Carl Hiaassen, Bad Monkey (2013)
Andrew Yancy — late of the Miami Police and soon-to-be-late of the Monroe County sheriff's office — has a human arm in his freezer. There's a logical (Hiaasenian) explanation for that, but not for how and why it parted from its shadowy owner. Yancy thinks the boating-accident/shark-luncheon explanation is full of holes, and if he can prove murder, the sheriff might rescue him from his grisly Health Inspector gig (it's not called the roach patrol for nothing). But first — this being Hiaasen country — Yancy must negotiate an obstacle course of wildly unpredictable events with a crew of even more wildly unpredictable characters, including his just-ex lover, a hot-blooded fugitive from Kansas; the twitchy widow of the frozen arm; two avariciously optimistic real-estate speculators; the Bahamianvoodoo witch known as the Dragon Queen, whose suitors are blinded unto death by her peculiar charms; Yancy’s new true love, a kinky coroner; and the eponymous bad monkey, who with hilarious aplomb earns his place among Carl Hiaasen’s greatest characters.
PT Deutermann, The Cat Dancers (2006)
THRILL SEEKER
Dangling silently in front of a cave eighty feet down the cliff's edge, the man snaps a picture of the enraged mountain lion. The furious beast lunges...but the man is gone, back up the rope.
JUSTICE DEALER
When a judge releases two unrepentant killers on a legal technicality, North Carolina police Lieutenant Cam Richter knows facing the victims' grieving families is going to be tough. But when Killer #1 turns up on the Internet riding a homemade electric chair?followed a few days later by Killer #2?Cam thinks despair may have turned to vigilante justice.
MAN EATER
But it doesn't add up, especially when Cam becomes a target. It looks like these vigilantes may also be cops, and he's quickly running out of people to trust. The answers lie deep in the North Carolina wilderness, where Cam must track down this mysterious group of adrenaline-driven "Cat Dancers"--and risk losing everything he has left…
Qiu Xiaolong, Death of a Red Heroine (2011)
Shanghai in 1990. An ancient city in a country that despite the massacre of Tiananmen Square is still in the tight grip of communist control. Chief Inspector Chen, a poet with a sound instinct for self-preservation, knows the city like few others. When the body of a prominent Communist Party member is found, Chen is told to keep the party authorities informed about every lead. Also, he must keep the young woman's murder out of the papers at all costs. When his investigation leads him to the decadent offspring of high-ranking officials, he finds himself instantly removed from the case and reassigned to another area. Chen has a choice: bend to the party's wishes and sacrifice his morals, or continue his investigation and risk dismissal from his job and from the party. Or worse . . .
Andrew Yancy — late of the Miami Police and soon-to-be-late of the Monroe County sheriff's office — has a human arm in his freezer. There's a logical (Hiaasenian) explanation for that, but not for how and why it parted from its shadowy owner. Yancy thinks the boating-accident/shark-luncheon explanation is full of holes, and if he can prove murder, the sheriff might rescue him from his grisly Health Inspector gig (it's not called the roach patrol for nothing). But first — this being Hiaasen country — Yancy must negotiate an obstacle course of wildly unpredictable events with a crew of even more wildly unpredictable characters, including his just-ex lover, a hot-blooded fugitive from Kansas; the twitchy widow of the frozen arm; two avariciously optimistic real-estate speculators; the Bahamianvoodoo witch known as the Dragon Queen, whose suitors are blinded unto death by her peculiar charms; Yancy’s new true love, a kinky coroner; and the eponymous bad monkey, who with hilarious aplomb earns his place among Carl Hiaasen’s greatest characters.
PT Deutermann, The Cat Dancers (2006)
THRILL SEEKER
Dangling silently in front of a cave eighty feet down the cliff's edge, the man snaps a picture of the enraged mountain lion. The furious beast lunges...but the man is gone, back up the rope.
JUSTICE DEALER
When a judge releases two unrepentant killers on a legal technicality, North Carolina police Lieutenant Cam Richter knows facing the victims' grieving families is going to be tough. But when Killer #1 turns up on the Internet riding a homemade electric chair?followed a few days later by Killer #2?Cam thinks despair may have turned to vigilante justice.
MAN EATER
But it doesn't add up, especially when Cam becomes a target. It looks like these vigilantes may also be cops, and he's quickly running out of people to trust. The answers lie deep in the North Carolina wilderness, where Cam must track down this mysterious group of adrenaline-driven "Cat Dancers"--and risk losing everything he has left…
Qiu Xiaolong, Death of a Red Heroine (2011)
Shanghai in 1990. An ancient city in a country that despite the massacre of Tiananmen Square is still in the tight grip of communist control. Chief Inspector Chen, a poet with a sound instinct for self-preservation, knows the city like few others. When the body of a prominent Communist Party member is found, Chen is told to keep the party authorities informed about every lead. Also, he must keep the young woman's murder out of the papers at all costs. When his investigation leads him to the decadent offspring of high-ranking officials, he finds himself instantly removed from the case and reassigned to another area. Chen has a choice: bend to the party's wishes and sacrifice his morals, or continue his investigation and risk dismissal from his job and from the party. Or worse . . .
