THE OTHER WOMAN by Hank Phillippi Ryan

Embroiled in a lawsuit, TV reporter Jane Ryland protects her source and is let go by her station. Jane lands at the Boston Register newspaper, where she's assigned to look into why a Senate candidate's wife has dropped off the campaign trail. Jane's search overlaps a police investigation into possible serial killings.

My interest in The Other Woman was piqued last summer, when I saw it described on Twitter as "Basic Instinct meets The Manchurian Candidate." I'm still not sure what that means, but the book plays on readers' expectations of political corruption and collusion. It's not much a stretch to say everyone is involved with everyone else.

The book is told from the viewpoints of Jane, her friend Boston Det. Jake Brogan, and a handful of key players, but is nonetheless full of eye-popping revelations. Quite a feat.

"I'm going to Bouchercon 2013."

Yes, Bouchercon would be my vacation of choice if I won an NBA championship. If you'd like to meet me in Albany next month, I'll be attending the opening ceremonies Thursday night, during which SMFS President Tom Sweeney will present plaques to the 2013 Derringer Award winners.

I'm also on the "A Room of Our Own" panel, Saturday 3:10–4:05 P.M. in Room 4. Reviewers Dave Magayna, Lynn Farris, Jordan Foster, Joe Meyers, Kristopher Zgorski and I will discuss what we're reading now.

BLACK APERTURE by Matt Rasmussen

As a member of the Academy of American Poets, I received a copy of Black Aperture, winner of the Academy's Walt Whitman Award for poets' first books. I did not intend to read the book in three sittings, wanting to give each poem space, but the overarching subject—the poet's brother's suicide—is darkly absorbing.

The poems are tightly written, yet figurative and purposeful; the book an example of where poetry, crime, and noir can meet.

Visit Matt Rasmussen's website.

THE BROKEN PLACES by Ace Atkins

Atkins' third Quinn Colson novel is out today. Here's my Amazon review. I have a longer one coming to Crimespree Magazine.

ROBERT B. PARKER'S WONDERLAND by Ace Atkins

Atkins' ambitious second Spenser novel is out today. Here's my Amazon review.

UPDATE (May 8, 2013): The sun broke out on an otherwise rainy day just before Ace Atkins signed WONDERLAND at New York City's Mysterious Bookshop. My friend and fellow Spenser fan, John Ricotta, and I attended along with Joe Guglielmelli of the East Side's dearly-missed Black Orchid Bookshop, and noir "queenpin" Megan Abbott.

Though this is the first we've met in person, I interviewed Ace for Crimespree Magazine on April 29, 2011, two days after Putnam and Parker's estate announced him as the choice to continue the Spenser novels. In his answers, I saw true knowledge of Spenser and respect for Parker. There's nothing like chatting with people who've read what you've read, watched or listened with the same fervor, but have perspectives you're hearing for the first time.

LEVERAGE: THE CON JOB by Matt Forbeck

Nathan Ford and his team of good-doing thieves, last seen on the TV series Leverage, come to the aid of aging comic book artist Simon Curtiss when forger Lorenzo Patronus, looking to make a splash at San Diego Comic-Con, cheats Curtiss of his life's work.

This is the first of three Leverage tie-in novels to date. I'm interested as a fan of the show from the beginning, but also, as a writer, I wanted to see how the show's style translated to novels. The show relied on quick cuts, flashbacks, and our heroes constantly talking with each other through earpieces. Matt Forbeck's chapters are short to keep the pace up, each one holding to one hero's view of the action for the most part. It works well, and Forbeck shows knowledge of each character's backstory and their dynamics with each other. Forbeck does not employ the show's quick flashbacks, which were effective for TV, but in a novel might have slowed the pace or disrupted the narrative.

Each of the three novels is written by a different author, which also attracted me to the books. Paging through the second, I see Keith R.A. DeCandido does use jumps in chronology (Now, An Hour Ago, Last Week...). In the right hands, the technique can work.

LEVIATHAN WAKES by James S.A. Corey

A few hundred years into the future, Jim Holden, executive officer of the ice hauler Canterbury, is part of a small team sent to the derelict ship Scopuli shortly before Canterbury is inexplicably destroyed by stealth fighters. Holden and the team try to survive long enough to find answers as the incident pushes Earth, Mars, and the Belt toward war.

Meanwhile, Miller, a detective with Star Helix security force on the dwarf planet Ceres, is assigned to retrieve Julie Mao, who rebelled against her wealthy parents and was last known to be aboard Scopuli.

My friend Matt Tedesco recommended LEVIATHAN WAKES to me last summer. It's the first book in The Expanse series, and when I learned the pseudonymous co-authors were inspired in part by Joss Whedon's Firefly, I was poised to plunk down coin, only Matt gave me the book for Christmas.

It's everything he promised, an absorbing vision of the future that, like Firefly, feels lived in. The characters may come from far off times and places, but I can relate to them. As a crime fiction fan, I especially related to Miller, but the story works because the characters are individuals. To hear from each of them is to get a sense how humanity might indeed react to technological advances and alien encounters.

Sign me up for the series.

In Short

I commented on a post about reading and writing short stories from Murderati's Stephen Jay Schwartz.

2013 MWA Edgar Nominees

I'm happy to see several books and TV episodes I enjoyed among the nominees.

THE LOST ONES by Ace Atkins, second in his Quinn Colson series, is up for Best Novel.

IN PURSUIT OF SPENSER ed. Otto Penzler, the Robert B. Parker tribute collection of essays, is up for Best Critical/Biographical.

And the pilot episode of A&E's LONGMIRE is up against the ELEMENTARY episode "Child Predator" in the Television category.

Congratulations and good luck to all.

RIDE 2: MORE SHORT FICTION ABOUT BICYCLES ed. Keith Snyder

I'd known of Keith Snyder for many years as a fellow Robert B. Parker fan and author of the Jason Keltner mystery series. Two years ago, he attended a reading of crime fiction and poetry at which I performed, and since then we've bonded over poetry, Parker, and ebook production.

When Keith mentioned that this second volume of bicycle-themed fiction also featured two poems, I jumped at his offer of a review copy. The eight contributors to Ride 2 clearly share Keith's passion for cycling, and the book is sure to appeal to readers who do, or to someone like me, who last pedaled the block on training wheels but fondly recalls the feeling of coasting under my own power.

Nothing Gold Can Stay

I love printed books. They will always have certain advantages over ebooks. For one, you can read them without electricity or batteries. For another, when you buy a physical book, it's yours. You walk out of the store and go home with it and keep it for as long as you want.

To the surprise of some, that's not the case with ebooks. Major vendors control whether and how long you can read ebooks you've "bought". (They now say "rented" is a better description of downloaded books.)

Still reading more paper books than ebooks, I hadn't come to think of purchased ebooks as permanently mine. As a poetry editor, I have to be up on how ebooks are read and created because I want the e-reading public to read poetry. That said, my ebook pricing reflects that ebooks aren't solid like books, in the same way MP3s aren't solid like CDs. If I can't hold them in my hand, I expect to pay less for them.

The ebooks I publish will always cost less than print would, reflecting that no money was spent on paper, ink, and binding. My ebooks will never be free because I believe creative and clerical work have value; but, if and when Amazon or BN decides to pull back your purchases, you're only out the cost of a movie rental.

THE LONELY SILVER RAIN by John D. MacDonald

I've read several of MacDonald's Travis McGee books, but never this final one until now. I felt like reading it after learning that Robert B. Parker's Cole and Hitch would be continued by actor/screenwriter Robert Knott. I support the continuation plans, but they also remind me that no two authors have the same intangibles. Parker wasn't the first mystery writer I read, but his eloquent, clean prose overshadowed everyone I read after him, John D. included.

I've been an email list moderator for thirteen years and, in that time, have tried to read widely and see writers' strengths and weaknesses. Even so, only now, two years after Parker's passing, do I realize to what extent he colored my opinions of other writing. As flattered as I'd be if someone likened my writing to Parker's or MacDonald's, I want to be appreciated for my intangibles.

Ready to see MacDonald in his own light, I chose The Lonely Silver Rain because I have a soft spot for first and last books. Writers put the most on the line with the first book; it's the one that sells the rest. It's pretty to think writers put the same into a series' last book, but most writers don't know they're writing a last book as they're writing it. In MacDonald's case, there's plenty to suggest he might have known.

Tracking down a friend's stolen yacht, McGee comes across the aftermath of three brutal murders and vows to bring the killer or killers to justice. A couple of close calls and encounters with recurring characters dying from cancer give him plenty of time to ponder, if not his own mortality, when he might give up his crusading lifestyle. The book is a satisfying last adventure in print, but its ending lets readers imagine more, the best of both worlds.

LAST CHANCE LASSITER by Paul Levine

LAST CHANCE LASSITER is an ebook novella published this month, a prequel to TO SPEAK FOR THE DEAD, the first novel featuring Miami Dolphins linebacker-turned-lawyer Jake Lassiter. The novella has Jake refusing to represent James Farrell, a man who all but admits to beating his wife. Shortly after quitting his firm, Jake takes a case of music plagiarism on referral from the boss he just antagonized.

As with any prequel, the most compelling question is not whether things work out, but how they work out. A crafty lawyer and writer in his own regard, Levine paints Jake into quite a corner and just as craftily gets him out.

If you haven't read the Jake Lassiter novels, this is a chance to get in on the ground floor, so to speak. If you're a Lassiter fan like I am, you'll jump at the chance to see more of Jake's history.

THE TRINITY GAME by Sean Chercover

Let me preface this review by saying I so enjoyed Chercover's Ray Dudgeon P.I. books (BIG CITY, BAD BLOOD; TRIGGER CITY) that I would read anything he wrote. I requested an advance copy of THE TRINITY GAME (on sale July 31) knowing nothing about its plot.

Father Daniel Byrne, who works for the Vatican verifying and disproving miracles, is assigned to debunk televangelist Tim Trinity, who also happens to be Daniel's estranged uncle. Having been raised by Trinity, Daniel already knows his uncle is a con man. However, arriving on scene, Daniel deciphers Trinity's speaking-in-tongues act as a genuine gift of prophecy. This discovery sends everyone after Trinity, from a legendary Las Vegas bookie, to shadowy factions of the Church, to the lost love of Daniel's life, newspaper reporter Julia Rothman.

Religious conspiracies don't interest me; I'm too skeptical of them to get very far. I was able to put that bias aside, though, and read the book for Daniel Byrne, a man hiding much behind the collar. The complex relationship of nephew and uncle was more important than their being priest and preacher. If you like mounting conspiracies and sweeping suspense, there's plenty to go around.

I come away from THE TRINITY GAME with an even higher opinion of Chercover's writing, convinced he can thrive in page-turners as well as P.I. fiction.

THE LOST ONES by Ace Atkins

Atkins' Edgar®-nominated THE RANGER ended with Deputy Lillie Virgil prodding Quinn Colson to run for sheriff of Tibbehah County, Mississippi. Having recently won election in THE LOST ONES, Quinn is confronted with two complex cases, one involving fugitive foster parents with eleven young children in tow, the other involving Donnie Varner, a disgruntled Afghanistan veteran looking to sell stolen weapons to Mexican drug dealers. On the homefront, Quinn has to deal with the reappearance of his sister, Caddy, who claims to have found religion, and wants Quinn to revisit a painful episode of their childhood.

THE LOST ONES shines in its moral complexity. Donnie is a reflection of what Quinn might have become had his uncle and the Army not straightened him out, but he isn't all black-hat villain, nor is the alluring drug dealer he falls for, nor the fugitive foster mother. Because none of the characters can be reduced to type, at no point can you assume how things play out. You have to keep reading, keep watching which way the characters turn. There is no better suspense.