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 Lagniappe, if you were wondering, is a word I learned from my mother. She was born in southern Louisiana where the term is common. It's a small gift or an unexpected benefit, and that's what I intend this page to be.
I'll shine a little light on some of my favorite people and places, and I'll link to a few random thoughts and musings I've had on various topics. I might even relate a few of the misadventures on this writer's life.
Feel free to drop
me a line. I'm always eager to hear from fans.
Highly Recommended Reads for 2008
- Linwood Barclay, No Time for Goodbye, 2007
In this strikingly original twist on a traditional thriller plot, a fourteen year old girl wakes up one morning to discover her family is missing from the house. No trace. No note. No nothing. And that's the way it remains for twenty-five years. Then, happily married and with a daughter of her own, she begins to discover hints about what happened. A marvelous thriller that's nearly impossible to put down.
- K.C. Constantine, Saving Room for Dessert, 2002
Part of the Rocksburg, PA series, but not featuring Mario Balzac or Rugs Carlucci. Nevertheless, a brilliant book. Constantine continues to amaze. His novels are compelling even though they spend less time on action than the people involved. This depiction of a catastrophic series of neighborhood disputes is writing and character development at their finest.
- Reginald Hill, Death Comes for the Fat Man, 2007
Hill's wonderful and literate series never disappoints. Andy Dalziel spends most of the novel on the edge of death after he and Pascoe are injured in a terrorist bombing. Dalziel's comatose ruminations and Pascoe's desperate investigations make for a marvelous read.
- Andrew Klavan, Empire of Lies, 2008
Klavan sets an unlikely hero in the middle of a terrorist plot only he can stop. Fast, fun, entertaining, and complete with a hilarious description of the ultimate, red-carpet-line act of one-upmanship. Or should that be one-upswomanship?
- George Pelecanos, The Turnaround, 2008
Three white boys drive into a black neighborhood looking for trouble, and get it when they find there's no way out-only the turnaround. Thirty years later, fate brings two men from opposite sides of that confrontation together with the possibility of redemption, or adding a deadly coda to that night of violence.
- Giles Blunt, By the Time You Read This, 2007
Detective John Cardinal can't accept his wife's suicide even though she left a note and had a history of serious problems with depression. You may not know Canadian writer Giles Blunt. If not, it's time to rectify that.
- John Sandford, Invisible Prey, 2007
Series mysteries usually grow tired by their 17th installment. Not Sanford's. An elderly woman and her maid have been brutally beaten to death. But if the motive was robbery, why were so many valuable antiques left behind?
- James Crumley, The Final Country, 2001
Neither age nor prosperity prove enough to sooth a former private investigator's boredom when an opportunity to return to his profession beacons. It's tragic to lose a writer as good as Crumley as we did last year. The Final Country stands as a proud farewell.
- Steven F. Havill, Statute of Limitations, 2006
The bodies and violence don't stop for Undersheriff Reyes-Guzman even when it's Christmas, the sheriff is recovering from serious injuries, and the local police chief has just suffered a heart attack. Steven Havill continues his superb regional mystery series set along New Mexico's remote southern border.
- Roberta Isleib, Preaching to the Corpse, 2007
I don't usually read cozy New England church-politics mysteries, but I'm glad I read Isleib's. It's funny, insightful, and a perfect escape from too much blood and gore.
Other Lagniappes For You
Bookstores
All these great books can be purchased
from your favorite bookstore or mine:
Contact Me
Of course, I'm always eager to hear from
readers. Feel free to contact me by
e-mail.
Thanks for dropping by,
Come again,
Mike.....
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