New Signed Firsts

Michael Harvey's The Fifth floor, is a sizzling follow-up to The Chicago Way ('A magnificent debut that should be read by all'-John Grisham; 'This book heralds the arrival of a major new voice'-Michael Connelly) opens with a murder in contemporary Chicago and winds its way back to Mrs. O'Leary's cow and the Great Chicago Fire of 1871.: When PI Michael Kelly is hired by an ex-flame to tail her abusive husband, he expects trouble of a domestic rather than a historical nature. Life, however, is not so simple. The tail leads Kelly to an old house on Chicago's North Side. Inside it, the private investigator finds a body and, perhaps, the answer to one of Chicago's most enduring mysteries: who started the Great Chicago Fire and why. The ensuing investigation takes Kelly to places he'd rather not go, specifically, City Hall's fifth floor, where the mayor is feeling the heat and looking to play for keeps. Ultimately, Kelly finds himself in a world where nothing is quite what it seems, face-to-face with a killer bent on rewriting history and staring down demons from a past he never knew he had.: A fast-stepping, intricately woven narrative, rich with the history and atmosphere of a great city, The Fifth Floor is a worthy successor to Harvey's critically acclaimed debut. : About the Author: : Michael Harvey is a journalist, documentary film producer, and writer, as well as the co-creator and executive producer of the television series Cold Case Files. His work has won many national and international awards, as well as an Academy Award nomination. He lives in Chicago.

The reviews are in:

Advance Praise for Michael Harvey's The Fifth Floor
“Michael Harvey is a magnificent new voice.”
—John Grisham

“In The Fifth Floor, Michael Harvey gives us a tale of murder, bare-knuckle mayoral politics, and historical catastrophe–in short, the perfect Chicago detective story, complete with a loving tour of the city’s funkier locales that’ll make any displaced Chicagoan long for home.”
—Erik Larson, author of The Devil In the White City

“Harvey’s superb second thriller . . . Harvey’s plot twists in all the right places, and his noir-inspired dialogue crackles without sounding showy. Marlowe and Spade would readily welcome Michael Kelly into their fold.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“PI Michael Kelly digs into the history of the Great Chicago Fire for his second case in what’s shaping up as a strong series. . . . Dry wit, delectable clues and tricky leads hallmark this trenchant tale of the Windy City.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

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And don't miss Amy Mackinnon's debut Tethered.

Clara Marsh is an undertaker who doesn’t believe in God. She spends her solitary life among the dead, preparing their last baths and bidding them farewell with a bouquet from her own garden. Her carefully structured life shifts when she discovers a neglected little girl, Trecie, playing in the funeral parlor, desperate for a friend.

It changes even more when Detective Mike Sullivan starts questioning her again about a body she prepared three years ago, an unidentified girl found murdered in a nearby strip of woods. Unclaimed by family, the community christened her Precious Doe. When Clara and Mike learn Trecie may be involved with the same people who killed Precious Doe, Clara must choose between the stead-fast existence of loneliness and the perils of binding one’s life to another.

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