New Releases by Jack Batten

Mystery-solving criminal lawyer Crang returns to investigate the disappearance of two rare books. Fletcher Marshall is a Toronto antiquarian book dealer, internationally respected in the business. One night, someone blows the safe in his office and makes off with the contents, which include an infamous forged first edition of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Sonnets from the Portuguese that is in itself a collector’s item. Fletcher, who was still in the process of verifying the book, doesn’t even know whether it was the real thing or a clever forgery (of a forgery). But rather than summon the cops to investigate the theft, he turns to his pal Crang, the nervy criminal lawyer, hoping he can retrieve the books before their owner gets wind of the crime. The owner happens to be the richest woman in Canada and a tough cookie who could ruin Fletcher’s career. Crang gets on the hunt, learning much about the trade in musty books and the lucrative business it makes for forgers. Just as he seems to be getting close to answers, a shocking development makes things much more complicated — and much more dangerous.

The smart-talking, wise-cracking, jazz-loving criminal lawyer has got a taste for straight vodka and a nose for trouble. No one could ever accuse Crang of being a superhero, but with his usual mixture of innate cool and naive enthusiasm he brings the villains to justice. This 6-book bundle includes: Crang Plays the Ace Crang Mystery #1 Straight No Chaser Crang Mystery #2 Riviera Blues Crang Mystery #3 Blood Count Crang Mystery #4 Take Five Crang Mystery #5 Keeper of the Flame Crang Mystery #6 “Like a fine wine, the [Crang] series — and its protagonist — have aged well.” The Toronto Star

At a time when gay communities were hidden worlds, Crang needs to root out a killer and do his best to right a grave wrong. At the height of the AIDS crisis in the early nineties, a close friend of Crang’s, Alex Corcoran, loses his partner, Ian, to the disease. After Ian’s death, Crang is enlisted by Alex to find the man who infected Ian. Crang searches for the man to prevent Alex from getting himself in trouble. However, when Alex is murdered, Crang owes it to his friends to find their killers. The case, which explores the gay scene in Toronto at a time when LGBT culture was still very much a hidden world and open persecution was commonplace, ends up involving a cabinet minister afraid of being exposed. A clever political mystery, Blood Count is also an emotional and moving story of a couple whose lives are devastated by AIDS and a community damaged by the prejudices of the world around them.

Criminal lawyer Crang agrees to do a favour for a family member while vacationing in the French Riviera, but his attempts find him stuck in a series of tight spots. Lurking in the background is a fraud set-up tangled up in a murder, forcing Crang to solve the riddles if he wants to unravel the case.

“Like a fine wine, the [Crang] series — and its protagonist — have aged well.” — The Toronto Star “Not to be missed.” — The Globe and Mail Jack Batten''s hard-boiled Crang series returns with this four-book bundle, including the latest Crang mystery, 2016''s Keeper of the Flame! Includes:Crang Plays the Ace Straight No Chaser Take Five Keeper of the Flame

When his popular hip-hop artist client is blackmailed, Crang stumbles on a porn operation and an unexpected case of murder. Crang is a smart-talking criminal lawyer who doesn’t mind chasing down unorthodox cases. That makes him just the guy to represent a famous hip-hop performer who’s on the wrong end of a blackmail scheme. It doesn’t strike Crang as a confounding case, but in no time, he finds himself confronting an organized gang that deals in porn, stock swindles, and murder. Things get so messy that Crang decides he’ll have to bend the law to make things right. It’s a dilemma that would cause other lawyers to back away, but not Crang, the nervy attorney with the fast mouth.

This special three-book bundle contains all three novel’s in Jack Batten’s Crang series. Acclaimed Jack Batten is one of Canada’s foremost crime fiction experts, and it shows in this entertaining and relentlessly witty series about the exploits of a hard-living, vodka- and jazz-loving criminal lawyer who deals with both the lives of the rich and the down-and-out on the streets and in the mansions of Canada’s largest city. Includes Crang Plays the Ace Straight No Chaser Take Five

It’s been twenty years since Crang, the Toronto criminal lawyer with the single name and the smart mouth, last sleuthed his way through deep trouble and tricky cases. Now, as witty and nervy as he was in such best sellers as Straight No Chaser and Riviera Blues, Crang has returned, and as usual, he’s got problems. A client has skipped out on him, still owing Crang a very large fee. The client, a woman of great beauty and even greater treachery, just happens to be the co-mastermind of the biggest marijuana grow-op business in Canadian drug history. Crang cuts a few legal corners in his hunt for the fleeing client, but she soon becomes only the most elusive of his worries. Along the way, Crang finds himself confronting a major Toronto mob boss, a thug intent on maiming him, and an ugly case of murder. Will Crang survive the onslaught? Sometimes he can’t help wondering. Crang remains the same, familiar off-beat guy from the earlier books. He loves vodka, jazz and smart repartee. His friends tend to be on the shady side of the law. Crang is still keeping romantic company with the delicious Annie, a freelance writer and a sharp-tongued match for Crang when batting around the dicey options that his practice in criminal law forces on him. Crang and Annie have just moved into their first house. It’s in mid-town Toronto, and, like everything else in Take Five, it comes with hints of danger.

Called the "Maharaja of the keyboard" by Duke Ellington, Oscar Peterson released over 200 recordings, won seven Grammy Awards, received the Order of Canada and is considered to have been one of the greatest jazz pianists of all time. This new biography from award-winning author Jack Batten, promises to tell Oscar Peterson''s story in acomplete, compelling and sympathetic way. This is first biography of Oscar Peterson for young people. This book is the story of a black kid from a Montreal ghetto who reached accliam in the great music halls of the world.

Cause a "poker face" ain’t just a song by Lady Gaga. Crang is a criminal lawyer. He loves jazz, old movies, Polish vodka, his Volkswagen convertible, and his girlfriend Annie, not necessarily in that order. A wise-cracking WASP with a moral code that owes little to the Law Society of Upper Canada, Crang is equally quick with his lip and fists, but he can tell a fish fork from a pair of brass knuckles when he has to. The clients who come to Crang’s second-floor walk-up office on Toronto’s Queen Street strip – street punks, two bit robbers, and small-time scam artists – are usually guilty. Crang likes it that way. Mostly he gets them off and they’re grateful. So when Matthew Wansborough, wealthy financier and scion of a fine old family, comes to Crang with the novel problem that his $300,000 investment in Ace Disposal Services is too profitable, Crang is puzzled. Wansborough isn’t Crang’s usual kind of client and Ace isn’t Wansborough’s usual kind of blue-chip operation. Crang’s unorthodox investigation of Ace reveals that it’s a dirty player in a dirty business, run by men who oil the wheels of commerce with kickbacks, fraud, muscle – and murder. Mystery and comedy mix in this entertaining novel, written with the in-depth knowledge of the legal scene and the easygoing style that have made bestsellers of Batten’s previous books. Once readers have made the acquaintance of Crang, they will be eager to read of his future cases in what promises to be a long and successful series.

Classic Batten – on the rocks. Jazz. Cocaine. Vietnamese triads. Dope-dealing yuppie lawyers. Jack Batten’s got them all in his second mystery novel starring Crang, the unconventional criminal lawyer with a taste for straight vodka and a nose for trouble. This time out Crang is hired by his buddy Dave Goddard, a sax player whose playing style is from the fifties, but whose unwitting involvement in a complex coke-smuggling ring is pure eighties. Crang’s friendly offer to help Dave find out who is tailing him takes a reluctant sleuth into a series of unlikely locales: behind the scenes at Toronto’s oh-so-chic film festival; into a triad-run afterhours boozecan; and into the gang’s inner sanctum, the office of Big Bam, the ring’s genial but deadly kingpin. No one could ever accuse Crang of being a superhero, but with his usual mixture of innate cool and naive enthusiasm he brings the villains to justice and readers to the end of a cleverly entertaining romp that leaves us looking forward to Crang’s next case.

A brilliant, concise history of The War to End All Wars. In the decade leading up to 1914, Europe had never known such prosperity. But the times were not good enough for the continent’s most powerful nations: Germany wanted a navy that matched England’s; Russia wanted an army as large and as disciplined as Germany’s; the Austro-Hungarian Empire wanted more respect; and England felt compelled to teach the others about civilized relations. How terrible could a war be? In this riveting account of a tragic episode in world history, author Jack Batten takes readers through a far bloodier conflict than mankind had ever before endured. Meet the soldiers who fought the deadly battles along the Western Front. Follow the trail of flying ace Billy Bishop as he tangles in the air with the Red Baron. Learn the strategy of Britain’s Grand Fleet of warships as it heads into the biggest sea battle in history. Discover how civilians decoded virtually all the messages the Germans sent to their ships around the world. From the Battle of the Somme, Gallipoli, Passchendale, and Vimy Ridge to the war’s final battles, The War to End All Wars evokes the heroism and suffering of men from every country, whose stories changed the face of the world forever. With maps, index, and selected bibliography.

Tom Longboat was a hero. A member of the Onondaga Nation, he was born on the Six Nations reserve in Oshwegen, near Brantford, Ontario. Despite poverty, poor training, and prejudice, Longboat went on to become one of the world’s best runners. In 1907, at the height of his fame, he won the Boston Marathon and ran in the 1908 Olympic Marathon. Longboat was one of the best-known people of his day, and certainly the most prominent member of the Six Nations. Throughout his career he had to race against opponents, as well as rumors of illegal running activities. Nevertheless, he maintained his dignity, and his achievements still inspire people who understand the great pleasure of running, and running fast.

Dutiful nurse, hospital matron, courageous resistance fighter, Edith Cavell was all of these. A British citizen, the forty-eight-year-old Cavell was matron of an institute for nurses in the suburbs of Brussels at the outbreak of World War I. Dedicated to the methods of Florence Nightingale, her intelligence and ferocious sense of duty had transformed the institute into a leading training center. When the Germans captured Belgium in the fall of 1914, an organization was formed to assist British and French soldiers trapped behind German lines. Edith was asked to help and she didn’t hesitate. From that moment forward, Edith sheltered escaping soldiers in her hospital, using trickery to keep the suspicious Germans from discovering them. She helped arrange a secret route to neutral Holland and back to England at great personal risk, enabling soldiers of all ranks to slip through German lines. Using the institute as part of an elaborate Allied escape route, Edith Cavell was responsible for one thousand soldiers eventually making their way home. But Cavell’s role was discovered and a German military court put her on trial in Brussels, where she was sentenced to be executed by firing squad. On October 12, 1915, she put on her nurse’s uniform and met her fate, immediately becoming a worldwide martyr and rallying point for the British in their war against Germany. In this riveting account, author Jack Batten brings an incredibly brave woman and her turbulent times to life.

Fans of the Toronto Maple Leafs are once again wearing their colours with pride. It''s been 36 years since the Stanley Cup was won by Toronto, but Leafs fans will agree that the past decade has seen their team come agonizingly close to the Cup finals. Indeed they are almost there again! The new edition of this bestseller is filled with memories of great Leafs teams through the ''90s, into the new millenium including their strong showing this season. The Leafs includes all new colour photographs complementing the sometimes amusing, sometimes dramatic and often nostalgic stories from within the inner sanctums of Maple Leaf Gardens and the Air Canada Centre. Die-hard fans won''t be able to put it down and new fans will find no better source for learning about this legendary team.

"Hockey Dynasties" is an era-by-era look at the proliferation of family ties in professional hockey. The book examines why there are so many families in professional hockey, and includes tales by the players about their time at center ice playing with and against their siblings, fathers, cousins, and uncles.

The crowning event of the National Hockey League season is the Stanley Cup final. After months of regular season play, and weeks of intense playoff competition, two battered and exhausted teams clash for the Stanley Cup. The Quest for the Cup is a 304-page celebration of hockey''s ultimate series that traces the Stanley Cup finals through five great eras of hockey: - The birth of the game from 1892 to 1926 - The 30s and 40s when Georges Vezina, Lionel Conacher and Howie Morenz were icons of the game - 1946 -1967, the era of epic Leafs versus Canadiens battles - 1968 -1983, when the Bruins and Flyers won with brawn before the Canadiens took over with grace - The modern era, where the Oilers, Penguins, Red Wings and Devils have won multiple cups With more than 350 full-colour and black and white photographs, Quest for the Cup traces the Stanley Cup finals from their beginnings as a showcase of North American hockey talent, to their current status as the pinnacle event of international hockey. (2001)

Now Jack Batten, well-known for his popular books about the law, has set out to shed light on DNA and other pieces of magic that are regularly worked by scientists and their allies in the forensic field - both at the scenes of crimes and, later, in the laboratories. The route he takes to investigate each piece of forensic science is by way of a particular Canadian trial, and his guides on the route are the detectives, the prosecutors and defence attorneys, and the scientists who actually worked on the cases.

Brief biographical sketch of Joe MacInnis, arctic underwater explorer. Includes an account of his exploration of the Breadalbane, a ship which sunk in the arctic in 1853.