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Hotlists 2008
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Booklists
Lists of books, many of 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). Additional titles of interest may be included on the lists. Titles are generally listed alphabetically by author.
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Booklists and Suggested Reading
Pick Your Poison Stars
Page Modified: April 5, 2008
Fiction and Nonfiction about poisons, poisoning and poisoners.
Annotations are from Advance, the Ingram Book Magazine, unless noted.
Fiction
- The Young Widow
Author: Chan, Cassandra
Publisher: Minotaur $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312337485 Date: 2005
LJ
Making a striking debut, Chan introduces two intriguing sleuths in a brand-new series. DS Jack Gibbons is aided by his best friend Phillip Bethancourt in an investigation where the prime suspect is wealthy, dangerous, and irresistible.
Suggested Reading: Debuts
Updated 6.9.05 - The Foodtaster
Author: Ebling, Peter
Publisher: Permanent $ 26 ISBN: 1579620477 Date: 2002
When Ugo DiFonte and his daughter are snatched from their farm and spirited away, Ugo thinks life can't get any worse--until he is forced to replace the recently de-tongued royal food taster. A bestseller in ten countries, this novel of gastronomical delight and brilliant wit captures the sights, sounds, and tastes of 16th-century ltaly.
Updated 8.18.05 - No Witnesses
Author: Pearson, Ridley
Publisher: Hyperion $ 22.95 ISBN: 0786860669 Date: 1994
Booklist PW
A Seattle food company is victim to an ingenious extortion involving product tampering that has the FBI two steps behind. Veteran homicide detective Lou Boldt and police psychologist Daphne Matthews must track down a killer who is willing to go to any lengths to contaminate and kill.
Updated 8.18.05 - The Blonde
Author: Swierczynski, Duane
Publisher: Minotaur $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312343795 Date: 2006
LJ
The night before a big meeting, Jack Eisley is sitting in an airport bar in Philadelphia, chatting up a pretty young blonde. Sure, Jack has a wife and daughter at home, but this is just a little harmless flirting. Harmless, that is, until the blonde leans forward and says, "I poisoned your drink."
She tells Jack that unless she can keep someone within ten feet of her at all times, she'll die. And if he wants the antidote, he'll have to take her back to his hotel room and promise to stay by her side.
Jack thinks: psycho. But as the violent night wears on, and he encounters a relentless government assassin, a threatening voice on a cell phone, a deadly waitress, dirty cops, and shady cab drivers . . .
He begins to believe her. - Publisher Marketing
Suggested Reading: Hard-Boiled & Noir | Assassins
Updated 10.18.06
Nonfiction
- The Poisonous Pen of Agatha Christie
Author: Gerald, Michael C.
Publisher: Univ of Texas $ 35 ISBN: 0292765355 Date: 1993
PW
Poisoning occurs in over half of Agatha Christie's many novels and stories. In fact, she used a larger number and broader selection of poisons and medicines, for a wider variety of purposes, with greater frequency, ingenuity, and scientific accuracy than any other detective fiction writer. Yet very little has been written on the use of drugs, poisons, and chemicals in Christie's fiction. The Poisonous Pen of Agatha Christie entertainingly and authoritatively fills this gap. - Publisher Marketing
Updated 8.18.05 - Arsenic Under the Elms: Murder in Victorian New Haven
by McConnell, Virginia A.
Publisher: Praeger Publishers ISBN:0-275-96297-0 $ 26.95 Date: 1999
Kirkus
Attorney and crime researcher Virginia McConnell delves into two unrelated, unsolved murders in late-1800s New Haven to provide a fascinating view of Victorian Connecticut. The colorful characters involved in tile commission, investigation, and prosecution of these crimes emerge as real, vibrant individuals, and their stories, compelling in themselves, reveal much about Victorian sex and marriage, drugs from arsenic to aphrodisiacs, early forensic medicine, and 19th-century courtroom antics. - Publisher marketing.
Suggested Reading: True Crime Stars - Wainewright the Poisoner: The Memoir of Thomas Griffiths
Wainewright - Regency Author, Painter, Swindler, and Probable
Murderer - Brilliantly Woven from Historical Fragments
by Motion, Andrew
Publisher: Knopf $ 26 ISBN: 0375402098 Date: 2000
Kirkus
Booklist LJ
A celebrated British biographer has researched letters, journals, newspaper dispatches, and other historical sources to illuminate the life of Thomas Griffiths Wainewright, a Regency author and painter who fell into debt, attempted a number of scams, and allegedly committed at least one murder.
Suggested Reading: All Stars | True Crime Stars
Hotlists
Crime Fiction - embedded
Stars
Fiction: Jan-June | July-Dec Crime Fiction: Jan-June | July-Dec
Speculative Fiction Romance Historical Nonfiction | YA
Hotlists
Hotlists: Fiction | Crime Fiction
Genre Hotlists: Christian Fiction | African American Fiction
Stars
Fiction: Jan-June | July-Dec Crime Fiction: Jan-June | July-Dec
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