Sofie Kelly

New York Times bestselling author, Sofie Kelly, writes the Magical Cats mysteries, set in the small town of Mayville Heights, Minnesota. As Sofie Ryan, she is the author of the popular bestselling Second Chance Cat mysteries that feature repurpose shop owner, Sarah Grayson, a group of senior sleuths and the world's oldest computer hacker.

Kelly has been a late night disk jockey—which explains her love of coffee--and taught absolutely terrified adults how to swim. Like Kathleen Paulson in the Magical Cats books, she practices Wu style Tai Chi. Kelly is also a mixed-media artist and likes to prowl thrift shops looking for things to re-purpose in her art.

Her new novel is Furever After.

Recently I asked the author about what she was reading. Kelly's reply:

I just finished reading an advance copy of Pony Confidential by Christina Lynch. The book will be out this November.

Fed up over being passed from owner to owner, Pony sets out on a cross-country search for Penny, the little girl he’s never forgotten. Meanwhile, Penny, who’s all grown up, has been arrested, accused of a murder she didn’t commit, and afraid that she has no one to help her prove her innocence. She takes comfort in remembering her beloved pony. The cast of characters includes a goat, a rat, a racehorse and a whole community of animals that help Pony make his way across the country to Penny. Because Pony knows, better than anyone, that the little girl who used to ride him is not a killer.

This really is a one-of-a-kind mystery, but it’s also a story about the power of friendship. Pony is snarky, devious and more than a little self-absorbed. And he’s a wonderful character. I laughed out loud in some places while I was reading and got a lump in my throat in others. I think Pony Confidential is one of the books people will be talking about this fall.

Visit Sofie Kelly's website.

My Book, The Movie: Curiosity Thrilled the Cat.

Writers Read: Sofie Kelly (October 2015).

The Page 69 Test: Faux Pas.

Writers Read: Sofie Kelly (September 2022).

--Marshal Zeringue

Deborah J Ledford

Deborah J Ledford is the award-winning author of the Eva “Lightning Dance” Duran suspense thriller series, including Redemption and Havoc.

Recently I asked the author about what she was reading. Ledford's reply:

I am currently fully immersed in a new mystery, and don’t tend to pleasure read the same genre while writing the first draft. And so, I chose the literary novel Prophet Song by Irish author Paul Lynch for my cookie at the end of the day.

Book seller aficionado Patrick Millikin at the Poisoned Pen Bookstore recommended this absolutely fascinating tale of a wife and mother who is forced to care for her young children alone when a new faction of Dublin’s secret police appear at her door and take her trade union husband away.

Soon the husband is lost to her, no way to find out if he’s alive or dead, or to even get word to him. As she continues to await, others in their tight-knit community disappear, never to be seen again as well. Are the arrests because of the men speaking up for the union, or a deeper and darker nefarious reason? Well, you’ll have to flip the pages to figure out the entire story within a story of what it takes to keep a family together and thrive without losing the conviction that makes a sisterhood of women strong, rather than breaking them.

Most fascinating about Prophet Song is the formatting and presentation on the pages. The book is beautiful to behold on the outside, and then when you open it up—what???? There are no paragraph breaks, no quotation marks, no “traditional” patterns readers are familiar with. But don’t let this be disconcerting. You quickly catch on to the intended method and soon get lost in the fascinating, heart wrenching, powerful read.

Prophet Song is the winner of the Booker Prize 2023 and worthy of a read, no matter your favorite genre.

Visit Deborah J Ledford's website.

Q&A with Deborah J Ledford.

The Page 69 Test: Redemption.

My Book, The Movie: Redemption.

The Page 69 Test: Havoc.

My Book, The Movie: Havoc.

--Marshal Zeringue

D.W. Buffa

D.W. Buffa's newest novel to be released is Evangeline, a courtroom drama about the murder trial of captain who is one of the few to survive the sinking of his ship.

Buffa is also the author of ten legal thrillers involving the defense attorney Joseph Antonelli. He has also published a series that attempts to trace the movement of western thought from ancient Athens, in Helen; the end of the Roman Empire, in Julian's Laughter; the Renaissance, in The Autobiography of Niccolo Machiavelli; and America in the twentieth century, in Neumann's Last Concert.

Here is Buffa's take on Caesar’s Ghost:

It was always dangerous, for those who lived in a monarchy hundreds of years ago, to write that killing the king was the only way to win liberty for their country. The only safe way to write about the virtue of murder, when murder was the only way to replace the rule of one with the rule of all, was to write about a political assassination that had taken place in the past, the distant past, the ancient story of someone murdered because he wanted to be king, the story William Shakespeare told in his play called Julius Caesar, the play that all the loyal subjects of Queen Elizabeth could applaud.

The question, once Shakespeare decided to write a play about why Brutus and Cassius and the others thought Caesar’s ambition, if left unchecked, would be the end of the Roman republic, was how to do it in a way that would make an audience feel an interest in things that had happened more than sixteen hundred years earlier. How teach an audience to understand the strange names, the changing relationships, the different agreements and conspiracies that made the murder of Julius Caesar and the civil war that resulted one of the most important turning points in history? Writing a century and a half after Shakespeare’s death, Samuel Johnson, who understood Shakespeare perhaps better than anyone, thought he knew how it had been done. Shakespeare’s people, which is how he described the characters of Shakespeare’s invention, “act and speak by the influence of those general passions and principles by which all minds are agitated, and the whole system of life is continued in motion. In the writings of other poets a character is too often an individual; in those of Shakespeare it is commonly a species.”

The characters - their feelings, their motives, their vanities and ambitions - are known to us because we have observed them, and experienced them, ourselves. Shakespeare understands that. But what about the story, Caesar’s story? Caesar’s life is very far from any life we have known. Shakespeare’s audiences could only follow him through the intricacies of the drama because they “held the thread of the story in their hands.” They had the thread of the story, the story told in Shakespeare’s play of 1599, because Plutarch’s history, the parallel lives of famous Greeks and Romans, had been translated for the first time into English by Sir Thomas North just twenty years earlier, in 1579.

Among the Roman lives, Plutarch’s lives of Brutus and Julius Caesar told every English reader all he needed to know, and all he probably ever knew, about how Caesar became the first man in Rome and how a conspiracy begun by Cassius and led by Brutus ended Caesar’s life and started the struggle that on the Plains of Philippi ended any chance of a restoration of the Roman republic. Because everyone knew the story Plutarch had told, everyone could follow what Shakespeare told them in his play, especially when, as often happened, Shakespeare’s characters used some of Plutarch’s own words.

According to Plutarch, Portia, the daughter of Cato, the philosophical statesman of stern and disciplined morality, complained that Brutus did not share with his wife his secret thoughts.

“I, Brutus, being the daughter of Cato, was given you in marriage not like a concubine, to partake only in the intercourse of bed and board, but to bear a part in all your good and all your evil fortune….” She should “be admitted to…your counsels that require secrecy and trust.”

In Act II, scene ii, Shakespeare has Portia question Brutus: “Am I yourself But, as it were, in sort or limitation, to keep with you at meals, comfort your bed, and talk to you sometimes? Dwell I but in the suburbs Of your good pleasure? If it be no more, Portia is Brutus’ harlot, not his wife.” And then, a few lines later, she reminds him: “I grant I am a woman, but, withal, A woman well-reputed, Cato’s daughter.”

This is but one example of the method Shakespeare followed, a method by which he stays as close to the original source as possible while, at the same time, adding the depth and subtlety of his own understanding and what, in his hands, the English language could be made to do. If it is suggested that this is not what the creative arts were meant to be, it is enough to remind ourselves that it was only after Shakespeare that we began to forget that writers, and not just writers, practiced what were then called, not the creative, but the imitative, arts.

Following as close as possible, tracing in detail, what Plutarch’s histories record, Shakespeare followed an even more ancient source to provide the speech by which Brutus justified Caesar’s murder and the speech by which Marc Antony made Brutus seem, not a patriot, but a criminal. All that Plutarch says about Antony’s speech, the speech that caused the civil war that resulted in a Roman Empire in which, more than Julius Caesar ever contemplated, one man would rule, limited by nothing but his own will, is that Antony, “finding the multitude moved with his speech…unfolded the bloody garment of Caesar, showing them in how many places it was pierced, and the number of his wounds.”

Following Thucydides, the historian of the Peloponnesian War, Shakespeare writes speeches that he imagines the speaker would have given. The first sentence of Plutarch’s biography of Brutus tells where Brutus stood in the eyes of Rome. The sentence is about his ancestor. “Marcus Brutus was descended from that Junius Brutus to whom the ancient Romans erected a statue of brass in the capitol among the images of their kings with a drawn sword in his hand, in remembrance of his course and resolution in expelling he Tarquins and destroying the monarchy.” So severe was he in his refusal to abandon freedom for the rule, however benevolent, of a single man, “he proceeded even to the execution of his own sons,” when he discovered they had conspired with tyrants. This, it may be noted, was the kind of Roman, or more broadly, republican, virtue Machiavelli thought had gone missing from the world.

Marcus Brutus, though far more humane, felt the same devotion to liberty, the same abhorrence of having a king who would make slaves of everyone, a king that the Roman populace, which is to say the Roman mob, was, with Caesar’s secret approval, intent on making Caesar become. In the speech Shakespeare writes, the speech that as you hear it in the play, or read it in the privacy your study, is exactly what, knowing what you have learned from Plutarch, you would expect Brutus to say:

“If there be any in this assembly, any dear friend of Caesar’s, to him I say, that Brutus’ love to Caesar was no less than his. If then that friend demand why Brutus rose against Caesar, this is my answer: Not that I loved Caesar less, but that I loved Rome more. Had you rather Caesar were living, and die all slaves, than that Caesar were dead, to live all free men? As Caesar loved me, I weep for him; as he was fortunate, I rejoice at it; as he was valiant, I honor him; but, as he was ambitious, I slew him.”

In Plutarch, Antony, given permission by Brutus over the strenuous objections of Cassius, speaks the next day; in Shakespeare, Antony speaks immediately after Brutus leaves. His speech, Shakespeare’s speech, begins with words every schoolchild used to know by heart: “Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend your ears: I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.”

Antony’s speech is more than four times longer than the speech in which Brutus argues that Caesar had to die if Rome was to remain free. In a masterpiece of misdirection, Antony repeats each accusation Brutus made, each time insisting that “Brutus is an honorable man,” a claim that soon becomes a mockery. When he gets to the central charge against Caesar, the proof that Caesar intended to be king, Antony reminds the crowd that when he, Antony, had three times presented Caesar with “a kingly crown…he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?”

Unlike Thucydides, Shakespeare adds the reaction of the crowd, the way it changes what it thinks about what it hears. “Mark’d ye his words?” asks one citizen of another. “He would not take the crown; Therefore ’tis certain he was not ambitious.” Antony makes the crowd mad with anger when he shows them Caesar’s blood-stained mantle; he makes them mad with anticipation when he tells them that Caesar in his will has left each of them money and all of them together his gardens. The crowd that had called Brutus the savior of his country now screams: “Burn! Fire! - Kill! - Slay! Let not a traitor live.”

Plutarch, the historian, told the story of Caesar’s death and the civil war that followed. Shakespeare, the playwright, took that history and made it come alive; come alive, moreover, in a way that made the assassination of Julius Caesar become immortal. And Shakespeare knew it. In Act III, scene ii, he puts into the mouth of Cassius a thought nowhere found in Plutarch: “How many ages hence Shall this our lofty scene be acted O’er, In states unborn and accents yet unknown!”

Samuel Johnson understood. Shakespeare, he wrote, “has long outlived his century, the term commonly fixed as the test of literary merit.” Shakespeare has outlived more centuries than that, in part because great actors have wanted nothing so much as to perform in one of Shakespeare's plays. In a coincidence so remarkable as to be almost beyond belief, one of the greatest Shakespearian actors was named, like Brutus’ own ancestor, Junius Brutus Booth. Born in 1796, he was enormously popular on both the London stage and in America. His performances were literally unforgettable. The 11th edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, as sober a publication as there ever was, remarks, “His eccentricities bordered on insanity, and his excited and furious fencing in Richard III and as Hamlet frequently compelled the Richmond and Laertius to fight for their lives in deadly earnest.”

The actor’s ability to confuse himself with the role he plays continued with his sons. In the introduction to Julius Caesar in the Yale edition of the collected works of Shakespeare, we are told that the “crowning achievement in America’s production of Julius Caesar will always be the magnificent double triumph of Edwin Booth and Lawrence Barrett in the 60s, 70s and 80s” of the l9th century. It was in the fall of 1864 that Edwin Booth appeared in Julius Caesar with his two brothers. Six months later, on April 14, 1965, one of his brothers, John Wilkes Booth, perhaps convinced that he was himself Brutus, murdered Abraham Lincoln in the Ford Theatre in Washington as Lincoln sat watching a play.

Julius Caesar was murdered more than two thousand years ago, but Caesar’s ghost will live forever, or at least as long as there are readers to turn the pages of Plutarch’s astonishing histories and Shakespeare’s marvelous plays.

Visit D.W. Buffa's website.

Third reading: The Great Gatsby. 

Third reading: Brave New World.

Third reading: Lord Jim.

Third reading: Death in the Afternoon.

Third Reading: Parade's End.

Third Reading: The Idiot.

Third Reading: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.

Third Reading: The Scarlet Letter.

Third Reading: Justine.

Third Reading: Patriotic Gore.

Third reading: Anna Karenina.

Third reading: The Charterhouse of Parma.

Third Reading: Emile.

Third Reading: War and Peace.

Third Reading: The Sorrows of Young Werther.

Third Reading: Bread and Wine.

Third Reading: “The Crisis of the Mind” and A Man Without Qualities.

Third reading: Eugene Onegin.

Third Reading: The Collected Works of Thomas Babington Macaulay.

Third Reading: The Europeans.

Third Reading: The House of Mirth and The Writing of Fiction.

Third Reading: Doctor Faustus.

Third Reading: the reading list of John F. Kennedy.

Third Reading: Jorge Luis Borges.

Third Reading: History of the Peloponnesian War.

Third Reading: Mansfield Park.

Third Reading: To Each His Own.

Third Reading: A Passage To India.

Third Reading: Seven Pillars of Wisdom.

Third Reading: The Letters of T.E. Lawrence.

Third Reading: All The King’s Men.

Third Reading: The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus.

Third Reading: Naguib Mahfouz’s novels of ancient Egypt.

Third Reading: Main Street.

Third Reading: Theodore H. White's The Making of the President series, part I.

Third Reading: Theodore H. White's The Making of the President series, part II.

Third Reading: Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

Third Reading: Fiction's Failure.

Third Reading: Hermann Hesse's Demian.

Third Reading: Frederick Douglass, Slavery, and The Fourth of July.

--Marshal Zeringue

Adam Mitzner

Adam Mitzner is the acclaimed Amazon Charts bestselling author of Dead Certain, Never Goodbye, and The Best Friend in the Broden Legal series as well as the stand-alone thrillers A Matter of Will, A Conflict of Interest, A Case of Redemption, Losing Faith, The Girl from Home, The Perfect Marriage, and Love Betrayal Murder. A practicing attorney in a Manhattan law firm, he and his family live in New York City.

Mitzner's new novel is The Brothers Kenney.

Recently I asked the author about what he was reading. Mitzner's reply:

Right now, I’m midway through Taffy Brodesser-Akner’s Long Island Compromise, and loving it. I live on Long Island, so the terrain feels familar, but what makes the novel so great are the characters she’s able to write. They are people that you might know in your life, but who at the same time are so damaged that they’re laugh out loud funny.

Before her book, I finished Alex Finlay’s If Something Happens to Me, which was as fast-paced a thriller as I’ve read in a long time. It takes place in various locales (from Kansas to Tuscany) and is told from multiple points of view, but what I loved most about is that it keeps you guessing until the final page.

Visit Adam Mitzner's website.

The Page 69 Test: A Conflict of Interest.

My Book, The Movie: A Conflict of Interest.

The Page 69 Test: A Case of Redemption.

My Book, The Movie: A Case of Redemption.

The Page 69 Test: Losing Faith.

My Book, The Movie: Losing Faith.

The Page 69 Test: A Matter of Will.

My Book, the Movie: A Matter of Will.

My Book, The Movie: The Perfect Marriage.

The Page 69 Test: The Perfect Marriage.

Q&A with Adam Mitzner.

Writers Read: Adam Mitzner (May 2023).

My Book, The Movie: Love Betrayal Murder.

The Page 69 Test: Love Betrayal Murder.

My Book, The Movie: The Brothers Kenney.

--Marshal Zeringue

Amanda Sellet

Amanda Sellet is a former journalist and the author of romcoms for teens and adults, including By the Book, which Booklist described in a starred review as, “impossible to read without laughing out loud.” She loves old movies, baked goods, and embarrassing her teen daughter.

Sellet's new novel, Hate to Fake It to You, is her adult debut.

Recently I asked the author about what she was reading. Sellet's reply:

This is a year of continuous and overlapping deadlines for me, which means even my leisure reading needs to multitask. Each of these titles relates to a current or future writing project, but since some of these works-in-progress are still top-secret, I’ll stick to the vague interest areas of “screwball comedy retellings,” “general fiction with a strong romantic subplot,” and “frothy mystery.”

Lady Eve’s Last Con by Rebecca Fraimow: In July, I had the absolute pleasure of moderating a virtual panel with a group of writers whose books draw inspiration from classic films—including this sparkling space caper, a must-read even if sci-fi isn’t your usual stomping ground. Fraimow updates the Preston Sturges classic The Lady Eve by trading cruise ships for spaceships, preserving the original’s wisecracking heroine, audacious hoax, and 1940s jargon in a beautifully crafted romp with a sharp eye for economic disparity. (If you enjoy the madcap energy of The Lady Eve, stay tuned for news about my summer 2025 release!)

I Hope This Finds You Well by Natalie Sue: It’s been a very long time since I occupied a cubicle, but this dryly witty contemporary took me right back to the sad packed lunch and fluorescent lights era of my life, complete with the petty resentments that fester amidst the 9-to-5 grind. Main character Jolene’s acerbic inner monologue won me over immediately, because I will follow a genuinely funny voice almost anywhere—even when it begins in a fairly dark place. Which is not to say that this falls into the style of books I think of as “misery porn,” where the goal is to rub the reader’s nose in human suffering for maximum melodrama. This is a much more hopeful and compassionate vision of the world, with moving twists and turns that shift the relationships—and reader perceptions—of a forced family of work colleagues.

Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies by Catherine Mack: Did I save this book so that I could hold it up in a vaguely menacing fashion while on vacation? Absolutely. (You’re welcome, Mom!) I’m a sucker for funny footnotes, which this book leans into in a big way, and thoroughly enjoyed the playfully meta stylings of a mystery novelist using her “skills” to solve an actual crime while on a fraught book tour of absurdly picturesque Italian locales. This would pair really well with a lemon spritz, so provision your cocktail cupboard accordingly.

Visit Amanda Sellet's website.

Q&A with Amanda Sellet.

The Page 69 Test: By the Book.

Writers Read: Amanda Sellet (December 2022).

--Marshal Zeringue

Zoje Stage

Zoje Stage is the USA Today and internationally bestselling author of the psychological thrillers Baby Teeth and Getaway, and the psychological horror novels Wonderland and Mothered. Her books have been named "best of the year" by Forbes Magazine, Library Journal, PopSugar, LitReactor, Barnes & Noble, Book Riot, and more.

Stage's new novel is Dear Hanna, the follow-up to her international sensation Baby Teeth. She lives in Pittsburgh with her cats.

Recently I asked the author about what she was reading. Stage's reply:

I just finished reading All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Cosby—a police procedural mystery set in rural Virginia. This novel had two exceptionally strong elements: its main character, Sherrif Titus Crown, and the atmosphere of the town itself. In certain ways it reminded me of another recent read, The Searcher by Tana French, which also had a small town setting—Ireland, in this case—and a compelling detective who embodied integrity. Both of these mysteries really benefitted from their locations, where the history and communities contributed a very visceral element, making both novels feel very alive and layered.

Another recent read was The Devil and Mrs. Davenport by Paulette Kennedy. People like to think of the 1950s as this wholesome time—but it was also a time when women couldn't have their own bank accounts, and their husbands could have them committed to mental institutions. Even with the presence of a supernatural element, this novel's purpose was to explore that darker underside of midcentury domestic life.

Visit Zoje Stage's website.

Writers Read: Zoje Stage (July 2018).

Q&A with Zoje Stage.

--Marshal Zeringue

Liz Alterman

Liz Alterman is the author of The Perfect Neighborhood, He'll Be Waiting, and Sad Sacked. Her work appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, McSweeney's, and other outlets. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and three sons where she spends most days microwaving the same cup of coffee and looking up synonyms. When Alterman isn't writing, she's reading.

Her new novel is The House on Cold Creek Lane.

Recently I asked Alterman about what she was reading. Her reply:

I love to jump back and forth between fiction and non-fiction and print and audiobooks.

I just finished reading Margot Harrison's intriguing The Midnight Club, which follows four adult friends who reunite in an attempt to gain a deeper understanding of their friend and classmate's death during their college days. Set in Vermont, it's very atmospheric and has a speculative element as the group uses a substance known as "sog" to travel back to the past to relive the moments right before their friend's death. I loved this unique premise and Harrison's smooth mix of pop culture and poetry references. Fans of The Secret History will enjoy this wild ride.

I also recently listened to Gary Janetti's We Are Experiencing a Slight Delay and thoroughly enjoyed every bit--right down to the acknowledgements. It's perfect summer reading/listening as it covers the pleasures and perils of travel in a fun, keenly observed way that you can't help but nod and laugh along.

I'm always hunting for books to motivate and inspire my writing and Steve Almond's Truth Is the Arrow, Mercy Is the Bow is a true gem. I've been recommending it to writer friends since I finished the first chapter. Almond narrates the audiobook and brings so much humor and heart to his advice that I know this is one I'll return to again and again.

On the thriller side, I listened to Tracy Sierra's Nightwatching earlier this summer and had goosebumps for the duration. The writing is fantastic and Emily Ellet's narration brings this harrowing tale to life in a way that had me glancing over my shoulder, convinced a intruder was lurking in the corner. Initially, I picked it up because (lucky for me!) Emily agreed to voice the Corey character in my novel The House on Cold Creek Lane, but after the first few minutes, I forgot all that and was completely spellbound by the story.

Visit Liz Alterman's website.

Q&A with Liz Alterman.

My Book, The Movie: The Perfect Neighborhood.

The Page 69 Test: The Perfect Neighborhood.

The Page 69 Test: The House on Cold Creek Lane.

My Book, The Movie: The House on Cold Creek Lane.

--Marshal Zeringue

Reed Farrel Coleman

Called a hard-boiled poet by NPR’s Maureen Corrigan and the noir poet laureate in the Huffington Post, Reed Farrel Coleman is the New York Times-bestselling author of thirty-one novels—including six in Robert B. Parker’s Jesse Stone series—short stories, poetry, and essays.

In addition to his acclaimed series characters, Moe Prager and Gus Murphy, he has written the stand-alone novel Gun Church and collaborated with decorated Irish crime writer Ken Bruen on the novel Tower.

Coleman is a four time Edgar Award nominee in three different categories: Best Novel, Best Paperback Original, and Best Short Story. He is a four-time recipient of the Shamus Award for Best PI Novel of the Year. He has also won the Audie, Macavity, Barry, and Anthony Awards.

With their kids moved away to far off Brooklyn, Coleman, his wife Rosanne, and their cats live in the wilds of Suffolk County on Long Island.

His new Nick Ryan novel is Blind to Midnight.

Recently I asked the author about what I'm reading. Coleman's reply:

During the course of my career—my first novel was published in 1991—reading has become, much to my regret, more of a chore and less of a pleasure. It can be an occupational hazard for a genre writer as you know the shorthand and can see what the person behind the curtain is doing to manipulate the reader. That combined with reading for blurbs kind of took it all out of me. During the pandemic I developed a bad case of “Reader Block” and found I had energy only to write. It’s eased somewhat, but in its wake I have found that I now want to read only high quality stuff from writers I love. I say this so you can understand why I’m mentioning the books I’m about to discuss.

Currently, I’m reading The Murder of Mr. Ma by SJ Rozan and John Shen Yen Nee. SJ’s always been a favorite and the setting is 1920s London. It is a fascinating Sherlock Holmes-ian style novel that shines a light on ugly anti-Asian racism. And any book that begins with Bertrand Russell playing a big part’s got me.

New on my list is Still Waters by Matt Goldman. Matt, a former TV comedy writer, is great at setting up readers with premises that grab you immediately and don’t let go. I can’t wait to dig in.

After Matt, I’ve got some of my favorites to reread. In that queue are: Berlin Noir by the late great Philip Kerr, A Dance at the Slaughterhouse by Larry Block, and The Death of Sweet Mister by Daniel Woodrell. I can’t bear to reread my older works, but works by the masters are always the way to go.

Visit Reed Farrel Coleman's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Hollow Girl.

The Page 69 Test: Where It Hurts.

The Page 69 Test: What You Break.

My Book, The Movie: Sleepless City.

Q&A with Reed Farrel Coleman.

The Page 69 Test: Sleepless City.

--Marshal Zeringue