Killing The Buddha

Ian MacDermott, an ex-military policeman turned private detective, searches for his brother’s murderers and seven golden Vietnamese Buddhas during the 1968 Democratic Convention and anti-war demonstrations in Chicago.

It's August, 1968 and the Students for a Democratic Society and thousands of anti-war protesters are converging on Chicago for the Democratic National convention. Sean McDermott, a Northwestern University seminarian, is tossed off the chapel tower by two Viet Nam mercenaries nick-named Heckle and Jeckle. The mercenaries were convinced Sean knew the whereabouts of seven golden Buddhas originally stolen from the Thien Mu Pagoda in Viet Nam during the Battle of Hue. Ian McDermott, Sean’s brother and an ex-military policeman from cold-war Berlin, takes the case. After burying his brother, Ian tracks his killers and tries to decipher how his brother came into possession of the golden Buddhas. Along the way, he encounters Mary Dunbar, Sean's girlfriend and anti-war leader, Fellini, a southern California surfer-filmmaker, and Reggie Koslowski, a rock’n’roll guitarist and old army buddie. This motley crew race Mary Dunbar's father, a notorious antiquities collector, and Heckle and Jeckle to find the golden Buddhas.

Douglas Jenmac was born in Dearborn, Michigan just a few miles from Ian MacDermott’s private detective agency in Detroit. He grew up on a diet of James Cain, Dashiel Hammett, Raymond Chandler and, later, Elmore Leonard, another native of the Detroit area. Doug has published several literary short stories and “Four” was purchased by T. E. D. Klein for Twilight Zone Magazine and optioned for an HBO short. He is also a member of Aeon Drive, a gothic electronic band and has been an active songwriter and member of ASCAP since 2000. Doug’s “fifteen minutes” of rock’n’roll fame came when his band “Daybreak” opened for Bob Seger at Cobo Hall in Detroit in 1968. He hasn’t gotten over it yet. Doug lives in Hercules, California with his wife, Julie (the German angel of Aeon Drive), and two cats, one blue-blood (Scarlett) and one alley cat (Wendel).