his studies. When his beloved former piano teacher confides that he has only months to live and calls in a favor—to look into a long-cold murder case and retroactively prove his son’s innocence—Adam is compelled to honor the dying man’s request. He soon stumbles on a test pressing of a never-released LP and uncovers the shadowy story of a high school garage band lost to the tides of the early ‘80s music scene in Los Angeles, aka the Paisley Underground. 

As Adam tracks down the former band members, one of them is slain before his eyes, taking with him the band’s dangerous secrets. Now Adam must act fast to catch the killer, tracing the band’s journey from the garage to the precipice of fame—a twisted tale marked by ambitious hucksters, crooked DJs, a wealthy patron with his own Hollywood aspirations, and the woman who held the key to the band’s triumph and ruin.    

Cinnamon Girl is a suspenseful, moving tale of musical camaraderie, hunger for stardom, greed, lust, betrayal, and the hidden price of teenage yearning.