PI News

A Haunted Town: Archer Sullivan’s debut novel is a story of missing children and much more. by Faye Jones & Chapter16.org The Witch’s Orchard By Archer Sullivan. Minotaur Books. 320 pages. $28. When we meet private investigator Annie Gore, the narrator and protagonist of Archer Sullivan’s The Witch’s Orchard, she’s desperate for work. Her laundry is piling up, her refrigerator is almost empty, and her prized watch, a gift from her uncle, is languishing in a pawn shop. When Max Andrews

Hell’s Kitchen: W.M. Akers’ To Kill a Cook serves up a mystery set in the restaurants of 1972 New York. by Sean Kinch & Chapter16.org To Kill a Cook By W.M. Akers. G.P. Putnam’s Sons. 353 pages. $30. The pleasures of reading W.M. Akers’ new mystery To Kill a Cook are similar to the joys of fine dining, an experience that occupies the heart of this novel. Akers prepares each chapter with subtle flavors and surprising spices, the episodes sequenced to

Nancy Lemann’s The Ritz of the Bayou finds the heart of a 1980s political scandal. by Maria Browning & Chapter16.org The Ritz of the Bayou By Nancy Lemann. Hub City Press. 184 pages. $24. “There is a lot of human frailty floating around,� observes Nancy Lemann in The Ritz of the Bayou, her account of the 1985 racketeering trial of Edwin Edwards, Louisiana’s colorful, crooked governor, then in his third term. Lemann’s sharp eye for the human frailty at work within