Sun and shadow

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Arne Dahl

When a Swedish literary critic is found tortured to death in a closet at Newark International Airport, the police realize that the murderer made off with the victim's ticket and boarded a flight to Stockholm. With no clear motive in sight, Detectives Paul Hjelm and Kerstin Holm of Intercrime's A-Unit learn that the method of torture used was not only a highly specialized means of extracting information secretly developed during the Vietnam War-- allowing the victim to whisper, but not to scream-- but also that it was the modus operandi of an allegedly deceased homicidal maniac known only as the Kentucky Killer.

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Michael Dibdin

Ratking, Vendetta, Cabal, Dead Lagoon, Cosi Fan Tutti--in each of these masterfully suspenseful and atmospheric novels we have met Michael Dibdin's Italian Criminalpol officer Aurelio Zen. Intelligent and urbane (if a little weary), Zen galvanizes us not only with his ability to solve the most intractable crimes but also with his methodology. He is both devious and moral, a slave to the status quo and original in his thinking, amused by his own tor-por and surprised by his drive. Now, in The Long Finish, he is driven by something new: a steelyinstinct for self-preservation coupled with a love of good food and wine. After a riotous and heroic stint in Naples, Zen is back in Rome, meeting with a world-famous film director at the instruction of his superiors. In the privacy of a remarkably well stocked wine cellar, the director--whose influence clearly reaches beyond the entertainment industry--convinces Zen to arrange for the release of the scion of an important wine-growing family, who has been jailed for the murder of his own father. At stake for the director, a connoisseur of Piedmontese wines, is this year's vintage: only the jailed man can ensure the timely harvesting of his family's precious grapes. At stake for Zen: avoiding a posting to the dreaded Sicily.In Alba--an outwardly serene village set among rolling hills that are planted with vines for as far as the eye can see--Zen discovers that only spilled blood can separate a family from its land. And though murder here is rare, it is complex. But at least it's accompanied by heaping plates of pasta, generous shavings of white truffles, and bottomless glasses of wine. If only Zen can keep his policing skills as sharp as his palate is pampered. . . .From the Hardcover edition.

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Ian Rankin

Investigator John Rebus pursues a case in Edinburgh's red-light district, where refugees seeking asylum are subject to the most ruthless members of the crime world.

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Elmore Leonard

Psycho mama"s boy Teddy Magyk has a serious jones for the Miami cop who put him away--but he wants to hit Vincent Mora where it really hurts before killing him. So when a beautiful Puerto Rican hooker takes a swan dive from an Atlantic City high-rise, and Vincent naturally shows up to investigate the questionable death of his "special friend," Teddy figures he's got his prey just where he wants him.