In just Two weeks : Soul of a Sleuth!!!
eBook and paperback versions of Soul of a Sleuth
Rick Ludwig’s Maui Mysteries Series.
About the pictures:
Top picture: The only image of Keone from my books. .
Bottom Picture:Rick Ludwig’s Maui Mystery Series
You can pre-order the Soul of the Sleuth eBook from Amazon today! Click here!
You can order the earlier books in the series from Amazon today! Click here!
Who is Keone Boyd?
[On August 13, 2024, Babylon Books will launch the final book in my Maui Mysteries Trilogy, Soul of a Sleuth . The eBook version now available for pre-order.]
As we get closer to the launch of Soul of a Sleuth, I’d like to share with you my vision of my main protagonist, Keone Boyd. I have tried to do this before on this blog, but a lot has changed over the course of three novels. I will try to avoid major spoilers.
Detective Sergeant Keone (Seeker) Boyd, MPD, was born on the Boyd-Kalama Ranch near Makawao on the Hawaiian island of Maui in 1980. His mother and Grandmother, Tutu, taught him to speak Hawaiian from birth, as well as English. His first name, Keone, means Sand or Homeland and his middle name, Ka‘imi, means Seeker. Before we meet Keone in book one, Eyes of the Beholder, he has lived a full and productive life. Keone’s mother’s family is pure Hawaiian and lived on Ni‘ihau before Keone’s maternal grandfather moved to Maui to work on the Boyd family’s ranch. Keone’s fathers family is Hawaiian and Irish. Keone’s great-grandfather’s wife was Irish, but his grandfather, and father both married Hawaiian women. Keone’s dark skin reflects his predominantly Hawaiian genes. Although he qualified for Kamehameha schools, there were none on Maui until 1996, so he attended public schools. But his grandmother, an Ali‘i, made sure he was also educated in Hawaiian traditions. Both of his parents were killed in an accident when Keone was ten years old.
Keone worked on the ranch part-time through high school then moved to Irvine, California in 1998 to study criminology in the Department of Criminology, Law, and Society in the School of Social Ecology at UC Irvine. He graduated in 2002 and took a job with Santa Ana Police Department, his knowledge of the Spanish language, which he’d learned from Puerto Rican workers on the ranch and studied in high school and college, helped here. He transferred to LAPD in 2004, took a Masters in CLS online from Irvine, and rose to the rank of Detective in 2010. Keone is a man of great physical stature, six-foot, seven-inches tall and weighing in at two-hundred and seventy-five pounds. But none of it is fat. Keone works out constantly and represents an intimidating adversary to would-be criminals.
Shortly after his promotion he transferred to Maui PD. After rotating through various divisions in the department, he spent two years in CID partnered with Det. Sgt. Tony Alcala. At the end of 2012 he became Detective Sergeant when Tony became Detective Lieutenant. Despite early discomfort from others on the force, due to his advanced education, his street smarts from LA and his Hawaiian heritage, allowed him to fit in after a couple of years. Now in his mid-thirties, Keone spends most holidays with his family at the ranch in Makawao. This includes three brothers and one sister. He recently moved from a condo in Kāʻanapali to one in Ma’alaea after being stuck on the wrong side of the island a few times, due to fires on the Pali.
In the first book, Eyes of the Beholder, A wrong-way driver causes a devastating collision in paradise, destroying a brand new possession of Keone’s that reminds him of his father. Even Keone, born and raised on the spirit-filled island of Maui, is not prepared for the investigation that follows. The facts lead him to an abused wife, an oily drug distributor, an observatory on the top of a dormant volcano, and a man who claims he’s traveled to Maui through an invisible contact between universes. He knows following the facts in paradise can take you far from where you expect or want to go, but this one takes him where he’s never gone before. Frustrated, conflicted, and faced with deadly threats to himself and those he cares about, Keone uncovers events and theories that challenge his views of life, police work, and reality. In the process, Keone meets a woman who turns his priorities on their collective heads. He learns how perceptions can change and the importance of the eyes of the beholder.
In the second book, Voice of the Victim, Keone heads to the Mediterranean for a fairy-tale honeymoon with his new bride, while back on Maui, Keone’s boss, Lt. Tony Alcala is called to a horrific shooting in Maui’s peaceful ‘Iao Valley. Understaffed and overworked, Alcala, takes his best detective’s advice and puts Keone’s protégé and friend Sergeant Angela Beyers on the case. During her investigation, Angela discovers a file on the victim’s computer with clues to the shooting. But the file, clearly written by the victim, was saved while he was in a coma at Maui Memorial Hospital. So, who left the clues? And how? As Angela investigates, Keone boards a luxury cruise but is recruited by Europol to help investigate a serial killer methodically eliminating Olympic athletes. The killer claims to be a Greek god of death and plans to kill a Canadian Olympic medalist in each of the ship’s ports of call. Does the computer contain actual memories or a vivid fantasy? Is a mythical god sending athletes to Elysium or a deranged maniac murdering them? Are the investigations related or are the lines between reality and fantasy dissolving both on Maui and twelve time zones away? A good detective always listens to the voice of the victim.
In the upcoming third book, Soul of a Sleuth, now partners, Maui PD Detective Sergeants Keone Boyd and Angela Beyers investigate the brutal murder of a local drug pusher. The body is found across the street from Maui PD headquarters, with its tongue cut out and its lips sewn together. For Keone and Angela, the murder stirs echoes of their former cases. In the midst of the investigation, Keone is summoned by his elderly grandmother. In her visions, Pele, the most powerful of the Hawaiian gods, wakes from her slumber to confront an ancient evil that threatens their beautiful island home—an evil Keone has faced before, thousands of miles away, and failed to destroy. Can this be related to the murder? What are the visions trying to tell him? This time Keone has no choice. Either he ends this evil, or the evil ends him—and everyone he loves. Even unborn children in the womb are threatened. This lovely and vital island continuously reminds Keone that his soul is inextricably linked to the source of their very existence in the bubbling fires of Pele.
These books, set about ten years before the devastating fires that destroyed the lovely town of Lahaina, show Maui as it was—and as I pray it will be again. A vital place, filled with tropical beauty, friendly active people, and the spirit of the land, the ʻāina. The spirit of aloha.