A list of the top ten mystery hardcover bestsellers for the week ending August 18, 2006 has been posted on the Hidden Staircase Mystery Books website.A few newcomers to the lists this week.
At the top of the Borders/Amazon.com list is Ricochet by Sandra Brown. When Detective Sergeant Duncan Hatcher is summoned to the home of Judge Cato Laird in the middle of the night to investigate a fatal shooting, he knows that discretion and kid-glove treatment are the keys to staying in the judge's good graces and keeping his job. At first glance, the case appears open-and-shut: Elise, the judge's trophy wife, interrupted a burglary in progress and killed the intruder in self-defense. But Duncan is immediately suspicious of Elise's innocent act. His gut feeling is that her account of the shooting is only partially true -- and it's the parts she's leaving out that bother him. "No one does steamy suspense like Brown, as shown by this expert mix of spicy romance and sharply crafted crime drama," states Publishers Weekly.At the top of the Barnes&Noble.com list is Triptych by Karin Slaughter.
From Atlanta's wealthiest suburbs to its stark inner-city housing projects, a killer has crossed the boundaries of wealth and race. And the people who are chasing him must cross those boundaries, too. Among them is Michael Ormewood, a veteran detective whose marriage is hanging by a thread- and whose arrogance and explosive temper are threatening his career. And Angie Polaski, a beautiful vice cop who was once Michael's lover before she became his enemy. But unbeknownst to both of them, another player has entered the game: a loser ex-con who has stumbled upon the killer's trail in the most coincidental of ways- and who may be the key to breaking the case wide open. Kirkus Reviews writes that, "The volcanic heroes and villains, who act both surprisingly and logically, are a welcome sign that Slaughter's trademark franchise (the Grant County crime series) only hints at the range of her gifts."Finally, new to both lists is Mask Market by Andrew Vachss.
They meet in a no-name diner. A shadowy man hands Burke a CD dossier of someone he wants found. Minutes later, as Burke watches from an alley, his client is gunned down by a professional hunter-killer team. Burke slips away, unsure if he's been spotted. Later, when he examines the dossier, he discovers that the missing woman is Beryl Preston, a girl he'd rescued from a brutal pimp twenty years earlier -- when she was only thirteen -- and returned to her father. Now he has to find her again -- not only because she might be in danger, but also because he has to prove to himself that his rescue mission hadn't been financed by a predator who wanted his "property" returned. His search will force him to confront a new kind of human ugliness and, finally, to practice the survivalist triage that has marked -- and cursed -- his life since childhood. Publishers Weekly states, "Despite a familiar plot, the sharp-edged prose and cutting insights into New York's underbelly elevate this above many similar crime novels."Visit the Hidden Staircase Mystery Books often where we provide readers and collectors of mysteries with the best and most current information about their favorite mystery authors, books, and series.
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