Follow The Washington Trail: New Cloak and Dagger Mystery Lampoons DC Corruption
The Washington Trail: A Slade and Cork Mystery
Written by Lou Aguilar
(Aethon Books, 304 pages, $21.99)
Regular readers of Lou Aguilar’s weekly column for The American Spectator are familiar with the author’s signature passions. Above all, he is a patriot who supports Judeo-Christian values and eschews anything that even hints at woke-ism. For Aguilar, DC’s football team will always be the Washington Redskins not the Washington Commanders because he knows that Native Americans never took umbrage at the team’s original name but they were very offended by the left’s attempts to erase any linkage between the football team and the Indian warrior culture. Aguilar, a screenplay writer, also waxes eloquently about Hollywood, especially the Hollywood of days gone by before the progressive left spray painted it with political correctness transforming the once glamorous industry into what he has labeled Hollywoke.The author also uses his column to lament the disappearance of traditionally beautiful and intelligent women from the big and the small screen in favor of unattractive and at times mean spirited she-devils. In Aguilar’s world, the ideal woman is endowed with the intellectual acumen of an astrophysicist and the physical assets of Raquel Welch circa One Million Years B.C. (1966).
Such is the essence of Lou Aguilar. He is unabashedly blunt and politically incorrect. Yet behind his seemingly cynical veneer beats the heart of an optimist who embraces the transformative power of the chance encounter. He believes that the world is inhabited by contemporary incarnations of Fitzgerald’s Daisy Buchanan offering “a promise that she had done gay, exciting things just a while since and that there were gay, exciting things hovering in the next hour.” It is this embrace of serendipity coupled with film noir type intrigue that populates the pages of Aguilar’s latest novel, The Washington Trail: A Slade and Cork Mystery Thriller.
Set in present day Washington, DC a few months in advance of the 2024 presidential election, The Washington Trail is peppered with indirect references to former U.S. president and 2024 presidential candidate Donald Trump and current U.S. president Joe Biden. The novel was clearly written before Biden exited the race and Vice President Kamala Harris became the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate. The story opens with a beautiful woman named Amy contacting private investigators Mark Slade and Neil Cork to investigate why her boyfriend Greg, an aide to a conservative senator, abruptly ended their relationship. Although Slade and Cork think the case is nothing more than a romantic ghosting, they agree to take it on anyway. Slade, an Afghanistan veteran, and Cork, a former FBI analyst, are quickly thrown into a situation involving multiple murders, government corruption, a plot to subvert the election process, and a search for a mysterious expensive painting. While the book is a work of fiction, Aguilar’s distinctive voice and antiprogressive posture are ever present.
The Washington Trail is very fast paced, the archetypical potboiler. The novel also satirizes contemporary progressive ideology, especially radical environmentalism. Aguilar writes like a cinematographer with such a level of visual detail that one imagines he storyboarded the novel while composing it. He also has an ear for memorable dialogue. If I were to offer any criticism, it is that the characters themselves are not particularly well developed. I found myself having difficulty differentiating between Slade and Cork. That being said, the story was incredibly engrossing. I happen to be a voracious reader and I finished the 300 page book in about three days, which is faster than usual for me.
I also believe that The Washington Trail has the potential to become a film or limited series. And while Aguilar has stated that he would love to have his novel adapted for film, he has concerns about casting. The two protagonists are in their thirties and the author worries that it would be difficult to find actors of that age range who would be willing to appear in an inherently conservative production.
If you appreciate Lou Aguilar’s column, Washington, DC intrigue, and film noir mystery, you will also enjoy The Washington Trail. It is a true page turner.
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