Review – The Lost Sheep

The Lost Sheep by Brandt Dodson is the fourth book in his Colton Parker Mystery Series and the first Brandt Dodson book I’ve had the pleasure of reading. The book starts fast and builds speed along the way as private detective Colton Parker searches for his fifteen-year-old runaway daughter Callie. Though Callie leaves Parker a message not to look for her, Parker sees it as a plea to chase after her and he won’t rest until he brings her home.

Fearing that his daughter has become involved with prostitution, Parker follows his leads, journeys to Las Vegas and straight into the smarmy underworld of prostitution and the occult. Following clue after clue and with the help of a former brothel owner Marty and his girlfriend, FBI agent Mary Christopher, Parker takes the reader on a realistic journey through the side of Las Vegas that we seldom see or want to acknowledge.

Colton Parker, an ex cop with a hard-edged view of life, on the surface fits all the old stereotypes of a gumshoe. Unlike these stereotypes, Dodson gives Parker added dimension bringing out his struggle between doing the right and often legal thing or bringing his daughter home. As a reader, we can identify with this struggle, with his love for his daughter and we cheer for Parker even when he makes a bad choice.

But Dodson doesn’t stop here. He powerfully weaves a spiritual thread through the Las Vegas scenes, showing Parker how God never leaves The Lost Sheep. Though Vegas is an incredibly odd place to find such a thread, the setting makes the message so real, so practical to every person living, that Dodson successfully brings the message of salvation to everyone.

As I said, this is my first Brandt Dodson novel. Don’t know how I missed them in the past. I certainly won’t in the future. My only regret is that I didn’t start with the first novel in the series and work my way through them in chronological order. But even this won’t stop me from going back and enjoying the others. I hope we see many more Colton Parker novels in the future.