Joy Castro is the author of the thriller Hell or High Water, which received a starred review from Booklist for its “exquisite New Orleans background, intriguing newsroom politics and atmosphere, a flawed but plucky heroine, and skillfully paced suspense.” Also the author of two memoirs, The Truth Book and Island of Bones, she lives with her husband in Lincoln, Nebraska and teaches creative writing, literature, and Latino studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.Recently I asked Castro what she was reading. Her reply:
Teaching in Seville recently, I came across an old Penguin paperback of John le Carré’s academic mystery A Murder of Quality on theVisit Joy Castro’s website and Twitter perch.bookshelves of my apartment there. Though it fell apart in my hands, I read it in two nights, delighted by the genuine suspense and le Carré’s witty, knowing takedowns of academic presumptions. When we got back to the States, I had to have more, and I’ve been reading his classic 1963 espionage thriller The Spy Who Came In From the Cold. I like the calm, terse quality of the writing and the deft way le Carré handles point of view, so that the reader isn’t entirely sure of what’s going on, when people are pretending, or who knows what. He’s got suspense down to a fine and elegant art.
The Page 69 Test: Hell or High Water.
--Marshal Zeringue
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