Hangman’s Game by Bill Syken Thomas Donne/Minotaur Books, $25.99, 320 pages, ISBN 978-1-250-06715-9 Kids everywhere dream of playing professional sports and being on a championship team. I remember for example—back in the late ‘50s when we were all playing Little League baseball in the upstate New York hamlet of Grahamsville—that we had regular, and dead serious, discussions about whether we’d rather play for the Yankees or the Brooklyn Dodgers.
The Whites by Richard Price Henry Holt, $28.00, 333 pages, ISBN 978-0-8050-9399-5 In a well-run, perfectly organized society, no crime would go unsolved, no criminal would go unpunished and no victim would go without redress. Perhaps, if indeed such an exemplary place existed, there wouldn’t be any crime or criminals. . . . But of course we don’t live in anything close to a utopian ideal. Our world is,
The Stolen Ones by Owen Laukkanen Putnam/Penguin, $26.95, 358 pages, ISBN 978-0-399-16553-5 It’s a helluva thing to take on a subject like the one we are about to . . . this being the Christmas season; a time when many of us are thinking about Peace on earth and goodwill to men . . . but the plain truth of the matter is that crime never sleeps and criminals
Palace of Treason by Jason Matthews Scribner/Simon & Shuster, $26.99, 468 pages, ISBN 978-1-4767-9374-0 Is there any doubt amongst well-informed people, that the tectonic plates of government spheres of influence are being shifted these days in ways we couldn’t even imagine as little as twenty-five years ago? Would you have thought for example, back in 1990 when the Soviet Union was collapsing and the U.S. led coalition was busy
Dragonfish by Vu Tran W.W. Norton & Company, $26.95, 296 pages, ISBN 978-0-393-07780-3 Noir fiction “Emphasizes the human urge toward self-destruction,” and “Focuses on the villain,” according to crime fiction writers James Ellroy and Otto Penzler. Its about the down-and-outers, the losers, the hopeless, unforgiven and abandoned among us who often spend their entire literary lives trapped in self-imposed prisons of the mind. These characters—who attract and repel the
New Yorked by Rob Hart Polis Books, PB, $14.95, 291 pages, ISBN 978-1-940610-40-5 Welcome! This is the Mysterious Book Report, a weekly column where we talk about, analyze and feature books and authors dealing with Mysteries, Crime Fiction and an occasional Sci-Fi or Supernatural Thriller. We’re going to discuss the latest in Spy Novels, dysfunctional, but brilliant detectives and all sorts of private eyes, shady lawyers, amateur sleuths and
The Crossing by Michael Connelly Little, Brown and Company/Hachette Book Group, $28.00, 388 pages, ISBN 978-0-316-22588-5 It’s no secret that Michael Connelly is widely considered to be one of the finest crime writers working in America today. With twenty-seven novels and sixty million copies sold worldwide he could arguably be called one of the top ten best-ever mystery and thriller authors in the world because, as my friend Dwight—a
Goodhouse by Peyton Marshall Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $26.00, 320 pages, ISBN 978-0-374-16562-8 This week is Halloween and the last of our first-ever Freak-Fest, celebrating novels with creepy characters, angels, demons, or things that creak, sneak and chomp in the dark of the night. Send us your thoughts—social media, snail mail or eee mail—let us know if you liked it or not and why . . . maybe we’ll
The Devil’s Detective by Simon Kurt Unsworth Doubleday/Random House, $25.95, 358 pages, ISBN 978-0-091956-51-6 We’re continuing with our Freak-Fest of weird reads in observance of Halloween, and you’d better brace yourself . . . because this one’s gonna be a wild ride. So far this month, we’ve covered fallen angels and a shattered New York City where the survivors zonk out, choosing to escape reality in an alternate World
Near Enemy by Adam Sternbergh Crown Publishing/Penguin Random House, $24.00, 306 pages, ISBN 978-0-385-34902-4 Hey! Remember Spademan? He’s the shady character who has boxcutter, will travel and take out your enemies . . . as long as you can pay his fees. He’s the anti-hero operating in a decimated New York City where a radioactive bomb has been set off by terrorists in Times Square. Half the city scattered