Focusing the Private Eye

Finding Dad: A Mysterious Term Paper is the Fourth Balona Book by Jonathan Pearce Community college criminal justice freshman Joseph Oliver Kuhl organizes fellow students and relatives to bring to justice Balona’s "Starfighter," the mysterious individual who has been systematically burning down the town’s central business district. The book is presented as Joe’s Criminal Justice term paper, but without footnotes as Joe has come to realize that typing footnotes is a drag. (The action takes place prior to Joe’s learning MS Word, a computer program that college students have found compiles footnotes with ease out of material you needn’t even have read.) Joe’s detecting efforts are triumphant, but because of the surprising involvement of a family member, Joe is unable to reveal the culprit and accept appropriate credit for solving the crimes. Joe finally acquires his own car and names it "The Yellow Peril" at the suggestion of fellow student Amelia Earhart Wong. Joe has been ordered by his mother to marry heiress Claire Preene, but Joe’s passionate admirer Patella Sackworth may yet have something to say about that.