Best Selling Books by Stuart M. Kaminsky

Days and nights of heavy spring rain threaten to cripple New York City. Neighborhoods are experiencing periodic blackouts. People have been reported electrocuted by fallen power lines. Flooding of some subway lines has stopped trains in their tracks. And in the midst of the deluge, the CSI team has three cases to solve. Mac Taylor and Don Flack are on the trail of the perpetrator of a string of grisly murders with one thing in common: initials carved into the victims'' bodies. When an unusual connection is found between the victims'' lives, Mac realizes the killer isn''t finished -- not by a long shot. Lindsay Monroe and Danny Messer investigate the death of a teacher at an exclusive Manhattan private school. The victim seems like everyone''s favorite teacher on the surface -- but they soon uncover a darker secret lurking beneath. Stella Bonasera and Sheldon Hawkes are on-site at a suspicious building collapse when shifting rubble traps Hawkes in a deep pit with a mysterious stranger. Tensions rise as their oxygen starts to run out.... The intrepid members of New York''s crack forensic team must race against time and the elements to bring three very different criminals to justice.

“Never miss a Kaminsky book, and be especially sure not to miss Death of a Russian Priest.” —Tony Hillerman, New York Times–bestselling author In the darkest hours of communist rule, Father Merhum fought to protect the sanctity of the Orthodox Church. Now the Soviet Union is gone, but the bureaucracy survives, and within it lurk men who would do anything to undermine the fragile new Russian democracy. Father Merhum is on his way to Moscow to denounce those traitors when he is struck with an ax and killed. As police inspectors Porfiry Rostnikov and Emil Karpo dig into the past of this celebrated village priest, they uncover strange church secrets and a conspiracy to carry the vile corruption of the former regime on into the twenty-first century. But if they don’t watch their steps, someone may need to say the last rites for them. With the Edgar Award–winning Inspector Porfiry Rostnikov series, “Stuart Kaminsky evokes Russian life like a born Muscovite. . . . Don’t miss this one. It’s even better than his Edgar-winning A Cold Red Sunrise.” —The Philadelphia Inquirer “Kaminsky moves closer to becoming the Ed McBain of Mother Russia . . . The usual strengths of the series—ingenious plotting, solid police procedure, and Rostnikov’s shrewdly perceptive presence—are joined here by casually effective glimpses of the old Soviet Union in chancy transition. It all adds up to Rostnikov’s best outing since A Cold Red Sunrise.” —Kirkus Reviews

The first novel in a crime series about "two Chicago cops, one Jewish, one Irish . . . Told with deceptive simplicity [and] a gentle wit" ( The Boston Globe). Detectives Abe Lieberman and Bill Hanrahan have been partners a long time—long enough to call each other "Rabbi" and "Father Murphy." Lieberman is sixty, a grandfather, and a devout Jew. Hanrahan is a lapsed Catholic who''s been hitting the bottle pretty heavily ever since his wife walked out on him. They may be flawed, but they''re good cops. But even good cops have bad days. On a hot Chicago afternoon, Lieberman would prefer to be watching his beloved Cubs from the bleachers at Wrigley Field instead of sitting in his brother Maish''s deli with Hanrahan, meeting a prostitute and valued informant. But Estralda Valdez needs their protection from a psychotic john, and the partners agree to watch her back on their off-duty time. That Friday night, while Lieberman is in temple, Hanrahan has the first watch, across the street from Estralda''s apartment in a Chinese restaurant. But while he passes the time with two doubles and flirts with the waitress, the beautiful prostitute is brutally murdered. Tortured by guilt and chewed out by their chief, Lieberman and Hanrahan race against the clock to find the killer. They owe at least that much to Estralda. Lieberman''s Folly is "first-rate work, featuring characters you can almost touch and streets you can almost walk on, and an expertly plotted story" ( The Phildelphia Inquirer).

A new Inspector Rostnikov title from America''s premier mystery writer, "A Whisper to the Living" continues the adventures of an honest policeman in a very dishonest post-Soviet Union.

As a hard-boiled Hollywood PI enlists Al Capone''s help to save the Marx Brothers, Kaminsky "makes the totally wacky possible" (The Washington Post). It''s 1941 and the Marx Brothers'' first movie for MGM, Go West, has the country in stitches. But now Chico Marx is worried he''s going to need stitches when he receives a severed ear in the mail--a simple message from a Chicago bookie who wants $120,000, or else. Chico is baffled because, although he loves to gamble, he''s never made a bet in Chicago. Desperate, he turns to the king of Hollywood, Louis B. Mayer, who puts in a call to Toby Peters. A Hollywood private detective who''s proven himself adept at keeping scandals out of the tabloids, Peters flies to Florida for an interview with Al Capone, deposed lord of the Chicago underworld. The retired bootlegger''s mind has gone soft, and he doesn''t know anything about Chico''s bookie, but he suggests Peters speak to his brother. With Scarface''s good word as an introduction, the PI heads to Chicago. But it will take more than a good sense of humor to keep Groucho, Harpo, and especially Chico from getting axed. Edgar Award-winner Stuart Kaminsky''s "Toby Peters series was a delight. They were written with more than a dash of humor and featured a variety of improbable real-life characters, ranging from the Marx Brothers to Judy Garland" (Library Journal).

Rockford is looking forward to a quiet day of lazing around the beach and evading the debt collectors. Last month''s bills were covered by a generous fee from a wealthy client for finding an antique green bottle, and an eccentric old lady with a sob story about a lost cat is handing him a big check to cover his expenses for next month. But Rockford''s luck may run out when he is visited by the Pulp Fiction look-alikes who want to rearrange his anatomy. And then he''s going to find out that the case of the green bottle wasn''t quite as simple as it looked.

Hollywood private eye Toby Peters is asked to find an aide to General Douglas MacArthur, who has disappeared with information that could ruin the general''s nascent political career

Inspector Porfiry Rostnikov fights to stop a vendetta against the acrobats of the Moscow circus. A drunk perches atop the statue of Nikolai Gogol in Arbat Square, and police inspector Porfiry Rostnikov sighs. After years fighting to become a top detective, he has suffered a demotion to the minor crimes unit, which means the lunatic on the statue is his responsibility. But the limping policeman fails to talk the distraught man down, and with a perfect somersault, acrobat Valerian Duznetzov makes the last leap of his storied career. Across town, Duznetzov''s partner, Oleg, waits for him under.

Sheldon Minck, le dentiste miteux qui partage un local avec le détective Toby Peters, est arrêté, accusé du meurtre de sa femme Mildred tuée par un carreau d’arbalète dans Lincoln Park. Une certaine Billie Cassin, qui n’est autre que l’actrice Joan Crawford, est témoin. Minck explique à son ami Toby qu’il s’entraînait au tir dans le parc, après avoir rejoint un groupe survivaliste dont l’inspirateur est John Fenimore Cooper.Joan Crawford charge Toby Peters d’éviter que son nom n’apparaisse dans la presse en lien avec une affaire criminelle. Mais Minck parvient à s’évader. Il est traqué par les survivalistes, tandis que John Crawford, elle, est prise en otage...C’est avec plaisir qu’on retrouve, dans ce divertissement concocté de main de maître par Stuart Kaminsky, tous les protagonistes des deux précédents romans de la série ; le nain bibliophile et polyglotte Gunter, et Mme Plaut la logeuse, aux terrifiantes recettes...

" Stuart Kaminsky relance Toby Peters, ce privé qui hante les studios d''Hollywood pendant la Seconde Guerre mondiale. Peters, c''est d''abord un anti-héros toujours fauché mais diablement perspicace, un ex-flic au nez cassé par son grand frère et au dos en compote, obligé de dormir sur une planche de bois et qui se nourrit de céréales, largué par une épouse dont il n''arrive pas à faire le deuil. Un grand gamin qui n''arrivera jamais à devenir adulte et qui erre au milieu d''une bande de solitaires aussi brisés par la vie que sa colonne vertébrale" " Patrice Gagnant, Le Progrès. Traduit de l''américain par Simone Hilling