RAINY DAY EXCERPTS: “SHELL GAME”

Welcome to another Tuesday celebrating bookish events, First Chapter/Intros, originally hosted by Bibliophile by the Sea and now hosted by I’d Rather Be at the Beach; and Teaser Tuesdays hosted by The Purple Booker.

Today’s feature is a recent acquisition:  Shell Game, by Sara Paretsky, is a compelling and timely adventure centers on some of the most divisive and pressing issues of our time…

 

 

 

Intro:  (Babe in the Woods)

The deputy turned without warning into an uncut thicket.  Felix and I stumbled after him, following his bobbing flashlight as best we could, the suckers from the bushes and trees snapping back to whip our faces.  When I called to him to slow down, he merely picked up his pace.

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Teaser:  It was my turn to pause while I went back over my conversations with McGivney.  Simone had told the state’s attorney she had an investigator digging into Fausson’s associates; McGivney had made the leap, but it was a reasonable guess. (56%).

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Synopsis:  When V. I Warshawski gets word that her closest friend and mentor Lotty Herschel’s nephew has become a suspect in a murder, the legendary detective will do everything she can to save him. The cops found Felix Herschel’s name and phone number on the unknown victim’s remains, but Felix insists he doesn’t know why.

As Vic digs deeper, she discovers that the dead man was obsessed with Middle Eastern archeology—the first clue in a bewildering case that leads to a stolen artifact and a shadowy network of international criminals. But the trouble multiplies when Vic’s long lost niece, Reno, goes missing. A beautiful young woman with a heartbreaking past and a promising future, Reno is harboring a secret that may cost her her life. V.I. can hear the clock ticking on her niece’s safety and is frantic in her efforts to find her.

Vic won’t leave any stone unturned until these very personal cases are cleared—a complex investigation that will entangle the Russian mob, ISIS backers, rogue ICE agents, a nefarious corporation preying on the poor, and a shady network of stock scams and stolen antiquities stretching from Chicago to the East Indies and the Middle East.

In Shell Game, no one can be trusted and nothing is what it seems, except for the indomitable detective and her thirst for justice.

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Do the excerpts grab you?  Do you want to keep reading?

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