Fiction Review

Marcia Clark’s Samantha Brinkman Series has landed with NBC. The first in the series, the bestselling and critically acclaimed novel BLOOD DEFENSE, launched this May, and the second in the series, MORAL DEFENSE, will launch this November 8.

So, mark your calendars now because Marcia Clark will be appearing at The Poisoned Pen on Thursday, Nov. 3.

Here’s the publicity release for the book from Clark’s publisher.

MORAL DEFENSE by Marcia Clark (On-Sale November 8, 2016)

Author and lawyer Marcia Clark has been back in headlines this year due to FX’s The People vs. O.J. Simpson (actress Sarah Paulson was just nominated for an Emmy for her portrayal of Clark) and ESPN’s documentary, OJ: Made in America. The seasoned crime writer of four previous novels also launched a new series that both long-time devoted fans and new readers are relishing. Blood Defense, which introduced ambitious and hard-hitting criminal defense attorney Samantha Brinkman, was a #1 Kindle bestseller and received wide critical praise as a “top-notch whodunit” (Publishers Weekly, Starred Review), a “page-turner featuring a ballsy protagonist” (Booklist), and a “great suspense novel” (WorkingMother.com).

Now, Clark follows up with a new Samantha Brinkman legal thriller, full of surprises and complications, not to mention moral ambiguities, entitled MORAL DEFENSE (Thomas & Mercer: November 8, 2016; published simultaneously in hardcover, paperback and e-book).

Defense attorney Samantha Brinkman usually doesn’t give a second thought to skirting—or even breaking—the rules of law and order when it comes to winning for her clients. In MORAL DEFENSE, she’s hired to represent Cassie Sonnenberg, a teenager whose family has just been brutally murdered. Her father and brother were stabbed to death and her mother was left barely clinging to life in their own home. As Sam builds the case to protect her client, she discovers details about the girl and her family that don’t add up. Why did Cassie survive? Is she hiding something? Sam finds herself identifying with Cassie as she uncovers startling similarities between the enigmatic teen’s upbringing and her own troubled childhood. The case has become personal, and Sam is forced to make some tough choices. How far will she have to go to win?

More and more readers are discovering the winning combination of Marcia Clark’s sharp writing, skillful plotting, and intriguing characters with her extensive courtroom knowledge and experience. Clark began her law career as a defense attorney and handles defense work currently, so she knows firsthand all the ins and outs of the defense side. And after years working as a prosecutor, she’s having a blast writing from the perspective of a character who can bend the rules to win her cases.

Congratulations to Sara Paretsky and Christine Carbo, winners of the Pinckley Prizes for Crime Fiction. Find out more about that prize here, https://pinckleyprizes.org/index.php?page=prizes

Sara Paretsky’s award is for her body of work, and Christine Carbo’s is for her debut novel, The Wild Inside. Signed copies of both of the above books are available through the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com/

Are you an Agatha Christie fan?   According to Variety, BBC One is moving ahead with plans for seven more adaptations of her work following the success of “And Then There Were None.” You can read about it here.  https://bit.ly/2bDNp4K

And, of course, you can order Agatha Christie mysteries though the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2bQebmZ

Is there anything better than discovering a debut author? Erik Storey was at the Poisoned Pen with his first novel, Nothing Short of Dying.

Can we entice you with the description from the Web Store? “Hailed by bestselling writer William Kent Krueger as “the year’s best thriller debut,” this furiously paced ride into harm’s way features a drifter with lethal skills, whose mission to rescue his abducted sister pits him against a ruthless meth kingpin and his army of killers.

Sixteen years. That’s how long Clyde Barr has been away from Colorado’s thick forests, alpine deserts, and craggy peaks, running from a past filled with haunting memories. But now he’s back, having roamed across three continents as a hunter, adventurer, soldier of fortune, and most recently, unjustly imprisoned convict. And once again, his past is reaching out to claim him.

By the light of a flickering campfire, Clyde receives a frantic phone call from his sister Jen. No sooner has she pleaded with him to come rescue her than the line goes dead. Clyde doesn’t know how much time he has, or where Jen is located, or even who has her. All he knows is that nothing short of dying will stop him from saving her.

Joining Clyde in his against-all-odds quest is a young woman named Allie whose motivations for running this gauntlet are fascinatingly complex. As the duo races against the clock, it is Allie who gets Clyde to see what he has become and what he can still be.

Vivid with the hues and scents of Colorado’s backcountry, and thought-provoking in its exploration of how past, present, and future collide to test resolve, Nothing Short of Dying is, above all, a propulsive, action-driven race against the clock.”

Of course, we have signed copies available through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2bRvHGT

And, we’d love to have you “meet” Erik Storey. We have a Livestream event of his program. https://livestream.com/poisonedpen/events/6210700

Andrew Gross appeared at The Poisoned Pen on publication day for his book, The One Man.

Because this book is a departure from his earlier books, here’s the summary from the Web Store. “Poland. 1944. Alfred Mendl and his family are brought on a crowded train to a Nazi concentration camp after being caught trying to flee Paris with forged papers. His family is torn away from him on arrival, his life’s work burned before his eyes. To the guards, he is just another prisoner, but in fact Mendl – a renowned physicist – holds knowledge that only two people in the world possess. And the other is already at work for the Nazi war machine.

Four thousand miles away, in Washington, DC, Intelligence lieutenant Nathan Blum routinely decodes messages from occupied Poland. Having escaped the Krakow ghetto as a teenager after the Nazis executed his family, Nathan longs to do more for his new country in the war. But never did he expect the proposal he receives from “Wild” Bill Donovan, head of the OSS: to sneak into the most guarded place on earth, a living hell, on a mission to find and escape with one man, the one man the Allies believe can ensure them victory in the war.

Bursting with compelling characters and tense story lines, this historical thriller from New York Times bestseller Andrew Gross is a deeply affecting, unputdownable series of twists and turns through a landscape at times horrifyingly familiar but still completely new and compelling.”

Interested? You can buy a signed copy at the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2blrCt2

We do have photos from the event.

If you would like to see the event you missed, or watch it again if you were there, it’s available via Livestream. https://livestream.com/poisonedpen/events/6210670

The Poisoned Pen recently hosted Meagan Beaumont, author of Blood of Saints, and Arthur Kerns, author of The Yemen Contract.

When Patrick Millikin interviewed them, he said he couldn’t think of anything the books or authors had in common, other than the books are both thrillers. If you like thrillers, you can read the summaries and order signed copies through the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com/

You could also watch the Livestream event https://livestream.com/poisonedpen/events/6176782, and that may give you a flavor of the books.

Although I linked to the Livestream program https://livestream.com/poisonedpen/events/5722778 showing Michael Koryta’s appearance at the Poisoned Pen on his Rise the Dark book tour, I didn’t have photos to share.

Here’s Koryta getting ready to sign books in that back room.

Patrick Millikin showing Rise the Dark.

Michael Koryta addressing the audience.

And, don’t forget, you can get signed copies of Rise the Dark through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2blguR3

There’s so much to mention in Charles Finch’s recent USA Today review of Caleb Carr’s Surrender, New York.

Here’s the review. https://usat.ly/2bPQ7TR

I could mention all of Charles Finch’s Charles Lenox mysteries. https://bit.ly/2c0366H

Home by Nightfall is his 2015 mystery, and The Inheritance will be out in November.

Or, we could talk about Finch’s references to Sherlock Holmes. Here, references to Sherlock Holmes often bring up Laurie R. King. She’ll be appearing here October 1 to talk about two books, Mary Russell’s War, and Echoes of Sherlock Holmes. https://bit.ly/2bJylPl

With mystery readers, you never know where one book review will take you.

Marilyn Stasio just reviewed books by two of the August authors at the Poisoned Pen. Stasio’s Crime column in The New York Times features reviews of Michael Koryta’s Rise the Dark and Erik Storey’s Nothing Short of Dying. https://nyti.ms/2b8HgIC

Koryta was just at the Pen, and Storey will be here Wednesday, August 24 at 7 PM. And, of course, signed books by both authors are available through the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com

Michael Koryta was just at The Poisoned Pen on his book tour for Rise the Dark.

Here’s the summary of the book, as it appears in the Web Store.

“Mark Novak’s greatest mystery may be his own…

Rise the dark. These were the last words written in Lauren Novak’s notebook before she was murdered in a strange Florida village. They’ve never meant anything to the police or to her husband, investigator Markus Novak. Now the man he believes killed her is out of prison, and draws Markus to the place he’s avoided for so long: the lonely road where his wife was shot to death beneath the cypress trees and Spanish moss in a town called Cassadaga.

In Red Lodge, Montana, a senseless act of vandalism shuts the lights off in the town where Sabrina Baldwin is still trying to adjust to a new home and mourning the loss of her brother, who was a high voltage linesman just like her husband, Jay. As the spring’s final snowstorm calls Jay deeper into the mountains, chasing the destruction on the electrical grid, Sabrina is abducted by Garland Webb, the man Markus Novak believes killed his wife. Drawing them all together is a messianic villain who understands that you can never outpace your past. You can only rise against the future.”

Intrigued? If you would like to hear Michael Koryta discuss Rise the Dark, along with other topics, with Patrick Millikin, check out the Livestream event. https://livestream.com/poisonedpen/events/5722778

And, don’t forget, you can order signed copies of Rise the Dark through the Web Store.

https://store.poisonedpen.com