Whacking Jimmy

Whacking Jimmy

William Wolf

William Wolf

Amazon.com ReviewThe Mafia is not an equal-opportunity employer, a fact made emphatically clear to Annette Tucci, daughter of one mobster, daughter-in-law of another, and the worst mother since Medea. When Don Vittorio, head of the Detroit mob, anoints Annette's son Bobby as his reluctant heir, Annette hatches a plot to take the reins of the Family. It all hinges on the $40 million the old man has promised Bobby once he's made his bones by whacking Jimmy--Jimmy Hoffa, that is. Annette knows her soft-hearted kid is much more interested in his college classes, his girlfriend Tillie, and his burgeoning career as a rock musician than running the mob, so she stages a power play that pits the Don's first lieutenant and her own father (chief of the Chicago Family) against Bobby. William Wolf's debut mystery is a romp that will delight fans of Donald Westlake and Elmore Leonard, with plenty of local color and a cast of lively, picaresque minor characters (including Mendy Pearlstein, a Runyonesque mentor who steers Bobby through the shark-infested waters of organized crime; Tillie's mother, Ann, who's seduced by Mendy's charm and prefers him to her banker husband; and Rudy and Delbert, a couple of black street kids who take over the former clubhouse of the Purple Gang and turn it into a neighborhood youth club funded by grants from a Grosse Pointe foundation). Whacking Jimmy is a fast, funny novel that offers an intriguing, if implausible, solution to one of the biggest mysteries since Judge Crater disappeared. --Jane AdamsFrom Publishers WeeklyWhoever the pseudonymous Wolf may be, he knows how to add a fresh twist to familiar material. Although Jimmy Hoffa's 1975 disappearance has already been put through the fictional grinder by several authors, most recently Jon R. Jackson in his excellent Man with an Ax, Wolf gives his version of the story depth and originality by energizing characters who easily could have become cliches. Don Vittorio Tucci, the Detroit mob leader whose death kickstarts the plot, is an eminently nasty but utterly believable pragmatist. When his daughter-in-law suggests that his 21-year-old grandson Bobby should be his heir, Don Vittorio says, "Bobby's a sissy. He's got hair like a girl. He plays the guitar. Last Christmas he told me he wants to write novels, for Christ's sake. He wouldn't last ten minutes." But Bobby's mother, Annette (the daughter of a Chicago capo, and an astonishingly evil piece of work), persuades the dying man that under her tutelage the boy will do just fine. The fact that Bobby hates his mother and has no desire to enter the family business is also refreshing: there's no instant Michael Corleone-type transformation from upstanding citizen to hoodlum. Wolf has created a gallery of supporting players?a loyal, smart old Jewish sidekick; a pair of inspired black gangsters who keep a boxing kangaroo to soften up the opposition?who are original and often hilarious. As for Hoffa, his death happens far offstage and doesn't have much to do with the rest of the story. But Wolf does have a plausible theory about where his body is buried. 35,000 first printing. Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Rubicon

Rubicon

J. S. Dewes

J. S. Dewes

J. S. Dewes, author of The Last Watch and The Exiled Fleet, returns with another science fiction space opera, Rubicon, that melds elements of Scalzi's Old Man's War with Edge of Tomorrow.Sergeant Adriene Valero wants to die.She can't.After enduring a traumatic resurrection for the ninety-sixth time, Valero is reassigned to a special forces unit and outfitted with a cutting-edge virtual intelligence aid. They could turn the tide in the war against intelligent machines dedicated to the assimilation, or destruction, of humanity.When her VI suddenly achieves sentience, Valero is drawn into the machinations of an enigmatic major who's hell-bent on ending the war—by any means necessary.The Divide seriesThe Last WatchThe Exiled FleetAt the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
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Moonlight Over Studland Bay

Moonlight Over Studland Bay

Della Galton

Della Galton

'Utterly uplifting, pure escapism' Trisha Ashley, bestselling author Animal loving Samantha Jones is on a mission to 'live the dream'. When best friend Abby has a beautiful baby boy Sam's priorities change and she realises she wants more from her life Uninspired with her dull day job Sam plans to expand Purbeck Pooches, her seaside pet sitting business into a full-time career and embarks on a mission to find her perfect man. Sam soon hits trouble. Her boss accuses her of moonlighting. The perfect man is frustratingly elusive and her parents make a shock revelation. The odds are stacking up against her but Sam finds that sometimes when you reach for the moon, you get a handful of glittering stars thrown in for free.
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Assignment: Eternity

Assignment: Eternity

Greg Cox

Science Fiction & Fantasy / Horror / Novelizations

Captain Kirk first encountered Gary Seven on twentieth-century Earth. Now Seven, a time-traveling operative for unknown alien forces, makes a surprise visit to the U.S.S. Enterprise. Kirk is on an urgent mission to bearing relief to a disaster ravaged planet, but Seven has an agenda of his own-- and he's not above hijacking the Starship Enterprise and sending it on a perilous journey deep into the heart of the Romulan Empire. Kirk must date to trust Gary Seven once again, as he confronts the possibility that the enigmatic stranger may bring death and destruction to Kirk's own era.
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You Should Have Known

You Should Have Known

Rebecca A. Keller

Rebecca A. Keller

Perfect for fans of Helene Tursten and Caroline B. Cooney, a grieving grandmother turns to murder in Rebecca Keller’s taut debut mystery that explores the bonds of family and the grudges we refuse to let go.When retired nurse Frannie Greene moves into a senior living apartment, she finds a compelling friendship with her new neighbor Katherine, only to discover that Katherine is married to the judge who Frannie believes is implicated in the death of her beloved granddaughter.Observing the medication cart sparks Frannie’s darkest imagination, and her desire for revenge combines with her medical expertise. In one dreadful, impulsive moment, she tampers with the medicine. However, the next day, someone is dead, and Frannie realizes the gravity of what she’s done.The police get involved, and suspicions gather around someone Frannie knows to be innocent. Wracked with remorse, Frannie’s anxiety becomes unbearable. As she works to make it...
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The Torso

The Torso

Helene Tursten

Helene Tursten

Part of a human torso washes up on a beach near Göteborg, Sweden. It is so mutilated that gender is only established by DNA testing. A similar crime, now several years old, remains unsolved in Denmark. Detective Inspector Irene Huss is dispatched to Copenhagen to liaise with police. Then a third corpse is discovered. This time it’s identified. It is a girl Detective Huss knew; she had been asked by the girl’s mother to locate her missing daughter. A fourth victim, the son of a woman heading the Copenhagen crime squad, is also known to Huss. She fears the killer is tracking her, killing people with whom she is connected. There is even a chilling suggestion that he or she is one of her colleagues. Helene Tursten has been compared to P.D. James in her native Sweden. Her Irene Huss mysteries have been highly praised. She lives in Göteborg, where she was born in 1954.
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Six Moon Dance

Six Moon Dance

Sheri S. Tepper

Science Fiction & Fantasy / Mystery & Thrillers / Horror

It was many years ago that humans came and settled the world of Newholme-cruelly bending the planet to their will; setting down roots and raising up cities and farms and a grand temple to their goddess.But now the ground itself is shaking with ever-increasing violence. And the Great Questioner, official arbiter of the Council of Worlds, has come to this isolated orb to investigate rumors of a terrible secret that lies buried deep within Newholme's past—a past that is not dead, not completely. And it will fall to Mouche, a beautiful youth of uncommon cleverness and spirit, to save his imperiled home by dicovering and embracing that which makes him unique among humans. For every living thing on newholme is doomed, unless Mouche can appease something dark and terrible that is coiled within...and surrender to the mysterious ecstatic revelry taht results when the six moons join.
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The Mystery of the Queen's Jewels

The Mystery of the Queen's Jewels

Gertrude Chandler Warner

Children's Books

The Boxcar Children are vacationing in London, England, where there is so much to see and do. Yet, as they eat their fish and chips, watch the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, and see the famous crown jewels of England, Violet can’t shake the feeling that someone is following them. Have the Aldens flown across the ocean straight into a mystery?
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N Is for Noose

N Is for Noose

Sue Grafton

Mystery / Suspense

Kinsey Millhone should have done something else--she should have turned the car in the direction of home. Instead, she was about to put herself in the gravest jeopardy of her career. Tom Newquist had been a detective in the Nota Lake sheriff's office--a tough, honest cop respected by everyone. When he died suddenly, the townsfolk were saddened but not surprised: Just shy of sixty-five, Newquist worked too hard, smoked too much, and exercised too little. That plus an appetite for junk food made him a poster boy for an American Heart Association campaign. Newquist's widow didn't doubt the coroner's report. But what Selma couldn't accept was not knowing what had so bothered Tom in the last six weeks of his life. What was it that had made him prowl restlessly at night, that had him brooding constantly? Selma Newquist wanted closure, and the only way she'd get it was if she found out what it was that had so bedeviled her husband. Kinsey should have dumped the case. It was vague and hopeless, like looking for a needle in a haystack. Instead, she set up shop in Nota Lake, where she found that looking for a needle in a haystack can draw blood. Very likely, her own."N" Is for Noose: a novel in which Kinsey Millhone becomes the target and an entire town seems in for the kill.
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A Chill In The Blood

A Chill In The Blood

P. N. Elrod

Science Fiction & Fantasy / Historical Fiction / Mystery & Thrillers

A delicious new novel of the The Vampire Files -- in which our undead detective finds himself caught in the middle of a Chicago gangland war!Take a bite out of the newest Vampire Files!A delicious new novel of the The Vampire files--in which our undead detective finds himself caught in the middle of a Chicago gangland war!"Excellent . . . The story shifts easily between comedy and mystery . . . clever and refreshing!"--Booklist"Entertaining . . . Echoes of Hammett and Chandler abound, but the novel succeeds in its own right."--Publishers Weekley"Fun . . . plenty of action [and] quirky characters."--Locus A brilliant blend of mystery, horror, comedy, and historical fiction
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Top Cat and Tales

Top Cat and Tales

Elizabeth Bevarly

Romance

In this charming romantic fantasy novella, two potential lovers need a little nudge from Cupid to set them on the path to romance. After a teenaged Cupid runs afoul of his mother, Aphrodite, he is cast down from Mt. Olympus to modern-day America in the guise of a cat to perform a good deed. But Cupid's matchmaking work is cut out for him. Shy professor Abby Walden may lust after her upstairs neighbor in secret, but confronting him in person is another thing entirely. What would she even say to a man who dresses in black leather and takes off for who knows where on his big ol' Harley hog during the darkest hours of the night? It may be too much for even a god of love to handle..."Top Cat and Tales," along with four other short reads by Elizabeth Bevarly, can also be purchased in the omnibus collection, SHORT WORK, for a reduced price!
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