Dead Whales Tell No Tales

Book excerpt: In Dead Whales Tell No Tales, mystery novelist Ron Lovell returns to the locale of his first novel, Murder at Yaquina Head--the rugged Oregon Coast. It is 1987 and college professor Thomas Martindale is teaching a summer writing seminar at the university's marine center. A marine biologist dies under bizarre circumstances and his assistant, Tom's former lover, is arrested for his murder. The death occurs while a conference of the International Whaling Commission is going on at the center. In Martindale's mind, there are more likely suspects than his friend: the Japanese fisheries minister, an Eskimo whaling commissioner, and several radical environmentalists. Tom's investigation uncovers the murdered man's involvement in a drowning at sea of a graduate assistant and his collaboration with the Japanese to alter whale population statistics. It also puts him in danger from unknown pursuers who keep following him in his car. At the same time, a large Gray whale has beached herself near his house, adding a unique aura to the events on land.