Available:*
Library | Call Number | Status |
|---|---|---|
Searching... Stillwater Public Library | MYSTERY PRO | Searching... Unknown |
Bound With These Titles
On Order
Summary
Summary
Jim Messenger is a CPA who hates his job, loves jazz, and can't forget a woman he has seen eating at the Harmony Café . She goes by the name of Janet Mitchell, and when he introduces himself, her only comment is, "It won't do you any good." When she commits suicide, Messenger is driven to find out why. Her name is only the first of the lies he uncovers. In "historic Beulah," Nevada, secrets coil like rattlesnakes ready to strike, and suffering lies like a suffocating blanket over lives put on hold. Starting with one slender clue, Messenger embarks on a search for the truth that becomes a rite of passage. By the end, lives have been changed, a horrible murder brought to light, and a quiet, little town irrevocably torn apart.
Author Notes
Bill Pronzini was born in Petaluma, California on April 13, 1943. His first novel, The Stalker, was published in 1971. He is best known for his creation of the Nameless Detective Mystery series, as well as several westerns and novels of dark suspense. He has been a full time writer since 1969. He is also an active anthologist, having compiled more than 100 collections, most of which focus on mystery, western, and science fiction short stories.
He has won numerous awards including three Shamus Awards and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Private Eye Mystery Writers of America. His book Snowbound received the Grand Prix de la Litterature Policiere, as the best crime novel published in France in 1988. Pronzini has established himself as a master of the Western novel as well as earning a name for himself in the dark fiction genre.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
In this top-notch thriller, the author of the Nameless Detective series combines the best elements of the psychological novel and the traditional whodunit and delivers them in classic noir tones. This hero has a name, Jim Messenger. He's a quiet, lonely CPA who becomes obsessed with an even lonelier woman he sees in the San Francisco neighborhood cafe where they both eat their solitary dinners. When ``Ms. Lonesome,'' as he calls her, commits suicide, Messenger seeks to learn her real identity and the cause of her fatal melancholy. The search leads him to the small Nevada town of Beulah, where the locals fear his questions about two past killings and urge him, sometimes violently, to get out. The dead woman's sister, Dacy, overcomes initial skepticism about Messenger, turning her local knowledge and feisty resourcefulness to his advantage. With her help, the quiet accountant finds courage to unearth the secret of Ms. Lonesome's tragedy. Pronzini is masterful here, as he uses both the stark desert setting and knowledgeable digressions about jazz to evoke the loneliness at the heart of the tale. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Booklist Review
Jim Messenger, a lonely, divorced San Francisco accountant who eats dinner every evening in the Harmony Cafe, notices at a table another lonely soul, Janet Mitchell, and attempts to strike up a conversation with her. She politely rejects him. When she stops coming into the cafe, Messenger is curious, then saddened when he learns of her suicide. The police tell him Mitchell didn't really exist--no family, no friends, no identification. Armed with little more than midlife angst and an overdue library book from Beulah, Nevada, Messenger is determined to learn the story of the lonely woman who couldn't stand life anymore. He discovers she was really Ann Burgess Roebuck, and virtually everyone in Beulah is glad she's dead, having unofficially declared her guilty of the murders of her husband and her eight-year-old daughter. Messenger is determined to clear his late soulmate's name, despite threats and opposition from most of the townsfolk. Pronzini, best known for his "Nameless" detective series, is a master storyteller and has created in Messenger an empathetic, brave, and honorable everyman. His growth through the course of his investigation is subtle and memorable. Readers will not forget him. Outstanding character study wrapped in a damn good mystery. --Wes Lukowsky
Kirkus Review
For three months jazz-loving accountant Jim Messenger has watched the woman he's dubbed Ms. Lonesome order the same supper in San Francisco's Harmony Café and leave every night without talking to him or anyone else. Then one night she fails to show up because she's dead, a sad suicide in a bathtub. The police aren't interested in who Ms. Lonesome really was or why she killed herself, but Messenger, who feels in her despair an echo of his own deep loneliness, is driven to find out more about her, even when his quest makes him persona non grata in tiny Beulah, Nevada, a desert town still reeling from the ugly murder of Ms. Lonesome's philandering husband and her eight-year-old daughter. Although there was no proof against Anna Roebuck for killing her husband, a member of Beulah's first family, everybody assumes she was guilty. And although nobody thinks Dave Roebuck was much of a loss, they can't accept the death of his daughter, Tess, who was carefully dressed up after death and thrown into a well. With the laconic help of Anna's sister, rancher Dacy Burgess, Messenger painfully wrestles the truth from Roebuck's powerful family--and from a town determined to shut its eyes to its darkest side. Veteran Pronzini (Hardcase, p. 744, etc.) turns in a spare, beautifully controlled retake on Bad Day at Black Rock that's a- twang with piercing loneliness from the title to the last sorry secret.
Library Journal Review
Two quotes that connect hell, the devil, and loneliness foreshadow the suicide of a woman known as Ms. Lonesome. The often-solitary James Messenger sets out in search of the aloof woman's identity even though he spoke to her only once. He finds himself in Beulah, Nevada, a harsh countryside dominated by embittered people, violent murder, and mulish sensibilities. Pronzini skillfully handles Messenger's quest. He uses jazz to accompany changes in mood, but is not verbose. Highly recommended. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Table of Contents
| Jim Messenger is a CPA who hates his job, loves jazz, and can't forget a woman he has seen eating at the Harmony Café |
| She goes by the name of Janet Mitchell, and when he introduces himself, her only comment is, ""It won't do you any good."" |
| When she commits suicide, Messenger is driven to find out why |
| Her name is only the first of the lies he uncovers |
| In ""historic Beulah,"" Nevada, secrets coil like rattlesnakes ready to strike, and suffering lies like a suffocating blanket over lives put on hold |
| Sta |
