New Releases by David Liss

Featuring North America''s foremost thriller authors, Thriller is the first collection of pure thriller stories ever published. Offering up heart-pumping tales of suspense in all its guises are thirty-two of the most critically acclaimed and award-winning names in the business. From the signature characters that made such authors as David Morrell and John Lescroart famous, to four of the hottest new voices in the genre, this blockbuster will tantalize and terrify. Lock the doors, draw the shades, pull up the covers and be prepared for Thriller to keep you up all night.

Edgar award-winning author of the popular historical novels A Conspiracy of Paper and A Spectacle of Corruption, David Liss showcases his amazing versatility with this brilliant new tale of contemporary suspense: a literary thriller set in Florida, where killing is a matter of conscience. No one is more surprised than Lem Altick when it turns out he’s actually good at peddling encyclopedias door to door. He hates the predatory world of sales, but he needs the money to pay for college. Then things go horribly wrong. In a sweltering trailer in rural Florida, a couple whom Lem has spent hours pitching is shot dead before his eyes, and the unassuming young man is suddenly pulled into the dark world of conspiracy and murder. Not just murder: assassination– or so claims the killer, the mysterious and strangely charismatic Melford Kean, who has struck without remorse and with remarkable good cheer. But the self-styled ethical assassin hadn’t planned on a witness, and so he makes Lem a deal: Stay quiet and there will be no problems. Go to the police and take the fall. Before Lem can decide, he is drawn against his will into the realm of the assassin, a post-Marxist intellectual with whom he forms an unlikely (and perhaps unwise) friendship. The ethical assassin could be a charming sociopath, eco-activist, or vigilante for social justice. To unravel the mystery and save himself, Lem must descend deep into a bizarre world he never knew existed, where a group of desperate–and genuinely deranged–schemers have hatched a plan that will very likely keep Lem from leaving town alive. David Liss skillfully interweaves a gallery of eccentric characters with a multilayered plot characterized by its unpredictable twists and turns. The Ethical Assassin is a brilliant, darkly comic novel that will leave readers in suspense until the very last page.

Text by Thomas McEvilley, Jim Drobnick, Caroline Koebel.

A collection of thirty tales of suspense features contributions from Heather Graham, Lincoln Child, Denise Hamilton, Michael Palmer, Douglas Preston, Alex Kava, Michael Palmer, and John Lescroart.

Benjamin Weaver, the quick-witted pugilist turned private investigator, returns in David Liss’s sequel to the Edgar Award–winning novel, A Conspiracy of Paper. “[A] wonderful book . . . every bit as good as [Liss’s] remarkable debut . . . easily one of the year’s best.”—The Boston Globe Moments after his conviction for a murder he did not commit, at a trial presided over by a judge determined to find him guilty, Benjamin Weaver is accosted by a stranger who cunningly slips a lockpick and a file into his hands. In an instant he understands two things: Someone wants him to hang—and another equally mysterious agent is determined to see him free. After a daring escape from eighteenth-century London’s most notorious prison, Weaver must face another challenge: to prove himself innocent when the corrupt courts have shown they care nothing for justice. Unable to show his face in public, Weaver pursues his inquiry disguised as a wealthy merchant seeking to involve himself in the contentious world of politics. Desperately navigating a labyrinth of schemers, crime lords, assassins, and spies, Weaver learns that in an election year, little is what it seems and the truth comes at a staggeringly high cost. Praise for A Spectacle of Corruption “[A] rousing sequel of historical, intellectual suspense. ”—San Antonio Express-News “Liss is a superb writer who evokes the squalor of London with Hogarthian gusto.”—People “In Benjamin Weaver, Mr. Liss has created a multifaceted character and a wonderful narrator.”—The New York Sun

Londres 1719. Benjamin Weaver, juif parmi les chrétiens, ruffian parmi les aristocrates, et justicier parmi les voleurs, sillonne le monde souterrain du crime en redresseur de torts pour le compte des puissants. Mais l''enquête, cette fois, le touche au plus près, car elle est liée à la mort mystérieuse de son père, un important financier qu''il n''a pas revu depuis son enfance. Un meurtre qui va le plonger au sein du monde de la spéculation financière. Avec pour seules armes son cerveau et ses poings, Weaver va découvrir les prémisses d''un nouveau règne économique, un mode de vie qui recèle de grands risques pour le porte-monnaie des investisseurs et de grands dangers pour la vie du jeune homme et des siens.

Amsterdam, 1659: On the world’s first commodities exchange, fortunes are won and lost in an instant. Miguel Lienzo, a sharp-witted trader in the city’s close-knit community of Portuguese Jews, knows this only too well. Once among the city’s most envied merchants, Miguel has suddenly lost everything. Now, impoverished and humiliated, living in his younger brother’s canal-flooded basement, Miguel must find a way to restore his wealth and reputation. Miguel enters into a partnership with a seductive Dutchwoman who offers him one last chance at success—a daring plot to corner the market of an astonishing new commodity called “coffee.” To succeed, Miguel must risk everything he values and face a powerful enemy who will stop at nothing to see him ruined. Miguel will learn that among Amsterdam’s ruthless businessmen, betrayal lurks everywhere, and even friends hide secret agendas.

In het Amsterdam van 1659 probeert een joods-Portugese handelsman zich te mengen in de opkomende koffiehandel, maar zijn vrienden zijn niet wie ze lijken, zijn vijanden zijn talrijk en de Joodse Raad volgt hem met argusogen.

Este livro fala sobre os primeiros crimes financeiros na Londres do século XVIII. Como personagem principal, um judeu de origens portuguesa, que conheceu a fama através de lutas de boxe, num submundo que o conhecia como ''O leão de Judá''. Benjamin Weaver é um estranho na Londres do século XVIII - um judeu entre cristãos, um rufião entre aristocratas, um pugilista aposentado que, contratado pela nobreza de Londres, viaja pelo mundo do crime, perseguindo devedores e ladrões. Em ''A Conspiração de Papel'', no entanto, Weaver investiga um crime do tipo mais pessoal - a morte de seu pai - um notório especulador da bolsa, de quem não tinha notícias há anos. Para encontrar as respostas, Weaver tem de enfrentar uma prostitutra desesperada, que sabe demais sobre o seu passado, parentes que lhe cobram a sua alienação da fé judaica e uma conspiração de poderosos homens do mundo das finanças britânicas.