JANUARY 2018 - AudioFile
This follow-up to Jones’s award-winning title, IQ, once again features protagonist Isaiah Quintabe. This time, IQ may have taken on one too many thugs as he tries to solve his brother’s murder and save the sister of the woman his brother loved. Narrator Sullivan Jones, reprising his role as IQ, consequently takes on every manner of thug himself: Mexican street gang members, loan sharks and their heavies, Rwandan drug dealers, and Chinese hit men. The various players become increasingly entangled, keeping both IQ and his narrator busy. But no worries: Both rise from the chaos triumphant. At the end of the story, the author signals new adventures ahead for IQ. Let’s hope Jones will be the one delivering them. K.W. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine
The New York Times - Janet Maslin
…Joe Ide [is] the best thing to happen to mystery writing in a very long time…There are a lot of fine reasons to discover Ide's work…He writes thumbnail descriptions that rival Elmore Leonard's…His dialogue…has bite that puts him in the Winslow/Lehane league…Then there's his leading man. Isaiah Quintabe…As anyone who read IQ will know, Ide isn't a one-plot type of writer. He sets many schemes in motion. In [Righteous], they involve gambling, a natty Rwandan Hutu gangster who lost one leg to the Tutsi, Chinese triads, money-laundering, human trafficking and a whole lot more. Ide writes about the hostility among ethnic groups—notably black gangs and Chinese triads…in ways that would be offensive if they weren't equal-opportunity insults. The world of these books is one of constant trash talk, and Ide delivers it with style.
Publishers Weekly
★ 08/14/2017
Two cases with powerful personal aspects challenge Isaiah “IQ” Quintabe, known in his Long Beach, Calif., community for his crime-solving abilities, in Edgar-finalist Ide’s outstanding sequel to 2016’s IQ. The most painful open wound in Isaiah’s life remains the hit-and-run death eight years earlier of his older brother, Marcus, which Isaiah witnessed. His perseverance in seeking justice seems to have paid off when he locates the car that killed Marcus, but new evidence that Marcus was deliberately targeted raises a slew of troubling questions. The revelation comes just as Marcus’s girlfriend, Sarita Van, reenters Isaiah’s life to request help; her half-sister, Janine, a Vegas deejay, has racked up gambling debts that can’t be paid off. Since Isaiah still carries a torch for Sarita, he agrees to help. Ide again makes his hero’s deductive brilliance plausible, while presenting an emotionally engaging story that doesn’t shy away from presenting the bleakest aspects of humanity. Agent: Esther Newberg, ICM. (Oct.)
From the Publisher
One of the Best Books of the Year - NPR, Washington Post, BookRiot, Suspense Magazine, Amazon, South Florida Sun Sentinel, LitHub
A Goodreads Choice Award finalist!
"Joe Ide is the best new discovery I've come across in a long time. And Isaiah Quintabe is the kind of sleuth not seen on the mystery landscape before. Righteous is a riveting follow up to IQ."—Michael Connelly, author of The Late Show
"Last year, Joe Ide became the best thing to happen to mystery writing in a very long time. . . . There are a lot of fine reasons to discover Ide's work. . . . He writes thumbnail descriptions that rival Elmore Leonard's. . . . His dialogue, much of it unprintable here, has bite that puts him in the Winslow/Lehane league. . . . The world of these books is one of constant trash talk, and Ide delivers it with style. . . . It may be time for Ide to lay to rest Isaiah's Marcus obsession and give him other things to think about. I can't wait to find out what they'll be."—Janet Maslin, New York Times
"Excellent... Ide keeps Righteous on a righteous path of compelling storytelling, allowing his characters to flourish while exploring the worst of human nature. Never once does Righteous go over the top as Ide keeps each plot point chillingly realistic... Ide's debut IQ showed what a skillful writer he is. Righteous elevates the author—and his characters—to a new level."—Oline Cogdill, The Associated Press
"Ide's sense of humor, his effervescent dialogue, and his knack for moments of emotion [are] all still present here, terrific news for readers."—Charles Finch, USA Today
"Joe Ide made many fans with his first book, which starred the young black PI Isaiah Quintabe. Its follow-up, in which "IQ" digs into the 10-year-old killing of his older brother, will no doubt earn Mr. Ide many more followers."—Wall Street Journal
"He's the real deal."—Carl Hiaasen
"Call it what you will—ungraphic manga, comedy noir—but IQ, Joe Ide's debut featuring Isaiah Quintabe, was definitely original. . . . Righteous, the second IQ novel, is every bit as solid and smart as the first. . . . Ide writes wild dialogue, creates totally original characters and makes me laugh out loud at two in the morning. What more can you ask?"—Margaret Cannon, The Globe and Mail [Canada]
"Outstanding . . . Ide again makes his hero's deductive brilliance plausible, while presenting an emotionally engaging story that doesn't shy away from presenting the bleakest aspects of humanity."—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Ide's debut, IQ, was one of last year's best crime novels, and he follows it with another scorcher. . . . Like the great Thomas Perry, Ide manages to combine light and
dark in wholly unpredictable ways, blending comic capering with real-life bloodletting in a manner that diminishes neither and taps a vein of deep emotion lurking amid the laugh lines and spurts of violence. Anyone who loves Perry or Timothy Hallinan needs to hop on Ide's bandwagon while there's still room to sit."—Booklist (starred review)
"Brilliantly executed . . . Deftly weaving the search for Marcus's killer with various escapades in Vegas, Ide employs a clever mixing of time lines that will keep readers guessing until the explosive, bloody denouement. A winning combination of skillful writing and flawless pacing, this second series outing is packed with adrenaline-inducing scenes along with a colorful cast of violent and treacherous villains."—Library Journal (starred review)
"Righteous is action packed, cerebral and altogether engaging, and I predict a long string of follow-up novels in this fine series."—Bruce Tierney, Bookpage
Library Journal
★ 09/01/2017
Isaiah Quintabe,"IQ," the Sherlock Holmes of East Long Beach, CA, uses his inductive reasoning skills to investigate crime and has taken payment in the form of live chickens and baked goods. His Achilles heel is an obsessive need to know who drove the car that killed his brother Marcus a decade ago. When Marcus's old girlfriend Sarita asks IQ to help extricate her sister from a crushing gambling debt in Vegas, he can't refuse. He has always been in love with Sarita and envisions this case ushering in their new life together. IQ once again enlists the help of Dodson (Watson to his Sherlock) who has a pregnant girlfriend and a day job in an attempt to go legitimate. Dodson's witty banter and dynamic personal life provide a piercing contrast to IQ's solitary and sterile existence, and the scenes between the two are notable in this brilliantly executed novel. Deftly weaving the search for Marcus's killer with various escapades in Vegas, Ide employs a clever mixing of time lines that will keep readers guessing until the explosive, bloody denouement. VERDICT A winning combination of skillful writing and flawless pacing, this second series outing is packed with adrenaline-inducing scenes along with a colorful cast of violent and treacherous villains. [See Prepub Alert, 4/10/17; "Editors' Fall Picks," p. 32.]—Amy Nolan, St. Joseph, MI
JANUARY 2018 - AudioFile
This follow-up to Jones’s award-winning title, IQ, once again features protagonist Isaiah Quintabe. This time, IQ may have taken on one too many thugs as he tries to solve his brother’s murder and save the sister of the woman his brother loved. Narrator Sullivan Jones, reprising his role as IQ, consequently takes on every manner of thug himself: Mexican street gang members, loan sharks and their heavies, Rwandan drug dealers, and Chinese hit men. The various players become increasingly entangled, keeping both IQ and his narrator busy. But no worries: Both rise from the chaos triumphant. At the end of the story, the author signals new adventures ahead for IQ. Let’s hope Jones will be the one delivering them. K.W. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
2017-08-06
The game's afoot once again for 20-something genius sleuth Isaiah Quintabe, who has two cases to deal with: one leading him to mayhem in Las Vegas, the other to the man responsible for his brother's death.Things are pretty much as we left them with Isaiah in Ide's acclaimed debut mystery/thriller, IQ (2016). He's still leading a mostly solitary life in his East Long Beach, California, neighborhood, using his agile intellect to help old ladies find lost jewelry, chase away abusive ex-husbands, or deal with volatile gang members who think he's too smart for his own good. The one case he'd most like to crack involves the hit-and-run death of his beloved older brother, Marcus. Just as he's finally figured out that Marcus' death was no accident, IQ gets a call from drop-dead-gorgeous Sarita Van, his late brother's one-time fiancee, who's now a high-powered attorney. She wants him to find her younger sister, Janine, a Vegas-based club DJ who shares a gambling addiction with her ne'er-do-well boyfriend, Benny. They're on the run from Leo, a vicious loan shark, whose collector in chief is a 7-foot-tall, broad-shouldered, dead-eyed Canadian named Balthazar. Isaiah's only backup on this mission is his short-fused but dauntless neighborhood buddy, Dodson, whose own plate is full trying to make his food truck profitable and waiting for his wife to give birth to their first child. Once on the Vegas strip, this post-Millennial Holmes and Watson get far more than they bargained for as they have to fight and think their way through waves of Chinese mob muscle led by a baleful sex trafficker leaning heavily on Sarita and Janine's craven, corrupt father. Ide weaves the often antic events of this case in tandem with Isaiah's lonesome inquiry into his brother's death; a pursuit that leads him to the sinister Seb Habimana, an East African refugee who's made his mark in Isaiah's hood in shady real estate dealings and shadier money laundering operations. The plots of these separate cases collide as much as they interweave, and Ide can sometimes go a little too long and deep on background info. But he keeps your head in the game throughout with his witty style and edgy storytelling, both of which show greater assurance than in his first novel—and even bigger potential for the future. A thrilling follow-up to one of the more auspicious detective-series debuts in recent memory.
