Edited by Jeffrey Toobin, CNN’s senior legal analyst and New York Times bestselling author of The Nine, The Best American Crime Reporting 2009 is a must-have for the true crime reader, complete with the most gripping, suspenseful, and brilliant stories of the year by the masters of crime reporting. Featuring stories of fraud, murder, theft, and madness, the Best American Crime Reporting series has been hailed as “arresting reading” (People) and the best mix of “the political, the macabre, and the downright brilliant” (Entertainment Weekly).
Thieves, liars, killers, and conspirators—it's a criminal world out there, and someone has got to write about it. An eclectic collection of the year's best reportage, The Best American Crime Reporting 2007 brings together the murderers and muscle men, the masterminds, and the mysteries and missteps that make for brilliant stories, told by the aces of the true crime genre. This latest addition to the highly acclaimed series features guest editor Linda Fairstein, the bestselling crime novelist and former chief prosecutor of the Manhattan District Attorney's Office's pioneering Special Victims' Unit.
Thieves, liars, killers, and conspirators—it's a criminal world out there, and someone has got to write about it. An eclectic collection of the year's best reportage, The Best American Crime Reporting 2008 brings together the murderers and the masterminds, the mysteries and missteps that make for brilliant stories, told by the aces of the true-crime genre. This latest addition to the highly acclaimed series features guest editor Jonathan Kellerman, bestselling author of more than twenty crime novels, most recently Compulsion and the forthcoming Bones.
Thieves, liars, and killers—it's a criminal world out there, and someone has to write about it. A thrilling collection of the year's best reportage by the aces of the true-crime genre, The Best American Crime Reporting 2009 brings together the mysteries and missteps of an eclectic and unforgettable set of criminals. Gripping, suspenseful, and brilliant, this latest addition to the highly acclaimed series features guest editor Jeffrey Toobin, New Yorker staff writer, CNN senior legal analyst, and bestselling author of The Nine.
From some of our most talented and perceptive crime writers—an entertaining anthology of true stories from the front lines of the war zone that has become American business today. • “Lovely and juicy. It's all about egos, excess, lack of caution.” —USA Today A year ago it would have been difficult to conceive of an anthology of stories solely devoted to corporate malfeasance. Today, the challenge has been to keep it confined to one volume. From P.J. O’Rourke’s hilarious “How To Stuff A Wild Enron,” in which he compares trying to understand Enron’s finances to trying to buy an airline ticket at the best price, to Marc Peyser’s’s perceptive look at that American institution, Martha Stewart, to Joe Nocera’s investigation of how it all went wrong, the stories here are sometimes infuriating, often entertaining, and invariably informative. Includes: • “The New Bull Market” by Michael Kinsley from Slate • “In Praise of Corporate Corruption Boom” by Michael Lewis from Bloomberg News • “HardBall” by David McClintick from Forbes • “The Accountants’ War” by Jane Mayer from the New Yorker • “Enron Debacle Highlights the Trouble With Stock Options” by Thomas Stewart from Business 2.0 • “Investigating ImClone” by Alex Prud’homme from Vanity Fair
On the eve of WWII, an international plot leads to a deadly obsession: “Nobody tells a story better than Thomas H. Cook” (Michael Connelly, New York Times–bestselling author of Two Kinds of Truth). It’s 1939 and the world is on the brink of war, but Thomas Danforth is in New York City living a fortunate life. The well-traveled son of a wealthy importer, he’s in his twenties and running the family business, looking forward to a bright future. Then, during a snowy evening walk along Gramercy Park, a friend makes a fateful request—and involves Thomas in a dangerous idea that could change the fates of millions. Thomas is to provide access to his secluded Connecticut mansion, where a mysterious woman will receive training in firearms and explosives. Thus begins an international plot carried out by the strange and alluring Anna Klein—a plot that will ensnare Thomas in more ways than one. When it all goes wrong and Anna disappears, he will travel far from home once again, but this time, into a war-torn world that is far more dangerous, in this story by an Edgar Award–winning author known for his “piercing thrillers” (New York Daily News). “No other suspense writer takes readers as deeply into the heart of darkness as Thomas H. Cook.” —Chicago Tribune
This “beautifully written and elegantly plotted” thriller from the Edgar Award–winning author of The Chatham School Affair is “one of his best ever” (The Globe and Mail, Toronto). Twenty years ago, Ray Campbell was a well-intentioned aid worker dedicated to improving conditions in Lubanda, a newly independent African country. Now a cautious risk-management consultant, he is forced to reconsider that year of living dangerously when an old friend is found murdered in a New York alley. Signs suggest that this recent tragedy is rooted in a more distant one—that of Martine Aubert, the only woman Ray ever loved, whose fate he’d sealed with a grievous mistake: “In Rupala, twenty years before, I had rolled the dice for a woman who was not even present at the table, and how on the outcome of that toss, a braver and more knowing heart than mine had been forfeited.” Martine Aubert was a white, native Lubandan farmer whose dream for her homeland put her in conflict with fearsome men intent on its so-called development. As Ray returns to Lubanda to investigate the cause of his friend’s murder, he also revisits the passion he’d once felt for Martine and vows, in her memory, to rectify his wrongs. A Dancer in the Dust is a gripping story of ill-fated love: one man’s love for an extraordinary woman, and one woman’s love for her troubled country. “Not since John Le Carré’s The Mission Song have I seen such a loving and sorrowful portrait of modern Africa.” —The News & Observer (Raleigh)
A “marvelously tense” novel of psychological suspense centered on a long-ago crime of passion, from an Edgar Award–winning author (Publishers Weekly, starred review). With dreams of academic greatness, Lucas Paige rose from humble and sordid beginnings to attend Harvard. But his achievements since then have been meager. In St. Louis to give yet another sparsely attended reading, he discovers a face from the past he’s tried to forget: Lola Faye Gilroy, the “other woman” he long blamed for his father’s murder. Reluctantly, Luke joins Lola Faye for a drink. As one drink turns into several, these two battered souls relive, from their different perspectives, the most searing experience of their lives. They are transported back to the tiny southern town of Glenville, Alabama, where a violent crime of passion is turned in the light once more. As it turns out, there is much Luke doesn’t know. And what he doesn’t know can hurt him. Trapped in an increasingly intense exchange, Luke struggles to gain control and determine what Lola Faye is truly after—before it is too late. This “darkly powerful” (Kirkus Reviews) literary thriller, rich with Southern atmosphere, is “a knockout” (People). “Cook continues his work as one of the best fiction writers in America.” —The Plain Dealer
In this Edgar Award finalist and “slow-burning, intricate” thriller, a professor falls for his wife all over again . . . while he stands trial for her murder (Publishers Weekly, starred review). Samuel Madison always wondered what Sandrine saw in him. He was a meek, stuffy doctoral student while she was a beautiful bohemian with limitless talent and imagination. On the surface their marriage seemed tranquil: jobs at the same small liberal arts college, a precocious young daughter, and a home filled with art and literature. But then one night Sandrine is found dead from an overdose—and Samuel is accused of poisoning her. As secrets about their tumultuous marriage come to light in the courtroom, Samuel must face a town and media convinced of his guilt, a daughter whose faith in her father has been shaken to its core, and astonishing revelations about his wife, who never ceased being a mystery to him. Sandrine’s Case is a “gripping, moving, and elegiac” novel about the evil that can lurk within the heart of a seemingly ordinary man (Michael Connelly). “Cook plays with and against the conventions of the noir mystery to craft a novel deeper and richer than the genre would seem to allow.” —The Columbus Dispatch
