Izzy Izzard, a seventeen and a half-year-old (just ask her) refugee from Arundel Asylum, looks for her brother, Dougal, the private detective that was supposed to take care of her upon her escape from the institution where she had been committed for little more than the ability to read people’s minds since the age of fifteen. Her other brother, Elliot, is dead but still lives in her imagination. Her parents are also dead but not particularly missed…and now, Dougal is also dead. But why? And by who’s hand?

Thus begins Izzy’s inquiry into Dougal’s death. Aided by an oddball cast of characters, all of which have personal agendas, alcohol, and her blue and yellow pills; hounded by an equally odd assortment of adversaries with a variety of underhanded interests, one of which probably killed Dougal (but which one?) she seeks the killer against a backdrop of military martial law and the dystopian social conditions permeating Albion Minor.

Loads of Trouble is a well-written, engaging tale of competing interests in a small dystopian community where everyone knows everyone else and strangers are not particularly welcome. The characters are interesting, well-developed, and all are nutty in different ways. I found the story interesting, and the disparate interests of the antagonists, any of which could have been Dougal’s killer, kept the story moving from possibility to possibility…colorful characters acting on a gray monotone stage of social collapse and corrupt military control.

Izzy’s Loads of Trouble should be a welcome, entertaining read for anyone who likes kinky mysteries, or suspenseful action. ( )