The Detective Guide Book (Alfred John Peebles)

The Detective Guide Book
Albert John Peebles
Amazon Digital Services
Nonfiction, Crime
* (Terrible)

DESCRIPTION: With more people, a worsening economy, and law enforcement agencies facing greater cutbacks, crime is on the rise, and the demand for private investigators is higher than ever. Learn how to investigate crimes with this quick-reference guide.
A Kindle-exclusive title.

REVIEW: I don't often resort to direct quotations from the books I read, but in this case I feel I must make an exception. First off, I downloaded this on the mistaken presumption that Peebles was some sort of private detective or law enforcement official. He isn't. So, how did he come up with this manual? His wife suggested he write it. To quote Peebles (and, yes, this is verbatim as it appears): "Well I watched hundreds of crime shows on the tube for months on end. Sometimes we watched movies and crime stories from morning to night. ... What I did was write notes and summaries statements. This went on for a while, because not only was I gaining information, but also I taught myself the field of detective work from the TV!" Now, I'm hardly the sharpest knife in the drawer, but even I know that crime dramas and "true life" crime television are at best skewed portrayals of the reality of criminal investigations. Claiming the authority to write a detective guide after watching TV is like applying for a job as a surgeon after an ER marathon.
As questionable as his research methods are, however, I can respect Peebles's intentions, offering people the tools they need to survive in an increasingly crime-ridden world, where even our police officers seem incapable of solving anything. He goes on to assert: "Most of our law enforcement people can become like our comic book super heroes if given the right tools, and that is what I want to do with this crime fighters Manuel." Who is this Manuel, who can solve any crime better than trained investigators? He must be a super hero, indeed! Maybe, someday, he can take a break from his crime-fighting schedule to visit Peebles and teach him basic English spelling and grammar, as the author tells would-be private eyes to watch for "plands of murder" and "people with bad boundary sysems; not respected of privacy or personal body space." Sound advice, I'm sure. In addition, "When you follow leads, and lead the evidence, take you places somewhere along the way a pattern will emerge." Yes, that was written exactly as it appeared in The Detective Guide Book - and, yes, typing it made my inner editor cry. Of course, my inner editor was already curled up in a fetal position after reading endless chapters and repetitive, all-caps lists stuffed to the gills with references to "preceived sociopaths" and "extreme skitzophrenics," admonishing investigators to "what closely for lies."
Now, understand that, in addition to watching hundreds - hundreds! - of hours of TV, Peebles states that he also attended college: "I have taken courses at college in assertiveness training, studied doctorate level psychology, and have taken a number of courses." Either English wasn't one of them, or he took the advice of those eBook publishing manuals that advocate outsourcing the actual writing portion of producing an eBook - to someone in a non-English-speaking country, I suspect. There is a third possibility, one that Peebles himself offers in what may be a "Fruedian" slip: "Guilty parties often act and talk in strange ways."
With luck, someone in the law enforcement community will read The Detective Guide Book and turn up on Peebles's doorstep. If nothing else, he's guilty of felony-level crimes against the English language.

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