Fiction Review

Join us at Facebook, Thursday, January 28 at 6 PM (8 PM ET) when Gregg Hurwitz discusses his new Orphan X novel, Prodigal Son, with guest host Isabella Maldonado.

Gregg Hurwitz is the New York Times, #1 internationally bestselling author of 22 thrillers, including the ORPHAN X series, and two award-winning thriller novels for teens. His novels have won numerous literary awards, graced top ten lists, and have been published in 32 languages.

Gregg has written screenplays for or sold spec scripts to many of the major studios (including THE BOOK OF HENRY), and written, developed, and produced television for various networks. He is also a New York Times bestselling comic book writer, having penned stories for Marvel (Wolverine, Punisher) and DC (Batman, Penguin). He has published numerous academic articles on Shakespeare, taught fiction writing in the USC English Department, and guest lectured for UCLA, and for Harvard in the United States and internationally. In the course of researching his thrillers, he has sneaked onto demolition ranges with Navy SEALs, swum with sharks in the Galápagos, and gone undercover into mind-control cults.

Additionally, Gregg is actively working to end polarization in politics and on college campuses. To that end, he’s produced several hundred commercials which got over a hundred million views on digital and TV platforms. His editorial pieces have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, The Huffington Post, The Bulwark, and others.

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You can order signed copies of Prodigal Son through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2Y7Dudb

Gregg Hurwitz. Prodigal Son (St Martins Press, $27.99 Signed). Forced into retirement, Evan Smoak gets an urgent request for help from someone he didn’t even suspect existed—in Prodigal Son, the next New York Times bestselling Orphan X book from Gregg Hurwitz.

As a boy, Evan Smoak was pulled out of a foster home and trained in an off-the-books operation known as the Orphan Program. He was a government assassin, perhaps the best, known to a few insiders as Orphan X. He eventually broke with the Program and adopted a new name—The Nowhere Man—and a new mission, helping the most desperate in their times of trouble. But the highest power in the country has made him a tempting offer—in exchange for an unofficial pardon, he must stop his clandestine activities as The Nowhere Man. Now Evan has to do the one thing he’s least equipped to do—live a normal life.

But then he gets a call for help from the one person he never expected. A woman claiming to have given him up for adoption, a woman he never knew—his mother. Her unlikely request: help Andrew Duran—a man whose life has gone off the rails, who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, bringing him to the deadly attention of very powerful figures. Now a brutal brother & sister assassination team are after him and with no one to turn to, and no safe place to hide, Evan is Duran’s only option. But when the hidden cabal catches on to what Evan is doing, everything he’s fought for is on the line—including his own life.

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If you’d like to read an excerpt of Prodigal Son, check out the sneak preview on https://CriminalElement.com, https://bit.ly/2Mp0jpO.

One of the advantages of the virtual events at The Poisoned Pen is the ability to share virtual book launches and visit with authors on a national, and even international stage. Lisa Gardner’s latest book, Before She Disappeared, is the Hot Book of the Week at The Poisoned Pen. You can order a signed copy through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/39Qr1jq

The Poisoned Pen kicked off Gardner’s virtual book tour. Here’s the description of Before She Disappeared.

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Gardner, a propulsive thriller featuring an ordinary woman who will stop at nothing to find the missing people that the rest of the world has forgotten

Frankie Elkin is an average middle-aged woman, a recovering alcoholic with more regrets than belongings. But she spends her life doing what no one else will–searching for missing people the world has stopped looking for. When the police have given up, when the public no longer remembers, when the media has never paid attention, Frankie starts looking.

A new case brings her to Mattapan, a Boston neighborhood with a rough reputation. She is searching for Angelique Badeau, a Haitian teenager who vanished from her high school months earlier. Resistance from the Boston PD and the victim’s wary family tells Frankie she’s on her own–and she soon learns she’s asking questions someone doesn’t want answered. But Frankie will stop at nothing to discover the truth, even if it means the next person to go missing could be her.

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Riley Sager, author of Home Before Dark, interviewed Lisa Gardener for this event. Enjoy the conversation!

Yesterday, we lost Sharon Kay Penman, a bestselling historical novelist and friend to The Poisoned Pen.

Sharon Kay Penman was the author of nine critically acclaimed historical novels: The Sunne in Splendour, Here be Dragons, Falls the Shadow, The Reckoning, When Christ and his Saints Slept, Time and Chance, Devil’s Brood, Lionheart, and A King’s Ransom. Her tenth historical novel, The Land Beyond the Sea, was published in March of 2020.  She also wrote four medieval mysteries. Her first was The Queen’s Man, the queen in question being Eleanor of Aquitaine, a finalist for an Edgar Award for Best First Mystery from the Mystery Writers of America. Her other mysteries are Cruel as the Grave, Dragon’s Lair, and Prince of Darkness.

Last year, she and I corresponded with the intention of posting an interview when The Land Beyond the Sea was published. Between deadlines and her health, she was never able to complete the interview, but she was so kind in her correspondence.

This was the announcement that appeared on Penman’s Facebook page yesterday morning.

“As many of you know, Sharon has been having various health issues for some time. In the past 18 months, things escalated, and she began to experience more symptoms and extreme fatigue. It was only recently she was diagnosed with a very rare form of cancer that had already reached stage 4. On Monday of this week, she was rushed to the hospital and diagnosed with pneumonia. She passed away quietly, in her sleep, this morning. Her family grieves, and now those who loved her well along with you, her fans, join with them. News of a memorial is pending.”

May she rest in peace.

Just look at the schedule of authors coming to The Poisoned Pen via virtual events. The rest of January and February looks terrific. But, a word to the wide. If there’s a book you want from one of these authors, it’s smart to pre-order it from the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com/

Here’s that terrific calendar of events.

John Charles from The Poisoned Pen asks one of my favorite questions of authors. Who were you before you became an author? You’ll have to check the conversation to hear their answers. Christina Dodd, author of Wrong Alibi, and Jayne Ann Krentz, author of All the Colors of Night, answered Charles’ questions recently. You can find signed copies of their books in the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com/

Here’s Christina Dodd’s Wrong Alibi.

Perfect for fans of Lisa Jewell, New York Times bestselling author Christina Dodd delivers an all-new thriller, featuring a bold and brash female protagonist.

WRONG JOB
Eighteen-year-old Evelyn Jones lands a job in small-town Alaska, working for a man in his isolated mountain home. But her bright hopes for the future are shattered when Donald White disappears, leaving her to face charges of theft, embezzlement—and a brutal double murder. Her protestations of innocence count for nothing. Convicted, she faces life in prison…until fate sends her on the run.

WRONG NAME
Evie’s escape leaves her scarred and in hiding, isolated from her family, working under an alias at a wilderness camp. Bent on justice, intent on recovering her life, she searches for the killer who slaughters without remorse.

WRONG ALIBI
At last, the day comes. Donald White has returned. Evie emerges from hiding; the fugitive becomes the hunter. But in her mind, she hears the whisper of other forces at work. Now Evelyn must untangle the threads of evidence before she’s once again found with blood on her hands: the blood of her own family…

“This is Dodd at her brilliant best.”
—Booklist (starred review) on Strangers She Knows

Dodd’s twisty suspense will have readers turning the pages and keeping the lights on at night.

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Here’s the summary of All the Colors of Night by Jayne Ann Krentz.

An instant New York Times bestseller!

Two psychics plunge into a dark world of deadly secrets in this second installment in the Fogg Lake trilogy by New York Times bestselling author Jayne Ann Krentz.
 
North Chastain possesses a paranormal talent that gives him the ability to track down the most dangerous psychic criminals. When his father suddenly falls into a coma-like state, North is convinced it was caused by a deadly artifact that traces back to the days of a secret government program known only as the Bluestone Project. North knows his only hope of saving his father is to find the artifact. He is good when it comes to tracking down killers, but to locate the relic he’s going to need help from a psychic who knows the shadowy world of obsessive collectors, deceptive dealers and ruthless raiders.…
 
With her reputation in ruins after a false accusation, antiques expert Sierra Raines is looking for a fresh start. She turns to the murky backwaters of the paranormal artifacts trade, finding and transporting valuable objects with a psychic provenance. When North Chastain approaches her for help, Sierra takes him on as a client, though not without reservations. North represents the mysterious Foundation, the secretive organization established to police the underworld populated by psychic criminals and those, like Sierra, who make a living in the shadows of that world.
 
North and Sierra soon find themselves at the scene of the Incident, which occurred decades ago in Fogg Lake. The town and its residents were forever changed by the disaster in the nearby Bluestone Project labs. The pair unearths shocking truths about what happened that fateful night, but they are playing with fire—someone in town knows what they’ve discovered and will do anything to make sure the secrets stay buried.

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If you enjoy these authors, you’ll appreciate the conversation between Jayne Ann Krentz, Christina Dodd, and John Charles.

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Reavis Z. Wortham’s eighth Texas Red River mystery, Laying Bones, has just been released. Fellow Texas author Joe R. Lansdale stepped in to lead the conversation with Wortham for The Poisoned Pen. You can find Wortham’s books in the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2yinlUS

Here’s the summary of Laying Bones.

The stakes don’t get much higher than murder…

It’s January 1969 in the small rural community of Center Springs, Texas. Constable Ned Parker suspects a larger mystery behind the seemingly accidental death of his nephew, R .B., who was found in his overturned pickup near Sanders Creek bridge. It appears that R. B. drowned in the shallow water, but something doesn’t add up for Ned, who begins turning over stones in search of what really happened the night R. B. died.

The mystery leads Ned to the Starlite Club, a dangerous honky-tonk recently constructed in a no-man’s land on the Lone Star side of the Red River. His investigations there uncover suspicious characters, drugs, and gambling, but even more troubling are a series of murders that seem designed to eliminate anyone who might know what really happened to R. B. on that cold January night.

As he works his way through the cover-up, Ned lands himself in a high-stakes game of consequences with no good end in sight. Are the good citizens of Center Springs conspiring against Constable Parker in his search for the truth?

In this thrilling addition to the historical Texas Red River Mystery Series, Constable Ned Parker bets big, but only time will tell if he’ll win justice or a grave of his own.

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You can tell Reavis Z. Wortham and Joe R. Lansdale enjoy each other’s company. All you have to do is read Michael Barson’s interview with Wortham in Bookreporter. When asked about his favorite Texas novelists, Wortham mentions Lansdale among others. Here’s that interview. https://bit.ly/3ippRiM

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Here’s the conversation about writing with Wortham and Lansdale.

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Left Coast Crime Announces the

2021 Lefty Award Nominations

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Because of the pandemic, the 2021 Left Coast Crime convention has been rescheduled for 2022. Everything else may have changed but the Lefty Awards continue! Left Coast Crime will be presenting four Lefty Awards in 2021: humorous, historical, debut, and best. This year, the awards will be voted on virtually and presented online April 10, 2021.

The award nominees have just been selected by registrants at the last in-person convention in San Diego and the next one scheduled for Albuquerque in April 2022. LCC is delighted to announce the 2021 Lefty nominees for books published in 2020. After you see the list, you’ll want to check the Web Store for the titles. https://store.poisonedpen.com/

Lefty Nominees for Best Humorous Mystery Novel

• Ellen Byron, Murder in the Bayou Boneyard (Crooked Lane Books)
• Jennifer J. Chow, Mimi Lee Gets a Clue (Berkley Prime Crime)
• Carl Hiaasen, Squeeze Me (Alfred A. Knopf)
• Cynthia Kuhn, The Study of Secrets (Henery Press)
• J. Michael Orenduff, The Pot Thief Who Studied the Woman at Otowi Crossing Aakenbaaken & Kent)
• Sung J. Woo, Skin Deep (Agora Books)

Lefty Nominees for Best Historical Mystery Novel for books set before 1970

• Susanna Calkins, The Fate of a Flapper (Minotaur Books)
• Dianne Freeman, A Lady’s Guide to Mischief and Murder (Kensington Books)
• Laurie R. King, Riviera Gold (Bantam Books)
• Catriona McPherson, The Turning Tide (Quercus)
• Ann Parker, Mortal Music (Poisoned Pen Press)
• James W. Ziskin, Turn to Stone (Seventh Street Books)

Lefty Nominees for Best Debut Mystery Novel

• Daisy Bateman, Murder Goes to Market (Seventh Street Books)
• Mary Keliikoa, Derailed (Camel Press)
• Erica Ruth Neubauer, Murder at the Mena House (Kensington Books)
• Richard Osman, The Thursday Murder Club (Viking)
• Halley Sutton, The Lady Upstairs (Putnam)
• David Heska Wanbli Weiden, Winter Counts (Ecco)

Lefty Nominees for Best Mystery Novel (not in other categories)

• Tracy Clark, What You Don’t See (Kensington Books)
• S.A. Cosby, Blacktop Wasteland (Flatiron Books)
• Matt Coyle, Blind Vigil (Oceanview Publishing)
• Rachel Howzell Hall, And Now She’s Gone (Forge)
• Louise Penny, All the Devils Are Here (Minotaur Books)

Congratulations to all of the nominees!

Everyone else listed their Best Books of 2020, so why not the staff of The Poisoned Pen? You’ll recognize a few of the names as people who host some of the virtual events, Barbara Peters, Patrick Millikin, John Charles, Pat King. But, some of the other staff listed their top ten picks as well. Check it out. One of the staff might have similar reading taste as yours. Then, check the Web Store for the books. https://store.poisonedpen.com/

Here’s the list. https://store.poisonedpen.com/?q=p.staff_best_of_2

The latest book in the Nora Kelly series by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child is The Scorpion’s Tail. As Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, says, there are still some signed copies available, but the bookstore always sells out. So, order your copy now, while you can still get a signed book. You can order them through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2us95e9

Here’s the summary of The Scorpion’s Tail.

#1 bestselling authors Preston & Child return with the latest book in the new series featuring archaeologist Nora Kelly and FBI Agent Corrie Swanson.

Following the acclaimed debut of OLD BONES, this second “happily anticipated” new thriller in Preston & Child’s series features Nora Kelly, archaeologist at the Santa Fe Archeological Institute, and rookie FBI Agent Corrie Swanson, as they team up to solve a mystery that quickly escalates into nightmare (Booklist).

A mummified corpse, over half a century old, is found in the cellar of an abandoned building in a remote New Mexico ghost town. Corrie is assigned what seems to her a throwaway case: to ID the body and determine cause of death. She brings archaeologist Nora Kelly to excavate the body and lend her expertise to the investigation, and together they uncover something unexpected and shocking: the deceased apparently died in agony, in a fetal position, skin coming off in sheets, with a rictus of horror frozen on his face.

Hidden on the corpse lies a 16^th century Spanish gold cross of immense value.

When they at last identify the body — and the bizarre cause of death — Corrie and Nora open a door into a terrifying, secret world of ancient treasure and modern obsession: a world centered on arguably the most defining, frightening, and transformative moment in American history.

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You’ll want to watch the virtual event because the authors provide the stories behind the two Nora Kelly books.

This country should pay back poor Lee Goldberg and Jason Pinter. Last year, when the first books in their new series came out, it was on the eve of the COVID pandemic. Now, when the second book came out, the U.S. experienced an insurrection. So, check out the new books by the authors, Lee Goldberg’s Bone Canyon and Jason Pinter’s A Stranger at the Door. You can find signed copies of their books in the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com/

Here’s the summary of Bone Canyon.

A cold case heats up, revealing a deadly conspiracy in a twisty thriller by #1 New York Times bestselling author Lee Goldberg.

A catastrophic wildfire scorches the Santa Monica Mountains, exposing the charred remains of a woman who disappeared years ago. The investigation is assigned to Eve Ronin, the youngest homicide detective in the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, a position that forces her to prove herself again and again. This time, though, she has much more to prove.

Bones don’t lie, and these have a horrific story to tell. Eve tirelessly digs into the past, unearthing dark secrets that reveal nothing about the case is as it seems. With almost no one she can trust, her relentless pursuit of justice for the forgotten dead could put Eve’s own life in peril.

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Here’s Jason Pinter’s A Stranger at the Door.

From the Amazon bestselling author of Hide Away comes the gripping second installment of the Rachel Marin Thriller series.

Rachel Marin is in a good place. After years of struggle, the single mother has found both a stable, loving relationship and a new purpose: putting her investigative skills to work solving crimes for the local PD. But just as the pieces of her life are finally starting to fall into place, her teenaged son’s teacher is gruesomely murdered, starting a domino effect that shatters her peaceful existence.

When Rachel discovers an ominous email the teacher sent to her just before his death, she knows she must help bring his killer to justice. But soon a figure from her past reappears, threatening to expose Rachel’s darkest secrets if she doesn’t tread lightly. And when her son is recruited by a shadowy businessman who may be connected to the murder, Rachel knows this has just gotten very, very personal.

Someone out there is dead set on keeping this grisly cover-up good and buried, which means if Rachel’s not careful, it’s only a matter of time before her dream life becomes her worst nightmare.

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Enjoy the conversation with Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, and authors Lee Goldberg and Jason Pinter.