Table of Contents
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Hotlists 2008
Crime Fiction - embedded
Seeing Stars
Lists of (mostly) hardcover books which received at least one starred review (indicating a work of unusual merit) from the following review sources: Booklist , Publisher's Weekly (PW), Kirkus and Library Journal (LJ).
The review journal assigns the star.
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Overbooked specializes in providing timely information about fiction (all genres) and readable nonfiction. Overbooked has been online since 1994. Overbooked is a work in progress . . .
Overbooked is the winner of the 2008 Louis Shores - Greenwood Publishing Award: to recognize excellence in book reviewing and other media for libraries. The award recipient is selected for significant achievement related to a reviewing process that helps librarians make selection decisions.
Starred Reviews
Crime Fiction Stars of 1999: July - December
September 9, 2008
Titles are listed by approximate date of publication, then by alphabetically by author.
Annotations are from Advance, the Ingram Book Magazine - unless otherwise noted.
A 
indicates an Overbooked
Jump
for Joy book.
December
- The Reeve's Tale
Author: Frazer, Margaret
Publisher: Simon & Schuster List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 0684855135
PW
Two-time Edgar Award nominee Margaret Frazer's national bestselling medieval mystery series continues as the "strong and saucy" (Minneapolis Star Tribune) Sister Frevisse investigates a chain of unholy
Suggested Reading: Historical Crime Fiction - Monster
Author: Kellerman, Jonathan
Publisher: Random List Price: $ 25.95 ISBN: 067945960x Date: 1999BooklistPW
Alex Delaware is back in a riveting and devilishly ingenious story about an asylum inmate who seems able to foresee grisly slayings. How can a nonfunctional psychotic locked up in a supposedly secure institution for homicidal madmen predict brutal murders in the outside world? This is the enigma that Alex Delaware and Detective Milo Sturgis must penetrate in order to put a stop to a series of horrific killings.
Suggested Reading: Psycho Killers - The Last Dance: 87th Precinct
Author: McBain, Ed
Publisher: Simon & Schuster List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 0684855135 Date: 1999PWKirkus
Following the success of The Big Bad City, crime fiction master author McBain delivers a new, gritty and witty depiction of life and death in the 87th Precinct.
Suggested Reading: Cops
November
- Lying With the Enemy
Author: Binding, Tim
Publisher: Carrol & Graf List Price: $ 24 ISBN: 0786706570 Date: 1999Kirkus
In 1943 the skies over Guernsey darken, and the search for a killer unearths horrors shared by the British and the Nazis alike, in this heart-stopping novel that bares the human soul in a time of war.
Suggested Reading: World Wars - Timeline
Author: Crichton, Michael
Publisher: Knopf List Price: $ 26.95 ISBN: 0679444815 Date: 1999PW
Michael Crichton's new novel opens on the threshold of the 21st century. It is a world of exploding advances on the frontiers of technology. Information moves instantly between two points, without wires or networks. Computers are built from single molecules. Any moment of the past can be actualized -- and a group of historians can enter, literally, life in 14th century feudal France.Imagine the risks of such a journey.
Not since Jurassic Park has Michael Crichton given us such a magnificent adventure. Here, he combines a science of the future -- the emerging field of quantum technology -- with the complex realities of the medieval past. In a heart-stopping narrative, Timeline carries us into a realm of unexpected suspense and danger, overturning our most basic ideas of what is possible. - Publisher marketing.
Suggested Reading: If You Like Michael Crichton . . . - Broken Wings
Author: Douglas, John & Mark Olshaker
Publisher: Pocket List Price: $ 24 ISBN: 0671023918 Date: 1999Booklist
Immediately after his retirement, John Chase is summoned to investigate the apparent suicide of his former boss - the director of the FBI. He enlists an elite team of ex-FBI agents, and what follows is a furious psychological duel between the nation's top profiler and a ruthless mastermind. - Dead Reckoning
Author: Egleton, Clive
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 031224102x Date: 1999Library Journal
A victim of brutal mass murder is discovered to have been using the identify of SIS agent Peter Ashton's wife. With every lead ending in a dead end and dead body, time is running out for Ashton - and his deadliest adversary is one step ahead. - Eton Crop
Author: James, Bill
Publisher: W.W. Norton List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 039304761x Date: 1999PW
In the latest gripping Harpur & Iles mystery, the London syndicate tries to take over a choice operation, setting off a murderous rivalry with the local drug lords--and a fierce policy war among the police. - The Unburied
Author: Palliser, Charles
Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 0374280355 Date: 1999BooklistLibrary JournalPW
Three separate tales are interwoven in this novel about Dr. Courtine, an unworldly academic, who is invited to spend the days before Christmas with an old friend. Doubly distracted, he becomes unwittingly enmeshed in the sequence of terrible events that follows his arrival.
Suggested Reading: All Stars - Occam's Razor
Author: Mayor, Archer
Publisher: Mysterious List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0892966823 Date: 1999PW
Vermont police detective Joe Gunther faces a twisted and far-reaching case involving the murder of a trucker, the death of a blackmailing hooker, and the threat of deadly toxins.
Suggested Reading: Cops - Hard Time: V.I. Warshawski
Author:
Paretsky, Sara
Publisher: Delacorte List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0385313632 Date: 1999BooklistKirkusPW
Suggested Reading: All Stars | Private Investigators - Harm Done: Inspector Wexford
Author: Rendell, Ruth
Publisher: Crown List Price: $ 24 ISBN: 060960547x Date: 1999PW
Inspector Wexford is plunged into the ubiquitous, secretive realm of domestic violence, where meting out justice is a complex and often delicate business. He knows that these hidden family dramas of humiliation and violence may spill their bounds - and death will claim another victim.
Suggested Reading: Domestic Violence - Shooting at Midnight
Author: Rucka,
Greg
Publisher: Bantam Doubleday Dell List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0553107208 Date: 1999PWKirkus
In his previous thrillers, Rucka created the explosive world of professional bodyguard Atticus Kodiak. Now he puts readers in the shoes of Kodiak's friend and lover, Bridgett Logan - an unforgettable portrait of a woman living life on her own terms.
October
- Those Bones Are Not
My Child
Author: Bambara, Toni Cade
Publisher: Pantheon List Price: $ 27.50 ISBN: 0679442618 Date: 1999Library JournalPWKirkus
The novel that Bambara was working on at the time of her death in 1995 - a story that puts readers at the center of the nightmare of the Atlanta child murders.
Suggested Reading: All Stars | | African American Stars - Drag Strip
Author: Bartholomew,
Nancy
Publisher: Minotaur List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312202954 Date: 1999PW
Sierra Lavotini, the classiest dancer at the Tiffany club in Panama City and star of the hit novel The Miracle Strip, returns in another action-packed adventure. This time, the death of another young Tiffany dancer sends Sierra in search of a killer.
Suggested Reading: If You Like Janet Evanovich . . . - Industry of Souls
Author: Booth, Martin
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0312242034 Date: 1999PWBooklistKirkus
On his 80th birthday, a British citizen arrested in the 1950s for spying in the Soviet Union looks back on his life in Russia - his harrowing life in the "gulag" and his quiet life 20 years later in the village.
Suggested Reading: All Stars - Garden of Evil
Author: Buchanan, Edna
Publisher: Twilight List Price: $ 24 ISBN: 038976544 Date: 1999Booklist
Miami news reporter Britt Montero meets a fearsome nemesis: a female serial killer with the mind of a black widow.
Suggested Reading: Florida Fiction - The Price of an Orphan
Author: Carlon, Patricia
Publisher: Soho List Price: $ 22 ISBN: 1569471738 Date: 1999PW
When an orphan on an outback cattle station claims to have witnessed a murder, Stuart and Kay Heath remind him of the boy who cried wolf. Then Johnnie is about to be sent back to an orphanage when he and Kay are invited on a camping trip - a special treat or a cunning trap?
Suggested Reading: Psychological Suspense Stars - Skeleton Crew
Author: Connor, Beverly
Publisher: Cumberland House $ 20.95 ISBN: 1-58182-042-9 Date: 1999Booklist
In an adventure fraught with modern-day pirates, a hurricane, and a dead body, Lindsay Chamberlain dives for sunken treasure and attempts to solve a 440-year-old murder mystery.
Suggested Reading: Crime Scene Investigations - The Lost Bird
Author: Coel, Margaret
Publisher: Berkley List Price: $ 21.95 ISBN: 0425170594 Date: 1999Booklist
After the murder of an elderly priest, Father John thinks the bullet was meant for him. Consumed with anger and guilt, he is determined to find the murderer - even if he risks his life. From the bestselling author of The Story Teller.
Suggested Reading: If You Like Tony Hillerman . . . - In Pursuit of the Proper Sinner
Author: George, Elizabeth
Publisher: Bantam Doubleday Dell List Price: $ 25.95 ISBN: 0553102354 Date: 1999PW
Now one of the most critically acclaimed mystery writers of her generation delivers her finest work yet - with her beloved characters Lynley and Havers exploring the incendiary themes of passion, loyalty, and betrayal in a classic detective story that is also a richly literary novel. - O is for Outlaw
Author: Grafton, Sue
Publisher: Henry Holt List Price: $ 26 ISBN: 0805059555 Date: 1999BooklistKirkusLibrary JournalPW
Delving more deeply into P.I. Kinsey Millhone's past than any of Grafton's previous 14 novels, O is for Outlaw finds Kinsey dealing with a man who has purchased the contents of a defaulted storage unit - for 30 bucks, he'll sell her the lot. A letter she finds amid childhood memorabilia forces her to reexamine her beliefs about the breakup of her first marriage - and about an old unsolved murder.
Suggested Reading: Private Investigators | Cold Cases | All Stars - Murder Duet
Author: Gur, Batya
Publisher: HarperCollins List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 0060172681 Date: 1999Booklist
Israeli policeman Michael Ohayon investigates the murders of the brothers and father of a woman he has been seeing, in the fourth novel in Gur's series of popular, intellectually challenging mysteries. - Out of Season
Author: Havill, Steven
Publisher: Minotaur List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312244142 Date: 1999PW
Gastner's life gets complicated when his boss, the sheriff, dies in a private plane crash at the hands of his brother-in-law. Questions about why the men were flying in bad weather are overshadowed by the coroner's discovery that the pilot was killed by gun shots. - Arms and the Women: An Elliad
Author: Hill, Reginald
Publisher: Delacorte List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0385332793 Date: 1999PWBooklist
A deadly stalker has targeted Peter Pascoe's house. After two near-misses, Peter sends Ellie, and their daughter Rose, out to the country for safety. But what neither Peter nor Andy Dalziel had ever considered was that it might be Ellie the killer is after. - Deepwater
Author: Jones, Matthew F.
Publisher: Bloomsbury List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 1582340595 Date: 1999Booklist
Nat Banyon is young, handsome and slightly rough around the edges. Just outside of a town called Deepwater, he meets an older man named Herman Finch. Finch, correctly guessing about the straits Banyon might be in, offers him a job fixing things up around his motel. When he meets Finch's young and beautiful wife, Iris, Banyon accepts. He and Iris immediately fall in lust, while Banyon and Finch develop a menacing father/son relationship. Banyon, an orphan, begins to have nightmarish fantasies that Finch may be his real father. As Banyon becomes trenchantly involved with Finch's life and the Deepwater locals, he finds himself understanding less about Finch. Is he the town father or town thug? Is he a benevolent man who wants to take care of Iris and Banyon, or is he setting them up for a fall? As Finch becomes more of a mystery to Banyon, what we think we know about the young man gets thrown into question. The hunted and the hunter become blurred until the surprising end. In the meantime, there's that damn Rottweiler to worry about...Deepwater has all one wants from a thriller: sex, murder, fast cars and a big dog. Jones has created a cast of wonderfully complex characters and enough twists and turns to keep you flipping the pages until the very last one. - Bloomsbury marketing. - Motherless Brooklyn
Author: Lethem, Jonathan
Publisher: Doubleday List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0385491832 Date: 1999BooklistLibrary JournalPWKirkus
Lethem fulfills the promise of his earlier, critically acclaimed novels with the gritty and uproarious tale of a Brooklyn P.I. with problems: a dead boss, woman trouble, and an uncontrollable case of Tourette's syndrome.
Suggested Reading: All Stars - Walkin' the Dog
Author: Mosley, Walter
Publisher: Little Brown List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0316966207 Date: 1999BooklistPWKirkus
Mosley returns with a character his fans know and love - Socrates Fortlow, the widely praised hero of Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned, starring in a brilliant new book that explores life outside the law in modern-day Los Angeles.
Suggested Reading: All Stars | African American Stars - Faded Coat of Blue
Author: Parry, Owen
Publisher: Avon List Price: $ 23 ISBN: 0380976420 Date: 1999PW
A riveting and original tale of crime, detection, and punishment set amid the blood and tumult of the American Civil War - for fans of such books as The Alienist and Cold Mountain.
Suggested Reading: Civil War Stars - The Twisted Root
Author: Perry, Anne
Publisher: Ballantine List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 0345433254 Date: 1999Kirkus
The tenth novel in the riveting series featuring Victorian private eye William Monk. In stunning feats of imagination, Anne Perry brings to life the lost world of England's Victorian Age as she holds readers rapt with a chilling story of love, betrayal, and consummate evil.
Suggested Reading: Historical Crime Fiction - Dead Souls
Author: Rankin, Ian
Publisher: Minotaur List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0312202938 Date: 1999Booklist
Between a convicted murderer free on parole, a pedophile living near a playground, and a high-school sweetheart whose teenage son is missing, John Rebus is in the middle of more than one dangerous, deadly mess, on the verge of losing his job, his lover - and his life.
Suggested Reading: Scottish Crime Fiction - So Sure of Death: Liam Campbell
Author: Stabenow, Dana
Publisher: Dutton List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN:0525945199 Date: 1999Booklist
When the bodies of a local family are found adrift at sea, Alaska State Trooper Liam Campbell is drawn straight into the heart of a family scandal involving adultery, tribal taboos, and forbidden romance. - Sins of the Brother
Author: Stewart, Mike
Publisher: Putnam List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0399145370 Date: 1999Kirkus
A young maverick attorney returns to his small Alabama hometown to look into the murder of his wild brother.
September
- Bone Hunter
Author: Andrews, Sarah
Publisher: Minotaur List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0312203810 Date: 1999PW
Forensic geologist Em Hansen investigates a paleontologist's murder when the expert is found stabbed with a dinosaur bone in Utah. - Long Firm
Author: Arnott, Jake
Publisher: Soho List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 15947169x Date: 1999KirkusPW
Club owner Harry Starks is a feared gangster in 1960s London. Five narrators tell the story of Harry's fall, and surprising resurrection, in this vividly imagined portrait of the sleazy London mobs ("firms") at the end of an era.
Suggested Reading: Mobbed Up - Big Trouble
Author: Barry, Dave
Publisher: Putnam List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0399145672 Date: 1999PWKirkusLibrary Journal
The humorous Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist makes his fiction debut with a ferociously funny novel about love and mayhem in south Florida, and the the life-changing events that rumble through a odd-ball family after two hit men pull up to their door.
Suggested Reading: All Stars | Humor | Florida Fiction | If You Like Carl Hiaasen - Bones: Irene Kelly
Author: Burke, Jan
Publisher: Simon & Schuster List Price: $ 23 ISBN: 0684855518 Date: 1999Booklist
Killer Nick Parrish says he'll lead authorities to the body of Judith Sayre - they will not demand the death sentence for his heinous crimes. But the criminal has no intention of spending his life behind bars - and he plans some deadly surprises. - The Catastrophist
Author: Bennett, Ronan
Publisher: Simon & Schuster List Price: $ 24 ISBN: 0684863340 Date: 1999PW
In subtle, haunting prose, Bennett captures the ricochet between the personal and political in the 1960s Congo - a colonial paradise about to erupt into chaos, where a man struggles to hold on to his lover, his sanity, and his life. - Heartwood
Author: Burke, James Lee
Publisher: Doubleday List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0385488432 Date: 1999PW
Billy Bob Holland, defense attorney and former Texas Ranger, defends an utterly hapless man, who is accused, by the most influential character in town, of taking a historically significant watch and $300,000 in bearer's bonds. - Majic Man: Nathan Heller
Author: Collins, Max Allen
Publisher: Dutton List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0525945156 Date: 1999PW
It's 1949, and Nathan Heller, president of the A-1 Detective Agency of Chicago, has been called to Washington, D.C., by retiring Secretary of Defense James Forrestal. The man is fearful of his life, and it's up to Nate to find out who wants him dead. - Gumbo Limbo
Author: Corcoran, Tom
Publisher: Minotaur List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312241941 Date: 1999PW
The author of the critically acclaimed The Mango Opera returns with a new Alex Rutledge mystery, where the part-time Key West crime scene photographer comes to the rescue of an old Navy buddy who has come up missing.
Suggested Reading: Florida Fiction - Train Man
Author: Deutermann, P.T.
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 25.95 ISBN: 0312203756 Date: 1999PW
When one of the six major rail bridges that crosses the Mississippi River collapses as a freight train is crossing it, the FBI sends two agents to investigate. Meanwhile, at an Alabama army depot, a military train carrying a deadly cargo begins its journey west. - Spanking Watson
Author: Friedman, Kinky
Publisher: Simon & Schuster List Price: $ 23 ISBN: 0684850613 Date: 1999Kirkus
Kinky Friedman tests his crew to see which would be his best sidekick - but in the middle of the investigation, someone attempts to kill the Kinkster's upstairs neighbor and dance teacher. - Gravity
Author: Gerritsen, Tess
Publisher: Pocket List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0671016784 Date: 1999PW
A young NASA doctor must combat a lethal microbe that is multiplying out of control - and in space. - Pocket marketing.
Suggested Reading: Medical Fiction | Medical Thrillers - A Place of Safety
Author: Graham, Caroline
Publisher: Minotaur List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312244193 Date: 1999PW
Charlie Leathers was not the most popular man in the charming English village of Ferne Basset, but few people seemed to hate him enough to murder him. Still, that was his fate one night, and it brings Inspector Barnaby to the scene to investigate. - Fool and His Honey
Author: Harris, Charlaine
Publisher: Minotaur List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0312203063 Date: 1999Kirkus
The return of Harris's beloved amateur sleuth, liberated Southern belle Aurora Teagarden, finds Roe investigating a brutal murder and the origins of an abandoned baby. - Now's the Time: The Complete Resnick
Short Stories
Author: Harvey, John
Publisher: Dufour List Price: $ 14.95 (trade paper) ISBN: 1871033535 Date: 1999Booklist - Vengeance: Lew Fonesca
Author: Kaminsky, Stuart M.
Publisher: Forge List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0312869274 Date: 1999PWKirkusBooklist
A process server quits his job and flees town to escape the memories of his beloved late wife. When his car breaks down in Florida, Lew Fonesca settles there and is hired find a man's missing wife.
Suggested Reading: All Stars | Florida Fiction - Fourth Down
Author: Klein, Dave
Publisher: Forge List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0312863705 Date: 1999Booklist
When a star quarterback, who is bring forced by the mob to throw games, dies in the middle of a game, a former teammate starts digging deep into the suspected murder.
Suggested Reading: Mobbed Up | Sport Stars - Cracks
Author: Kohler, Sheila
Publisher: Zoland List Price: $ 21 ISBN: 158195008x Date: 1999Kirkus
A stunning tale of the passion and tribalism of adolescence, Cracks - set in a South African boarding school for girls in the 1960s - is reminiscent of Lord of the Flies and Picnic at Hanging Rock. - Quit Monks or Die
Author: Kumin, Maxine
Publisher: Story Line List Price: $ 19.95 ISBN: 1885266774 Date: 1999PW
Quit Monks or Die! Maxine Kumin This gripping literary novel exposes the complicated passions and politics of the volative animal rights movement. Written by one of America's greatest poets and essay writers, Quit Monks or Die is a scathing social commentary, with a little mystery thrown in for good measure. - Publisher marketing. - Freezer Burn
Author: Lansdale, Joe R.
Publisher: Mysterious List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 089296703x Date: 1999Booklist
Hideously disfigured during a bungled firecracker stand hold-up, Bill joins a traveling freak show to evade police. He doesn't stand out too much among the dogmen, bearded women, hermaphrodites, and the mysterious frozen man whose sinister aura seems to link them all. - The Elvis and Marilyn Affair
Author: Levinson, Robert S.
Publisher: Forge List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0312869681 Date: 1999Booklist
When soap actress Stevie Marriner becomes the prime suspect in the murder of a once-famous movie director, the key is untangling the truth in a rumor that Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe had a torrid love affair. And someone has the letters to prove it!
Suggested Reading: Elvis - Family Honor
Author: Parker, Robert B.
Publisher: Putnam List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0399145664 Date: 1999KirkusPW
After rescuing a wealth family's missing teenage daughter from prostitution, private investigator Sunny Randall becomes the girl's unlikely bodyguard, fending off some serious mobsters and getting involved in a murder case and criminal conspiracy.
Suggested Reading: Mobbed Up - The Skull Mantra
Author: Pattison, Eliot
Publisher: Minotaur List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0312204787 Date: 1999BooklistPWKirkus
When a headless corpse is found on a windy Tibetan mountainside, the astonishing early evidence shows that the killer is a mythical Buddhist demon.
Suggested Reading: All Stars - The Jook
Author: Phillips, Gary
Publisher: Really Great Books List Price: $ 7.95 (trade paper) ISBN: 1893329046 Date: 1999Booklist - Stone Quarry
Author: Rozan, S.J.
Publisher: Minotaur List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312209126 Date: 1999PWBooklist
In the finest novel yet in an award-winning series, murder, corruption, and long-held secrets threaten to destroy a small town when P.I. Bill Smith is summoned to recover six stolen paintings.
Suggested Reading: Private Investigators - Peking Letter: A Novel of China's
Civil War
Author: Topping, Seymour
Publisher: Public Affairs List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 1891620355 Date: 1999Booklist
A love affair between a CIA agent and a young Chinese revolutionary changes the turbulent course of the Chinese Civil War in this panoramic debut novel by renowned journalist Seymour Topping. - Personal Injuries
Author: Turow, Scott
Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux List Price: $ 27 ISBN: 0374281947 Date: 1999KirkusPW
Suggested Reading: Legal Stars - The Bird Yard
Author: Wallis, Martin J.
Publisher: Minotaur List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312205007 Date: 1999PW
When two boys come up missing, the evidence leads to an aviary or bird yard attached to an abandoned house. Detective Parker, convinced that the killer is stalking his third victim, enlists a child psychologist to unravel a dark secret.
August
- Darkness Peering
Author: Blanchard, Alice
Publisher: Bantam List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0553111531 Date: 1999KirkusLibrary Journal
For Police Chief Nalen Storrow, the murder of teenager Melissa D'Agostino is a shocking reminder of everything he'd tried to put behind him when he moved his family to small-town Maine. And as Storrow searches for the truth about Melissa's death, a chilling possibility awaits: He will have to interrogate his son, Billy, as a suspect.
Suggested Reading: Psycho Killers | Serial Killers - The Rainy Season
Author: Blaylock, James P.
Publisher: Ace List Price: $ 21.95 ISBN: 0441006183 Date: 1999PW
After the sudden death of his wife, Phil Ainsworth senses an eerie presence in the house. His niece, left in his care, is a special child who can sense powerful emotions from the past - and see the uncanny powers closing around them.
Suggested Reading: Woo Woo Stars - Cuba
Author: Coonts, Stephen
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 031220521x Date: 1999PW
Rear Admirable Jack Grafton, the hero of five New York Times bestsellers, returns in a powerful novel, as the United States and Cuba engage in a terrifying game of brinksmanship - a gamble that could break the last military taboo and destroy both countries. - Devil's Teardrop: A Novel of
the Last Night of the Year
Author: Deaver, Jeffrey
Publisher: Simon & Schuster List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 0684852926 Date: 1999PW
From the bestselling author of The Coffin Dancer comes a new, unforgettable thriller about an extortion plot gone wrong and a forensic expert who has just one clue to save hundreds from being murdered. - The Hours of the Virgin
Author: Estleman, Loren D.
Publisher: Mysterious List Price: $ 23 ISBN: 0892966831 Date: 1999PW
Walker follows the 500-year-old trail of a stolen illuminated manuscript across the bleak landscape of a dead city, coming face to face with a variety of odd characters.
Suggested Reading: Private Investigators - Cold Hit
Author: Fairstein, Linda
Publisher: Scribner List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 0684848465 Date: 1999PW
The mysterious death of a wealthy art collector leads Assistant D.A. Alexandra Cooper and NYPD detectives Mike Chapman and Mercer Wallace on a quest for clues that takes them behind the scenes at glitzy East Side auction houses, to top-level police meetings, and into courtrooms, where justice does not always prevail.
Sugggested Reading List: Legal Stars | Nazi Plunder - Anonymous Rex: A Detective Story
Author: Garcia,
Eric
Publisher: Villard List Price: $ 23 ISBN: 0375503269 Date: 1999PW
Vincent Rubio, a Los Angeles private investigator, is down on his luck: He's out of work. His car's been reposessed. He's been banned from The Council. His partner has died under mysterious circumstances. And his tail just won't stay put. Somewhere between L.A. Confidential and Jurassic Park, you can find Anonymous Rex, one of the smartest, wittiest, and most entertaining debuts this side of the Ice Age. - From the Anonymous Rex web site.
Suggested Reading: Humorous Mysteries | Debuts - Shallow Grave
Author: Harrod-Eagles, Cynthia
Publisher: Scribner List Price: $ 22 ISBN: 0684837773 Date: 1999Kirkus
In the seventh mystery in this stylish, witty series, Scotland Yard's Inspector Bill Slider investigates a woman's murder in an exclusive West London neighborhood - and her husband's possible involvement. - Body Politic
Author: Johnson, Paul
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0312202792 Date: 1999PW
Gorky Park meets Brave New World in this award-winning debut novel of a serial killer lost in a supposedly perfect society overtaken by the Enlightenment.
Suggested Reading: Scottish Crime Fiction - Comedy of Heirs
Author: MacPherson, Rhett
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 21.95 ISBN: 0312205139 Date: 1999PW
As Torie O'Shea explores her family tree, she discovers that her great-grandfather was murdered, and that her great-uncle was the main suspect. She never dreams that the past history she thought was long-buried could resurface in the present in such a deadly way. - Dark Lady: A Novel of Suspense
Author: Patterson, Richard North
Publisher: Knopf List Price: $ 25.95 ISBN: 0679450432 Date: 1999Booklist
In a steel-mill town on the verge of an economic comeback, two prominent men are found dead within days of each other. In each case, the known character of the man seems grossly more contradicted by the circumstances of his death. But, as assistant county prosecutor Stella Marz discovers, the victims and their deaths may be connected in ways that no one would ever suspect. - Write to Kill
Author: Pennac, Daniel
Publisher: Harvill List Price: $ 23 ISBN: 1860465358 Date: 1999
Booklist
This is not the sort of offer professional scapegoat and downtrodden publisher Benjamin Malaussene is used to. But his boss, Queen Zabo, the redoubtable doyenne of the Parisian publishing world, has finally offered him a starting role -- all he has to do is impersonate the world's best-loved but hitherto anonymous author. Yet things are never quite so simple for Malaussene and his extended family of misfits and chancers. Soon he is in deep: the theft of a manuscript, a frenzied readership, the disarray of his private life, and then a spate of connected murders that threaten to destroy Vendetta Press entirely.Think of a cross between Diva and Delicatessen, set within the literary intrigue of a publishing house and the multiracial exuberance of low-life Paris, and you will be somewhere near the world of Pennac's Belleville quarter. - Publisher marketing.
- The Wicked Winter
Author: Sedley, Kate
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0312206259 Date: 1999PWKirkus
This sixth installment of this medieval mystery series finds Roger traveling to Cederwell Manor to sell his wares. He is not overjoyed to meet the ever-zealous Brother Simeon, who has come to pray with Lady Cederwell. But when she is found dead, the two unite to uncover the truth.
Suggested Reading: Historical Crime Fiction - Mr. X
Author: Straub, Peter
Publisher: Random House List Price: $ 25.95 ISBN: 0679401385 Date: 1999PW
The bestselling author of Ghost Story returns to the supernatural genre for the first time in over a decade. Over the week culminating in his 35th birthday, Ned Dunstan endures a series of extraordinary events which reveal the long-withheld secret of his identity.
Suggested Reading: Woo Woo Stars | Scary Stars - Mystery Midrash: An Anthology of
Jewish Mystery and Detective Fiction
Author: Raphael, Lawrence (ed)
Publisher: Jewish Lights List Price: $ 16.95 (trade paper) ISBN: 1582030555 Date: 1999PW - Justice at Risk: Benjamin Justice
Author: Wilson, John Morgan
Publisher: Doubleday List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0385491166 Date: 1999PWBooklist
The investigation of a 15-year-old crime puts Benjamin Justice at mortal risk, in the latest dark and dangerous episode in this award-winning series.
July
- Murder in Marais
Author: Black, Cara
Publisher: Soho List Price: $ 22 ISBN: 1569471592 Date: 1999PW
It is November 1993 and the French prime ministerial candidate is about to sign a treaty with Germany that wilt severely restrict immigration, reminiscent of the Vichy laws. Aimee Leduc is approached by a rabbi to decipher a fifty-year-old encrypted photograph and place it in the hands of Lili Stein. When she arrives at Lili's apartment in the Marais, the old Jewish quarter of Paris, she finds a corpse on whose forehead is carved a swastika. With the help of her partner, a dwarf with extraordinary computer hacking skills, Aimee is determined to solve this horrendous crime. Then more murders follow. Her search for the kilter leads her to a German war veteran involved in the 1940s with a Jewish girt he was supposed to send to her death. It takes Aimee undercover inside a neo-Nazi group, where she must play a dangerous game of current politics and old war crimes. Many of the order Jews in the Marais are afraid and prefer to leave the past alone, but the horrible legacy of the death camps and the words "never forget" propel Aimee to find out the true identities of the criminals past and present. - Soho marketing. - The Final Detail
Author: Coben,
Harlan
Publisher: Delacorte List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0385323719 Date: 1999PWKirkus
As he plunges into his most difficult and bizarre case yet, reluctant sleuth Myron Bolitar works to clear his partner's name when she is accused of killing a client, a fallen baseball star attempting a comeback. - Black Notice
Author: Cornwell, Patricia
Publisher: Putnam List Price: $ 25.95 ISBN: 0399145087 Date: 1999KirkusPWLibrary Journal
Kay Scarpetta is taken an ocean's length away from home in the newest high-stakes novel by bestselling author Patricia Cornwell. A cargo ship arriving from Belgium at Richmond's Deep Water Terminal is discovered to be transporting a locked, sealed container holding the decomposed remains of a stowaway.
Suggested Reading: Crime Scene Investigations | All Stars - L.A. Requiem
Author: Crais,
Robert
Publisher: Doubleday List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0385495838 Date: 1999PWBooklistKirkus
A past vendetta strains the partnership of investigators Joe Pike and Elvis Cole when Pike becomes a suspect in the death of his former lover.
Suggested Reading: Private Investigators | All Stars - High Five
Author: Evanovich,
Janet
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312203039 Date: 1999BooklistKirkusPW
The bestselling author of Four to Score brings back bounty hunter Stephanie Plum, in her fifth hilarious, high-octane thriller. Out of bail skippers and rent money, Stephanie throws caution to the wind and engages in some morally correct yet marginally legal enterprises, including tracking down her Uncle Fred, who's missing after arguing with his garbage company.
Suggested Reading: Humorous Mysteries | All Stars | If You Like Janet Evanovich - Solar Eclipse
Author: Farris, John
Publisher: Forge List Price: $ 25.95 ISBN: 0312850727 Date: 1999Booklist
After a stuntwoman's Chevy Tahoe is forced off the road, she and her daughter walk to a lone house for help, only to find the occupants sitting at the dinner table - with bullets in their foreheads. - Killing Me Softly
Author: French, Nicci
Publisher: Mysterious List Price: $ 24 ISBN: 089296691 Date: 1999Kirkus
Damage meets Into Thin Air in this spellbinding novel of a forbidden love turned into a dangerous obsession that drives a woman to impulsively abandon her old life and marry a charismatic stranger.
Suggested Reading: Psychological Suspense Stars - Jade Palace Vendetta: A Samurai Mystery
Author: Furutani, Dale
Publisher: William Morrow List Price: $ 23 ISBN: 0688158188 Date: 1999PW
The second installment in the beguiling mystery series set in the heart of feudal Japan. As the noble ronin Matsuyama Kaze continues the search to find his lord's missing child, he finds himself trapped in a web of deceit and violence, where a veneer of propriety hides a great evil.
Suggested Reading: Historical Crime Fiction - Blood of the Prodigal: An
Ohio Amish Mystery
Author: Gaus, P.L.
Publisher: Ohio Univ. List Price: $ 12.95 ISBN: 0821412779 Date: 1999Kirkus
Professor Michael Branden plunges headlong into the Amish culture when a boy goes missing and the body of his father is discovered, dressed in Amish garb. - Hannibal
Author: Harris, Thomas
Publisher: Delacorte List Price: $ 27.95 ISBN: 038529929x Date: 1999PW
Seven years after Dr. Hannibal Lecter's escape from the authorities, the climax of Silence of the Lambs, one of his earlier victims uses Agent Starling as bait to draw the doctor into an intricate and unspeakable design for revenge.
Suggested Reading: Psychological Suspense Stars - Known Dead
Author: Harstad, Donald
Publisher: Doubleday List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0385488955 Date: 1999Booklist
Nation County, Iowa, Deputy Sheriff Carl Houseman returns in a suspenseful new novel. When he hears the call sign, "officer needs assistance," Carl finds himself stepping into the middle of a war zone, where there are already two known dead, and the shooters show no signs of stopping. - Hunting Down Amanda
Author: Klaven, Andrew
Publisher: William Morrow List Price: $ 25 ISBN: 0688168957 Date: 1999KirkusPW
A fast-paced and electrifying thriller by the author of True Crime. Lonnie Blake's wife was brutally murdered three years ago. Now he finds that someone has dispatched a team of ruthless killers to hunt down his new lover and her five-year-old daughter. - Descent
Author: Long, Jeff
Publisher: Crown List Price: $ 24 ISBN: 0609602394 Date: 1999Booklist
The subterranean kingdom of humanity's deepest fears erupts into the world with terrible reality. The demonic hordes exist. So, too, does their satanic overlord, whose ultimate purpose remains shrouded in the darkness over which he reigns.
Suggested Reading: Supernatural Stars - The Wanton Angel
Author: Marston, Edward
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312203918 Date: 1999PW
The tenth in an Edgar Award-nominated series set in the theaters of Elizabethan England. When court politics threaten to lower the curtain on Lord Westfield's Men, an anonymous benefactor emerges. Soon, one of the group's rising stars is found murdered.
Suggested Reading: Historical Crime Fiction - Italian Fever
Author: Martin, Valerie
Publisher: Knopf List Price: $ 22 ISBN: 0375405429 Date: 1999BooklistLibrary Journal
From the author of The Great Divorce and Mary Reilly. Searching for her late employer's manuscript in Italy, Lucy Stark is drawn into the thick of various mysteries, including the whereabouts of the man's latest lover and the true cause of his death. - Victim's Choice
Author: McClister, Michael
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0312206186 Date: 1999Kirkus
In this spectacular first novel by Michael McClister, Joe Colby is a successful TV newscaster and a recent widower. When he loses his two children to a rapist-murderer, there is little that can be done to assuage his crippling grief - even when the man is caught and put behind bars. With an unquenchable thirst for revenge, Joe develops a crazy scheme to get at the criminal in prison. At the same time, there begins in the city a series of murders of people close to convicted killers. A double homicide takes the lives of the wives of the lawyer who defended several of the criminals and of the judge whose sentences were thought too lenient. A citywide panic begins, as others receive threats and there are more murders. A famous crime fighter is soon enlisted to try and find the person who calls himself "The Avenger". The tension mounts until the climactic and utterly surprising ending. - Publisher marketing. - Shell Game: A Mallory Novel
Author: O'Connell, Carol
Publisher: Putnam List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0399144951 Date: 1999BooklistPWLibrary Journal
The recreation of a legendary magic trick goes horribly awry on live television - a terrible accident, everyone agrees. But two people know otherwise. One is an aged magician in a private hospital and the other is streetwise Kathy Mallory, now a New York City policewoman.
Suggested Reading: Magic & Magicians | All Stars - The First Victim
Author: Pearson, Ridley
Publisher: Hyperion List Price: $ 23.95 ISBN: 0786864400 Date: 1999PWBooklist
When a female reporter disappears - purportedly at the hands of the Chinese Triad - while investigating a story on illegal aliens, Lou Boldt and John LaMoia of the Seattle Police Department embark on an investigation that leads them from Seattle's docklands to the offices of the INS in search of answers. - Lost Daughters
Author: Redmann, J.M.
Publisher: Norton List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0393040283 Date: 1999Booklist - The Sexual Occupation of Japan
Author: Setlowe, Richard
Publisher: HarperCollins List Price: $ 24 ISBN: 006018934 Date: 1999KirkusPWLibrary Journal
A smart, riveting thriller and poignant love story set amid Japan's volcanic economy and political intrigues. An American lawyer fights to keep a secret, multibillion dollar deal - and himself - alive in a country haunted by the past.
Suggested Reading: All Stars - Bliss Jumps the Gun
Author: Sloan, Bob
Publisher: Foul Play List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0393047504 Date: 1999PW
New York City homicide detective Lenny Bliss's biggest mistake wasn't bungee-jumping off the Brooklyn Bridge. The mistake was handing his gun to the previous jumper, a young Chinese girl who has now disappeared.
Suggested Reading: Cops - Essential Saltes: An Experiment
Author: Webb, Don
Publisher: St Martins List Price: $ 22.95 ISBN: 0312203020 Date: 1999Booklist
After someone steals the remains of his dead wife, a man's quest for the ashes takes him into a realm of crime far beyond any cops-and-robbers adventure. - California Fire and Life
Author: Winslow, Don
Publisher: Knopf List Price: $ 23 ISBN: 0679454314 Date: 1999PW
From the author of The Death and Life of Bobby Z comes an unstoppable new novel about a Southern California Gold Coast conflagration of greed, deceit, and murder, and the one man trying to fight it.
Suggested Reading: Mobbed Up | On Fire
1999: Stars
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