Did you miss John Sandford’s appearance at The Poisoned Pen when he was here with his twenty-ninth Lucas Davenport book, Neon Prey? You can still pick up a signed copy through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2XKpm7l

Here’s the description of Neon Prey.

Lucas Davenport tracks a prolific serial killer in the newest nail-biter by #1New York Times-bestselling author John Sandford.

Clayton Deese looks like a small-time criminal, muscle for hire when his loan shark boss needs to teach someone a lesson. Now, seven months after a job that went south and landed him in jail, Deese has skipped out on bail, and the U.S. Marshals come looking for him. They don’t much care about a low-level guy–it’s his boss they want–but Deese might be their best chance to bring down the whole operation.

Then, they step onto a dirt trail behind Deese’s rural Louisiana cabin and find a jungle full of graves.

Now Lucas Davenport is on the trail of a serial killer who has been operating for years without notice. His quarry is ruthless, and–as Davenport will come to find–full of surprises . . .

*****

Even better, here’s the link to John Sandford’s conversation with Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen.

If you are a fan of Kerry Greenwood’s mysteries featuring Phryne Fisher, or the TV shows, Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, you might want to watch for the spin-off series, Ms. Fisher’s Modern Murder Mysteries. The new series debuts on Acorn TV on Monday, April 29. In the meantime, you can always order copies of the books through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2JfL7W5

Here’s Acorn TV’s description of the new series.

When the famous aunt she never knew, Phryne Fisher, goes missing over the highlands of New Guinea, the gorgeously reckless Peregrine Fisher (Geraldine Hakewill, Wanted) inherits a windfall. Peregrine sets out to become a world-class private detective in her own right, aided by the handsome, straitlaced Detective James Steed (Joel Jackson) and with the unerring guidance of The Adventuresses’ Club, a group of exceptional women of which her celebrated aunt was a member. A natural rule breaker, Peregrine is fearless, fun, and charmingly down-to-earth, as well as having a keen instinct for solving crimes. With newfound wealth and The Adventuresses to hone her rough edges and become the family she’s never had, Peregrine is unstoppable.

You can check out the trailer.

Don’t you love it when The Poisoned Pen Bookstore highlights a debut? S.A. Lelchuk’s Save Me From Dangerous Men is a debut, the Hot Book of the Week, and the first in the Nikki Griffin series. Now’s the time to jump on it, and order a signed copy through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2Wd2H3m

Here’s the description of Save Me From Dangerous Men.

“An outstanding debut…If you’re a fan of Jack Reacher or Lisbeth Salander, you are gonna love Nikki Griffin.” —New York Times bestselling author Douglas Preston

“Action packed and razor sharp – Jack Reacher would love Nikki Griffin.” —Lee Child, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Past Tense

Nikki Griffin isn’t your typical private investigator. In her office above her bookstore’s shelves and stacks, where she luxuriates in books and the comfort they provide, she also tracks certain men. Dangerous men. Men who have hurt the women they claim to love. And Nikki likes to teach those men a lesson, to teach them what it feels like to be hurt and helpless, so she can be sure that their victims are safe from them forever. 

When a regular PI job tailing Karen, a tech company’s disgruntled employee who might be selling secrets, turns ugly and Karen’s life is threatened, Nikki has to break cover and intervene. Karen tells Nikki that there are people after her. Dangerous men. She says she’ll tell Nikki what’s really going on. But then something goes wrong, and suddenly Nikki is no longer just solving a case—she’s trying hard to stay alive.

Part Lisbeth Salander, part Jack Reacher, part Jessica Jones, Nikki Griffin is a kickass character who readers will root for as she seeks to right the world’s wrongs. S.A. Lelchuk’s Save Me From Dangerous Men marks the beginning of a gripping new series and the launch of a fabulous new character.

Mystery Writers of America livestreamed the Edgar Awards Ceremony on Thursday night. Here are all the 2019 winners, in the order as they were presented. Congratulations to all of the winners.

Sue Grafton Memorial Award – Shell Game by Sara Paretsky

The Simon & Schuster Mary Higgins Clark Award –The Widows of Malabar Hill by Sujata Massey

Robert L. Fish Memorial Award (short story) – “How Does He Die This Time” by Nancy Novick

Ellery Queen Award – Linda Landrigan, Editor of Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine

The Raven Award – Marilyn Stasio of The New York Times

Best Television Episode – Matthew Seiner & Donald Joh for “The One that Holds Everything”, The Romanoffs

Best Juvenile –Otherwood by Pete Hautman

Best Young Adult –Sadie by Courtney Summers

Best Critical Biographical –Classic American Crime Fiction of the 1920s by Leslie S. Klinger

Best Fact Crime –Tinderbox: The Untold Story of the Up Stairs Lounge Fire and the Rise of Gay Liberation by Robert W. Fieseler

Grand Master – Martin Cruz Smith

Best Short Story – “English 398: Fiction Workshop” by Art Taylor (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)

Best Paperback Original – If I Die Tonight by Alison Gaylin

Best First Novel – Bearskin by James A. McLaughlin

Best Mystery Novel – Down the River Unto the Sea by Walter Mosley

Congratulations to the winners. Check the Web Store for copies of the books. https://store.poisonedpen.com

And, you can watch Walter Mosley discuss Down the River Unto the Sea on the Poisoned Pen’s YouTube channel.

Christina Estes recently interviewed Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen. The interview, which aired on KJZZ, the local NPR affiliate, discussed the store’s numerous author events, and the programs with new authors. There’s a lengthy section about Clive Cussler, and his relationship with the Pen. Barbara Peters acknowledges the importance of Diana Gabaldon’s books in the days after 9/11. It’s an important article about the cultural influence of a bookstore, its owner, the staff, and the customers who treasure the books and authors connected to the store. You can listen to the broadcast, or read it. https://bit.ly/2PpNadR

On Saturday, June 1 at 6:30 PM, Douglas Preston will be back at The Poisoned Pen to discuss his book, Talking to the Ground. Preston’s latest newsletter urges interested readers to order the book now from The Poisoned Pen because there will only be 600 copies available. You can pre-order your signed copy here. https://bit.ly/2XERvwG

No one can summarize Talking to the Ground better than Preston himself. Here’s his latest newsletter.

To my excellent readers, One of the most personal and favorite of my books, Talking to the Ground, will be published in a new edition on June 4—with an Afterword I wrote,entitled “The Great Terror.” The book tells the incredible story of a four-hundred-mile journey I took on horseback through the Navajo Nation with my fiancée and daughter, retracing the journey of the gods during the creation of the world. This is an actual route that can still be mapped through Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. The new Afterword brings the story up to date with extremely disturbing discoveries about what happened to the ancient Puebloan Indians who left their great ruins scattered across the Southwest, in places like Chaco Canyon and Canyon de Chelly. I have personally autographed copies of this new, high-quality softcover edition for my readers, available from the Poisoned Pen Bookstore—for $17 only, with free shipping!  You can purchase through this link.  But please order right away, as the supply of signed books is limited to 600 and will go quickly.  As you know, we always try to entertain our newsletter subscribers instead of just trying to sell them something. So to that end, I’ve included some amazing photos of our journey at the bottom of this email, some of which do not appear in the book. Rather than tell you more about the book myself, I’d like to quote from an eloquent Amazon review by a Native American reader named Marty DeLand: There have come and gone many writers who promised us a journey through Navajoland: some in the form of mystery yarn-spinners, others as locally homegrown contributors to Arizona Highways. In and of itself, going forth into such a dangerous and beautiful place is a damned difficult thing to do. Then to return from out of that American Holyland with even the smallest comprehension of what abides there is a feat so extraordinary that only two have accomplished it: LaFarge with his “The Enemy Gods” and Abbey’s distant runner-up, “Desert Solitaire”.  Finally, we can add a third name to that short list: Douglas Preston. “Talking to the Ground” begins as a family adventure by horseback, tracing the footsteps of the Navajo Hero Twins. Preston, his fiancée Christine and her young daughter Selene, pass through some of the emptiest country in our entire nation. However, their three-month ride is little more than a device (albeit a fascinating and ballsy one) to reveal stunning truths about an alternate world inhabited by the Navajo. No author has ever conveyed the living, beating heart of Navajo legends with such powerful intimacy. An encounter with an old sheepherder in search of his lost flock is nothing short of breathtaking in its implications. Preston relates a host of frightening moments as well, not all of which are horse, cliff or weather related. He leaves us with a profound sense of kinship to the Navajo people, and a clear and chilling vision of what awaits us if we fail to note the societal shipwrecks scattered throughout Navajoland: skeletons left behind by those ancients who would not read the writing on their own canyon walls.

To purchase the autographed book, click here.

In the past, we’ve shared Jacqueline Winspear’s newsletters here. It’s often fun to share the newsletter before the author appears at The Poisoned Pen, Sujata Massey, author of the forthcoming mystery, The Satapur Moonstone, will be at the bookstore on Saturday, May 25 at 2 PM, appearing at a tea with Jayne Ann Krentz and Meg Tilley. Massey is the bestselling author of the first Perveen Mistry mystery, The Widows of Malabar Hill. Both books are available through the Web Store, and you can pre-order a signed copy of The Satapur Moonstore. https://bit.ly/2Vo7Ub4

Here’s the description of The Satapur Moonstone.

The highly anticipated follow-up to the critically acclaimed novel The Widows of Malabar Hill.

India, 1922: It is rainy season in the lush, remote Sahyadri mountains, where the princely state of Satapur is tucked away. A curse seems to have fallen upon Satapur’s royal family, whose maharaja died of a sudden illness shortly before his teenage son was struck down in a tragic hunting accident. The state is now ruled by an agent of the British Raj on behalf of Satapur’s two maharanis, the dowager queen and her daughter-in-law.

The royal ladies are in a dispute over the education of the young crown prince, and a lawyer’s counsel is required. However, the maharanis live in purdah and do not speak to men. Just one person can help them: Perveen Mistry, Bombay’s only female lawyer. Perveen is determined to bring peace to the royal house and make a sound recommendation for the young prince’s future, but she arrives to find that the Satapur palace is full of cold-blooded power plays and ancient vendettas. Too late, she realizes she has walked into a trap. But whose? And how can she protect the royal children from the palace’s deadly curse?

*****

By now, I hope you’re curious. Here’s Sujata Massey’s Newsletter.

How’s your spring going? I’m enjoying the sun, tulip and daffodil sightings, and a relatively quiet month to write before May and June, when I will be traveling the country to read from The Satapur Moonstone. The tour schedule so far includes Arizona, Delaware, Kansas, Maryland, Minnesota, New York, Texas and Wisconsin. Check in to my website next month to see dates that might include California and Washington State.

This book will be published May 14 in two editions, one from Soho Press, and the other from Penguin Random House India. There’s also an audiobook coming out from Recorded Books.

More international sales in the year ahead: The Widows of Malabar Hill will be published in Korean, Japanese, French and Finnish. And The Satapur Moonstone is coming out in Finland and Italy. Tell your pen pals.

But back to The Satapur Moonstone. Perveen Mistry’s assignment arrives after Sir David, Alice Hobson-Jones’s father, hires her to make contact with a young maharaja and his family living in an isolated palace in the Sahyadri mountains. From the start of journey, Perveen senses something corrupt is occurring at the palace. Check out the first two chapters.

Publishers Weekly said: “Edgar finalist Massey’s second whodunit featuring Bombay attorney Perveen Mistry is even better than the series’ impressive debut.”

And here’s the review from Library Journal: “Massey does a superb job of combining a fascinating snapshot into 1920s British-ruled India with a top-notch mystery. She has created a strong, appealing heroine who is forging her own path in a rapidly changing world… Highly recommended for fans of other intrepid women sleuths such as Elizabeth Peters’s Amelia Peabody and Tasha Alexander’s Lady Emily.”

It would be so much fun to meet in person when I’m on tour. And if I’m not scheduled for your area, would you please pre-order my book? That helps me and my publishers by leaps and bounds.

You can pre-order the US and World English Soho Press edition of The Satapur Moonstone at your local bookshop or with an online retailer.

South Asia residents, please preorder the Penguin Random House India edition!

And remember, library readers have star power. Please request the hardcover, large print edition, or audiobook now: this encourages librarians to order enough for everyone.

Even if I’m not coming to your town, here’s another way we can talk. The Satapur Moonstone Book Club on Facebook Live is gathering at my author page on Facebook thirteen lucky days after publication. We will discuss  everything—research, characters, ending—of The Satapur Moonstone at 8 PM ET/5 PM PT on Monday, May 27 (Memorial Day evening) in a video conference. This means you can see me relaxing my living room with my dogs—and use the sidebar feature on your computer screen to send me questions which I’ll read aloud and answer. You will not be seen, but your questions will be heard loud and clear. If you are outside the US or Canada, please check if the time difference might allow you to join us, because you will be a VIP participant! The best way to remember this event is to sign up as “GOING” on the event page, and Facebook will remind you.

The whole show will be Q&A format and there will be prizes. Please join me!

Warmly,
Sujata
sujatamassey.com

P.S. If someone sent you this free email newsletter—and you’d like more recipes, free fiction, and information about India, Japan and writing several times each year—please subscribe by signing up here. Your name will never be sold, shared or distributed, and you can unsubscribe at any time. Thanks, and I can’t wait to hear from you!

Gmail users report this newsletter sometimes is mistakenly sent into spam. Please add sujata@sujatamassey.com to your address book so you don’t miss an issue!

Audience members paid attention when Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, suggested they would want to show up for a debut novelist David R. Dow. Dow’s Confessions of an Innocent Man is his first novel, but not his first book. You can find copies, including signed copies of Confessions of an Innocent Man, through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2ILkH0L

Here’s the summary of Confessions of an Innocent Man.

“Every person wrongfully convicted of a crime at some point dreams of getting revenge against the system.  In Confessions of an Innocent Man, the dream comes true and in a spectacular way.”—John Grisham, New York Times bestselling author of The Reckoning 

A thrillingly suspenseful debut novel, and a fierce howl of rage that questions the true meaning of justice.

Rafael Zhettah relishes the simplicity and freedom of his life. He is the owner and head chef of a promising Houston restaurant. A pilot with open access to the boundless Texas horizon. A bachelor, content with having few personal or material attachments that ground him. Then, lightning strikes. When he finds Tieresse—billionaire, philanthropist, sophisticate, bombshell—sitting at one of his tables, he also finds his soul mate and his life starts again. And just as fast, when she is brutally murdered in their home, when he is convicted of the crime, when he is sentenced to die, it is all ripped away. But for Rafael Zhettah, death row is not the end. It is only the beginning. Now, with his recaptured freedom, he will stop at nothing to deliver justice to those who stole everything from him. 

This is a heart-stoppingly suspenseful, devastating, page-turning debut novel. A thriller with a relentless grip that wants you to read it in one sitting. David R. Dow has dedicated his life to the fight against capital punishment—to righting the horrific injustices of the death penalty regime in Texas. He delivers the perfect modern parable for exploring our complex, uneasy relationships with punishment and reparation in a terribly unjust world.

*****

Barbara Peters and Patrick Millikin tag-teamed for the conversation with author David R. Dow. I think you’ll want to check it out.

John Sandford is back at The Poisoned Pen on Tuesday, April 23 at 7 PM, and he’s returning with a new Lucas Davenport book, Neon Prey. In fact, it’s the featured book in Marilyn Stasio’s latest crime column in The New York Times. https://nyti.ms/2ZmZMqE

Of course, Sandford’s books, along with signed copies of Neon Prey, are available through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2Dncbl0

Here’s the description of Neon Prey.

Lucas Davenport tracks a prolific serial killer in the newest nail-biter by #1New York Times-bestselling author John Sandford.

Clayton Deese looks like a small-time criminal, muscle for hire when his loan shark boss needs to teach someone a lesson. Now, seven months after a job that went south and landed him in jail, Deese has skipped out on bail, and the U.S. Marshals come looking for him. They don’t much care about a low-level guy–it’s his boss they want–but Deese might be their best chance to bring down the whole operation.

Then, they step onto a dirt trail behind Deese’s rural Louisiana cabin and find a jungle full of graves.

Now Lucas Davenport is on the trail of a serial killer who has been operating for years without notice. His quarry is ruthless, and–as Davenport will come to find–full of surprises . . .