G Is for Gumshoe was published by Henry Holt in 1990. On her thirty-third birthday, Kinsey learns that a hit man has been hired to kill her — a consequence of a previous case. While dealing with this existential threat, she takes a job finding the mother of a woman who was placed in foster care as a child. The search leads to the Mojave Desert and a network of connections spanning decades.
The novel introduces Robert Dietz, a private investigator and security specialist hired to protect Kinsey, who becomes one of the series’ few recurring romantic interests. The tension between Kinsey’s fierce independence and the enforced intimacy of having a bodyguard drives the personal subplot.
Robert Dietz
Dietz is the most significant romantic figure in the series — a man whose professional competence Kinsey can respect and whose own independence mirrors hers. Their relationship, which recurs across several subsequent novels, is handled with the unsentimental realism that characterises Grafton’s treatment of personal relationships: attraction, pragmatic companionship, eventual distance, without melodrama.
The Desert
The Mojave Desert sections — spare, hot, isolated — provide a geographical counterpoint to the coastal Santa Teresa setting. Grafton’s descriptive prose, usually focused on urban and suburban textures, adapts effectively to landscape writing.
Collecting G Is for Gumshoe
First edition (Henry Holt, New York, 1990): Boards with dust jacket.
Approximate market values:
- Fine in dust jacket: $40–$100
- Signed first edition: $80–$250
Projected values (2026–2036): Moderate appreciation.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Robert Dietz Kinsey’s love interest? Yes, the most sustained one in the series. Their relationship is complicated by both partners’ fierce independence and itinerant lifestyles.