Fiction Review

According to Monica Marie Zorrilla’s recent article in Variety, “Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Television has closed a deal to develop and produce a television series adapted from Walter Mosley‘s bestselling gritty historical fiction mystery series starring Rawlins, one of literature’s most popular Black investigators.” You can read her entire article here. https://bit.ly/3smXwNS

But, why wait for television? You can order Mosley’s books through the Web Store, including signed copies of the latest Easy Rawlins book, Blood Grove. https://bit.ly/2NXhTQU

Here’s the description of Blood Grove.

“Master of craft and narrative” Walter Mosley returns with this crowning achievement in the Easy Rawlins saga, in which the iconic detective’s loyalties are tested on the sun-soaked streets of Southern California (National Book Foundation) 

It is 1969, and flames can be seen on the horizon, protest wafts like smoke though the thick air, and Easy Rawlins, the Black private detective whose small agency finally has its own office, gets a visit from a white Vietnam veteran. The young man comes to Easy with a story that makes little sense. He and his lover, a beautiful young woman, were attacked in a citrus grove at the city’s outskirts. He may have killed a man, and the woman and his dog are now missing. Inclined to turn down what sounds like nothing but trouble, Easy takes the case when he realizes how damaged the young vet is from his war experiences—the bond between veterans superseding all other considerations.

The veteran is not Easy’s only unlooked-for trouble. Easy’s adopted daughter Feather’s white uncle shows up uninvited, raising questions and unsettling the life Easy has long forged for the now young woman. Where Feather sees a family reunion, Easy suspects something else, something that will break his heart.

Blood Grove is a crackling, moody, and thrilling race through a California of hippies and tycoons, radicals and sociopaths, cops and grifters, both men and women. Easy will need the help of his friends—from the genius Jackson Blue to the dangerous Mouse Alexander, Fearless Jones, and Christmas Black—to make sense of a case that reveals the darkest impulses humans harbor. 

Blood Grove is a novel of vast scope and intimate insight, and a soulful call for justice by any means necessary.

Walter Mosley is one of America’s most celebrated and beloved writers. A Grand Master of the Mystery Writers of America, he has won numerous awards, including the Anisfield-Wolf Award, a Grammy, a PEN USA’s Lifetime Achievement Award, and several NAACP Image Awards. His books have been translated into more than twenty languages. His short fiction has appeared in a wide array of publications, including The New Yorker, GQ, Esquire, Los Angeles Times Magazine, and Playboy, and his nonfiction has been published in The New York Times Book Review, The New York Times Magazine, Newsweek, and The Nation. He is the author of, most recently, Down the River unto the Sea. He lives in New York City.

If you missed it earlier, here’s Patrick Millikin’s recent conversation with Walter Mosley.

Yesterday, we lost Margaret Maron. In 2013, the Mystery Writers of America celebrated Maron’s contributions to the mystery genre by naming her a Grand Master – an honor first bestowed on Agatha Christie.

Margaret Maron grew up in the country near Raleigh, North Carolina, but for many years lived in Brooklyn, New York. When she and her artist husband returned to the farm that had been in her family for a hundred years, she began a series based on her own background. The first book, Bootlegger’s Daughter, became a Washington Post bestseller that swept the major mystery awards for its year — winning the Edgar, Agatha, Anthony, and Macavity Awards for Best Novel — and is among the 100 Favorite Mysteries of the Century as selected by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association.

Later, her Deborah Knott novels Up Jumps the Devil, Storm Track, and Three-Day Town each also won the Agatha Award for Best Novel. Margaret is also the author of the Sigrid Harald series of detective novels. In 2008, Maron received the North Carolina Award for Literature, the highest civilian honor the state bestows on its authors.

Here is Margaret Maron’s obituary, as posted by her family.

Margaret Maron, may she rest in peace.

Charles Finch’s latest Charles Lenox mystery, An Extravagant Death, is the Hot Book of the Week at The Poisoned Pen. He’s also appearing for a virtual event on Friday, February 26 at 6 PM (8 PM) ET. You can find the event on the bookstore’s Facebook page, or go directly from the store’s homepage. You might want to order your signed copy of his new book now. https://bit.ly/2wTAsyM

Here’s An Extravagant Death, the Hot Book of the Week.

Charles Finch. An Extravagant Death (St Martins Press, $27.99 Signed). In what promises to be a breakout in Charles Finch’s bestselling series, Charles Lenox travels to the New York and Newport of the dawning Gilded Age to investigate the death of a beautiful socialite.

London, 1878. With faith in Scotland Yard shattered after a damning corruption investigation, Charles Lenox’s detective agency is rapidly expanding. The gentleman sleuth has all the work he can handle, two children, and an intriguing new murder case.

But when Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli offers him the opportunity to undertake a diplomatic mission for the Queen, Lenox welcomes the chance to satisfy an unfulfilled yearning: to travel to America. Arriving in New York, he begins to receive introductions into both its old Knickerbocker society and its new robber baron splendor. Then, a shock: the death of the season’s most beautiful debutante, who appears to have thrown herself from a cliff. Or was it a suicide? Lenox’s reputation has preceded him to the States, and he is summoned to a magnificent Newport mansion to investigate the mysterious death. What ensues is a fiendish game of cat and mouse.

Witty, complex, and tender, An Extravagant Death is Charles Finch’s triumphant return to the main storyline of his beloved Charles Lenox series—a devilish mystery, a social drama, and an unforgettable first trip for an Englishman coming to America.

Charles Finch is the USA Today bestselling author of the Charles Lenox mysteries, including The Vanishing Man. His first contemporary novel, The Last Enchantments, is also available from St. Martin’s Press. Finch received the 2017 Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing from the National Book Critics Circle. His essays and criticism have appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Washington Post, and elsewhere. He lives in Los Angeles.

Dr. Jason Rugolo led the interview with Dan Frey, author of The Future is Yours. The novel is already in development as an HBO Max series. There are still a few signed copies available through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/3qUeoeF

Here’s the summary of The Future is Yours.

Two best friends create a computer that can predict the future. But what they can’t predict is how it will tear their friendship—and society—apart.

“An impossibly addictive brainteaser wrapped in a buttery popcorn kernel.”—Aneesh Chaganty, director and co-writer of Searching and Run

IN DEVELOPMENT AS AN HBO MAX ORIGINAL SERIES

If you had the chance to look one year into the future, would you? 

For Ben Boyce and Adhi Chaudry, the answer is unequivocally yes. And they’re betting everything that you’ll say yes, too. Welcome to The Future: a computer that connects to the internet one year from now, so you can see who you’ll be dating, where you’ll be working, even whether or not you’ll be alive in the year to come. By forming a startup to deliver this revolutionary technology to the world, Ben and Adhi have made their wildest, most impossible dream a reality. Once Silicon Valley outsiders, they’re now its hottest commodity. 

The device can predict everything perfectly—from stock market spikes and sports scores to political scandals and corporate takeovers—allowing them to chase down success and fame while staying one step ahead of the competition. But the future their device foretells is not the bright one they imagined.

Ambition. Greed. Jealousy. And, perhaps, an apocalypse. The question is . . . can they stop it?

Told through emails, texts, transcripts, and blog posts, this bleeding-edge tech thriller chronicles the costs of innovation and asks how far you’d go to protect the ones you love—even from themselves.

Here’s the conversation between Dan Frey and Dr. Jason Rugolo.

A Fatal Lie is the 23rd Ian Rutledge novel by Charles Todd. The mother/son team of Caroline and Charles Todd recently talked with Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, about their latest book and the history behind it. You can order a signed copy of A Fatal Lie, and copies of Todd’s other books, through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2CYwbY1

Here’s the story of A Fatal Lie.

“If there’s ever been a more complex and compelling hero in crime fiction than Inspector Rutledge, I can’t think of one.”—Jeffery Deaver 

In one of his most puzzling cases, Scotland Yard Inspector Ian Rutledge must delve deep into a dead man’s life and his past to find a killer determined to keep dark secrets buried.

A peaceful Welsh village is thrown into turmoil when a terrified boy stumbles on a body in a nearby river. The man appears to have fallen from the canal aqueduct spanning the valley. But there is no identification on the body, he isn’t a local, and no one will admit to having seen him before. With little to go on, the village police turn to Scotland Yard for help.  

 When Inspector Ian Rutledge is sent from London to find answers, he is given few clues—a faded military tattoo on the victim’s arm and an unusual label in the collar of his shirt. They eventually lead him to the victim’s identity: Sam Milford. By all accounts, he was a good man and well-respected. Then, why is his death so mysterious? Looking for the truth, Rutledge uncovers a web of lies swirling around a suicidal woman, a child’s tragic fate, another woman bent on protecting her past. But where among all the lies is the motive for murder?  

To track a killer, Rutledge must retrace Milford’s last journey. Yet death seems to stalk his every move, and the truth seems to shift at every turn. Man or woman, this murderer stays in the shadows, and it will take desperate measures to lure him—or her—into the light. 

Charles Todd is the New York Times bestselling author of the Inspector Ian Rutledge mysteries, the Bess Crawford mysteries, and two stand-alone novels. A mother-and-son writing team, they live on the East Coast.

Here’s the virtual event featuring Charles and Caroline Todd.

If you don’t recognize Sarah Pearse’s name yet, you soon will. Her debut novel, The Sanatorium, is a Gothic thriller that made The New York Times bestseller list, and is a Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick. Another bestselling author, Jayne Ann Krentz, hosted the virtual event conversation. Pearse and Krentz spoke about the writing process and the book itself. You can order a copy of The Sanatorium through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/37tG1U8

Here’s an introduction to The Sanatorium.

REESE’S BOOK CLUB PICK
An instant New York Times bestseller!

“An eerie, atmospheric novel that had me completely on the edge of my seat.” —Reese Witherspoon

You won’t want to leave. . . until you can’t.

Half-hidden by forest and overshadowed by threatening peaks, Le Sommet has always been a sinister place. Long plagued by troubling rumors, the former abandoned sanatorium has since been renovated into a five-star minimalist hotel.

An imposing, isolated getaway spot high up in the Swiss Alps is the last place Elin Warner wants to be. But Elin’s taken time off from her job as a detective, so when her estranged brother, Isaac, and his fiancée, Laure, invite her to celebrate their engagement at the hotel, Elin really has no reason not to accept.

Arriving in the midst of a threatening storm, Elin immediately feels on edge–there’s something about the hotel that makes her nervous. And when they wake the following morning to discover Laure is missing, Elin must trust her instincts if they hope to find her. With the storm closing off all access to the hotel, the longer Laure stays missing, the more the remaining guests start to panic.

Elin is under pressure to find Laure, but no one has realized yet that another woman has gone missing. And she’s the only one who could have warned them just how much danger they are all in. . .

Sarah Pearse grew up in Devon, UK, and studied English literature and creative writing at the University of Warwick before completing a postgraduate diploma in broadcast journalism. She lived in Switzerland for several years before returning to the UK. The Sanatorium is her first novel.

Here’s the conversation and the introduction to debut author Sarah Pearse.

The Poisoned Pen recently welcomed J.A. Jance for a virtual event to discuss her latest Joanna Brady novel Missing and Endangered. You can order signed copies of the book, and copies of Jance’s other books, through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2NIqCrG

Here’s the summary of Missing and Endangered.

Cochise County Sheriff Joanna Brady’s professional and personal lives collide when her college-age daughter is involved in a missing persons case in this evocative and atmospheric mystery in J. A. Jance’s New York Times bestselling suspense series, set in the beautiful desert country of the American Southwest.

When Jennifer Brady returns to Northern Arizona University for her sophomore year, she quickly becomes a big sister to her new roommate, Beth Rankin, a brilliant yet sheltered sixteen-year-old freshman. For a homeschooled Beth, college is her first taste of both freedom and unfettered access to the internet, and Jenny is concerned that she’s too naïve and rebellious for her own good.

Her worries are well-founded because one day Beth vanishes, prompting Jenny to alert campus authorities, local police, and her mom, Sheriff Joanna Brady—who calls in a favor. Beth is found, but Jenny’s concern has unwittingly put her in the crosshairs of a criminal bent on revenge. 

With Christmas vacation approaching, and Beth at war with her parents, Jenny invites Beth to the shelter of the Brady home. While Joanna is sympathetic, she’s caught up in a sensitive case—an officer-involved shooting that has placed the lives of two young children in jeopardy—leaving her stretched thin to help a fragile young woman recently gone missing and endangered.

J.A. Jance is the New York Times Bestselling author of more than sixty books. Born in South Dakota and raised in Bisbee, Arizona, she and her husband live in the Seattle area with their two longhaired dachshunds, Mary and Jojo.

Enjoy the conversation between J.A. Jance and Barbara Peters, especially the discussion of Bisbee, Arizona.

The Poisoned Pen held a virtual book release and surprise party for Mark Greaney’s new Gray Man thriller, Relentless. Relentless is the Hot Book of the Week at The Poisoned Pen, and you can still order a signed copy through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2o92azg

Before I share the surprise for Mark Greaney, here’s the summary of Relentless.

The Gray Man’s search for missing intelligence agents plunges him deep into a maelstrom of trouble in the latest entry in the #1 New York Times bestselling series.

The first agent disappearance was a puzzle.

The second was a mystery.

The third was a conspiracy.

Intelligence operatives around the world are disappearing. When a missing American agent re-appears in Venezuela, Court Gentry, the Gray Man, is dispatched to bring him in, but a team of assassins has other ideas. Court escapes with his life and a vital piece of intelligence.

Meanwhile, CIA agent Zoya Zakharova is in Berlin. Her mission: to infiltrate a private intelligence firm with some alarming connections. The closer she gets to answers, the less likely she is to get out alive.

Court and Zoya are just two pieces on this international chessboard, and they’re about to discover one undeniable truth—sometimes capturing a king requires sacrificing some pawns.

Mark Greaney has a degree in international relations and political science. In his research for the Gray Man novels, including One Minute Out, Mission Critical, Agent in Place, Gunmetal Gray, Back Blast, Dead Eye, Ballistic, On Target, and The Gray Man, he traveled to more than fifteen countries and trained alongside military and law enforcement in the use of firearms, battlefield medicine, and close-range combative tactics. With Marine LtCol Rip Rawlings, he wrote the New York Times bestseller Red Metal. He is also the author of the New York Times bestsellers Tom Clancy Support and Defend, Tom Clancy Full Force and Effect, Tom Clancy Commander in Chief, and Tom Clancy True Faith and Allegiance. With Tom Clancy, he coauthored Locked On, Threat Vector, and Command Authority.

If you watch the video, you’ll get a chance to join in on the surprise. Mark Greaney celebrates the release of his 20th book (and 10th Gray Man novel), RELENTLESS, with a star-studded group of guest authors: Don Bentley, Marc Cameron, Jack Carr, Joshua Hood and Brad Taylor.

Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, had the opportunity to introduce debut Julie Carrick Dalton, author of Waiting for the Night Song. Dalton talked about the New Hampshire setting and her novel. You can order copies of the book through the Web Store, https://bit.ly/2NbwWZ4

Here’s Waiting for the Night Song.

Named a Most Anticipated book by Newsweek * USA Today * CNN * Parade * Buzzfeed * Medium * GoodReads * PopSugar * Frolic Media * Betches * The Nerd Daily * SheReads and more

“Smart and searingly passionate…an illuminating snapshot of nature, betrayal, and sacrifices set in the evocative New Hampshire wilderness.”–Kim Michele Richardson, bestselling author of The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek

A startling and timely debut, Julie Carrick Dalton’s Waiting for the Night Song is a moving, brilliant novel about friendships forged in childhood magic and ruptured by the high price of secrets that leave you forever changed.

Cadie Kessler has spent decades trying to cover up one truth. One moment. But deep down, didn’t she always know her secret would surface?

An urgent message from her long-estranged best friend Daniela Garcia brings Cadie, now a forestry researcher, back to her childhood home. There, Cadie and Daniela are forced to face a dark secret that ended both their idyllic childhood bond and the magical summer that takes up more space in Cadie’s memory then all her other years combined.

Now grown up, bound by long-held oaths, and faced with truths she does not wish to see, Cadie must decide what she is willing to sacrifice to protect the people and the forest she loves, as drought, foreclosures, and wildfire spark tensions between displaced migrant farm workers and locals.

Waiting for the Night Song is a love song to the natural beauty around us, a call to fight for what we believe in, and a reminder that the truth will always rise.

As a journalist, JULIE CARRICK DALTON has published more than a thousand articles in The Boston Globe, BusinessWeek, The Hollywood Reporter, and other publications. She contributes to DeadDarlings, The Writer Unboxed, and GrubStreet’s writer’s blogs. She also owns and operates a small farm in rural New Hampshire, the backdrop for Waiting for the Night Song, her debut.

Enjoy the book chat with Julie Carrick Dalton and Barbara Peters.