Boobytrap

by Bill Pronzini

Overview

His 25th case pits the "Nameless Detective" against a vengeance-mad bomber in a nightmarish battle of wits.

Emotionally exhausted from the events surrounding his partner's suicide, "Nameless" welcomes the chance for a quiet vacation that comes when San Francisco Assistant District Attorney Patrick Dixon proposes that the burnt-out detective drive Dixon's wife and son to their summer cottage on a remote High Sierra lake. In exchange, "Nameless" will have a week's free use of a neighboring cabin.

The same week, unknown to both the assistant D.A. and "Nameless," also among the vacationers at Deep Mountain Lake is a recently paroled explosives expert, Donald Michael Latimer. The timing is not coincidental, for Latimer has meticulously devised a warped plan for revenge against the men who sent him to prison. His viciously ingenious boobytraps have already claimed the lives of two of his intended victims, and at Deep Mountain Lake he has lined up his next three targets: Pat Dixon, Dixon's twelve-year-old son, and "Nameless" himself.

A harrowing tale that builds with relentless suspense to an edge-of-the-chair climax, Boobytrap marks another triumph both for the sleuth cited by the Chicago Sun-Times as "the thinking man's detective" and for his creator, Bill Pronzini, whom the Denver Post praises as "an exceptionally skilled writer working at the top of his ability."

Bill Pronzini, the author of Illusions and Sentinels, is the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Private-Eye Writers Association of America, as well as two Shamus Awards for his crime fiction.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781628152876
Publisher:	Speaking Volumes, LLC
Publication date:	11/13/2015
Series:	Nameless Detective Mystery Series , #25
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.51(d)

About the Author

Bill Pronzini is simply one of the masters. He seems to have taken a crack at just about every genre: mysteries, noirish thrillers, historicals, locked-room mysteries, adventure novels, spy capers, men's action, westerns, and, of course, his masterful, long-running Nameless private detective series, now entering its fourth decade, with no signs of creative flagging.

He's also ghosted several Brett Halliday short stories as Michael Shayne for Mike Shayne's Mystery Magazine, and has managed to collaborate with such fellow writers as John Lutz, Barry Wahlberg, Collin Wilcox and Marcia Muller.

Editorial Reviews

On a fishing trip to Deep Mountain Lake in the High Sierras, Pronzini's San Francisco-based Nameless Detective pursues a crash course with a psychotic bomber just released from prison and bent on revenge. Nameless, seen last in Illusions (1997), is called Bill here--once--by 12-year-old Chuck Dixon. Chuck and his mother are staying in a cabin near Nameless's, waiting for Chuck's father, an assistant DA in San Francisco, to join them. Readers are privy to the journals of David Michael Latimer, the bomber who has targeted the judge and a lawyer who sent him to jail for bombing attacks on his ex-wife and her lover. Latimer's ingenious boobytraps have killed both men, and his next target, Chuck's dad, isn't aware of the danger he faces. Pronzini gradually draws the principals in his plot together near Deep Mountain Lake, first with the death of the retired local sheriff, which disquiets Nameless, and then with the odd behavior of a few newcomers, who variously spark the PI's suspicions. When one of these unlikely fishermen plans a trip with Chuck, Nameless replaces his fiberglass rod with a metal one. Approaching 60, Nameless is aging with grace and sensitivity and no loss of his macho appeal. Pronzini plays his readers expertly, hooking them with a credible cast and setting his plot line with just the right amount of tension. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly