Best Selling Books by Ross Thomas

A long-distance call from a Texas city on his birthday gives Benjamin Dill the news that his sister--it''s her birthday, too, they were born exactly ten years apart--has died in a car bomb explosion. It''s the chief of police calling--Felicity Dill worked for him; she was a homicide detective. Dill is there that night, the beginning of his dogged search for her killer. What he finds is no surprise to him, because Benjamin DIll is never surprised at what awful things people will do--but it''s a real surprise to the reader.

"Hain''t we got all the fools in town on our side? And ain''t that a big enough majority in any town?" -- Mark Twain When Lucifer Dye is released from three months in a Hong Kong prison, debriefed, handed a false passport, a new wardrobe and a $20,000 check, his haughty control makes it clear that Dye''s career with his country has been permanently terminated. But a good agent is always in demand, and just a few hours later Dye is being interviewed for a highly ingenious position. Victor Orcutt, although a not very good imitation of a British pre-war gent, has creative talents of his own. He has his sights a small southern city, with the ordinary run-of-the-mill corruption one would expect in such a place. The canny Orcott knows there''s no profit in that. His creed is "To get better, it must be much worse." He and his two associates have looked up Dye''s history, and he now offers the ex-spy a mission: for two and a half times the government''s bounty, Dye is to thoroughly corrupt the town. And the sly Dye takes the offer.

"Anyone reading a Ross Thomas thriller for the first time is in imminent danger of addiction: One taste is never enough." - Los Angeles Times In Twilight at Mac''s Place, the quiet death of an aged spy triggers a desperate race to control his memoirs, which threaten to reveal Cold War secrets many would prefer stayed secrets. When the spy''s estranged son receives the then dizzying sum of $100,000 for all rights to the work, he is properly dizzied. He is also smart enough to seek the help of veteran Cold Warriors McCorkle and Padillo, owners of a D.C. bar called Mac''s Place that is both a capital landmark and a nest of intrigue.

Would you be wary if someone gave you the assignment of delivering five million dollars to a Philippine terrorist--never mind from whom or why? Booth Stallings, a terrorism expert just fired from his job at a bashful organization that never admitted its mount in the Washington merry-go-round, is wary. So wary that he cuts in con man "Otherguy" Overby, who in turn involves Artie Wu, pretender to the throne of China, and his partner, Quincy Durant. Obviously, good patriots don''t want to hand over all that money to bad guys. Better they keep it for themselves. Which inevitably raises the question: Who among them will end up with the money?

An ex-spy and his sidekick hunt for a rogue assassin of Nazi war criminals—“Thomas is without peer in American suspense” (Los Angeles Times). Nicolae Polscaru, a three-and-a-half-foot-tall dwarf, is tossed into a Hollywood swimming pool by four drunken screenwriters, who take bets on how long he can tread water. Minor Jackson, his OSS training still fresh a year after World War II’s end, beats the bullies senseless and pulls Nicolae from the water. A friendship is born. Jackson is broke, his spying days over, and Nicolae offers him a job. A former spy himself, the globetrotting Romanian has a commission to find Kurt Oppenheimer, an expert assassin of high-ranking Nazis. Kurt won’t stop killing, no matter what the bloodshed will do to the fragile world peace, and the Soviets, the British, and the remains of the Nazi High Command all want his head. Jackson will beat them all to finding Kurt—unless his new friend betrays him first.

Mac McCorkle and Mike Padillo team up to help twin bodyguards in a thrilling crime caper from“America’s best storyteller” (The New York Times Book Review). The twins who walk into Mac McCorkle’s bar look identical, despite their differing genders. Their names are Wanda and Walter Gothar, and from the steel in their eyes it’s apparent that their business isn’t the friendly kind. They’ve come seeking help from Mac and his partner, Padilla, an ex-CIA agent who has skulked in the world’s darkest corners. Anxious for a big payday, the twins took an assignment out of their depth, working as bodyguards for a Saudi prince who came to Washington to sign an oil deal. The job fell apart, and now the twins are being pursued by the world’s two finest killersu00ad—who take out Walter without breaking a sweat. Now Mac and Padilla are faced with a choice: Save Wanda, or join her in the grave.

An old CIA connection brings trouble for a Washington, DC, barman in this thriller from “America’s best storyteller” (The New York Times Book Review). As the saying goes, you can’t pick your friends. If you could, Mac McCorkle would disown Padilla. They owned a bar together in Bonn, the West German capital, and stayed partners even after Padilla’s sideline as a CIA operative got the bar blown up. Padilla was thought to be dead and erased from the CIA’s files—but now he’s back on the agency’s turf. Mac moved to Washington, DC, after the trouble in Bonn to get married and open his bar anew. His new bride is beautiful, the bar is a success, and Padilla’s reappearance threatens everything. A group of African terrorists want Padilla to assassinate the prime minister of their small sub-Saharan republic—and they’ve kidnapped Mac’s wife to use as leverage.

Only one man can save the president’s kidnapped brother in this propulsive thriller from the author “without peer in American suspense” (Los Angeles Times). American agents abduct a high-profile terrorist in broad daylight on the streets of London, subduing him with a tranquilizer. He dies a few hours later on a flight back to Washington, DC, and the body is dropped into the ocean. Hours later, the President’s brother—a political powerhouse in his own right—boards a plane to Las Vegas that doesn’t land in Nevada. Libyan radicals are at the controls, and he is their prisoner. The only man who can save him is Chubb Dunjee. A former United Nations operative with skills in every aspect of political negotiation, Chubb became famous for solving problems with well-placed bribes. Saving the President’s brother should be no trouble for him. But the Libyans don’t want a bribe. They want blood.

To coincide with the paperback release of Voodoo, Ltd., here is Thomas''s classic Edgar-nominated political thriller--out of print for years. Investigator and ladies'' man Jake Pope is out to discover what shocking secret Crawdad Gilmore was planning to reveal before he was shot to death.

A rare book disappears—and so does the detective who was guarding it—in a novel by an author who is “without peer in American suspense” (Los Angeles Times). Philip St. Ives has no love for New York’s drafty, broken-down Adelphi Hotel, but he is in no mood to be evicted from it. His cash dwindling, he is happy to learn about a job that calls for his specific talents as a mediator between thieves and their victims. It sounds like the set-up to a bad joke: A thief, an insurance salesman, and the Library of Congress call Philip’s lawyer to ask about a stolen copy of Pliny’s Historia Naturalis. To find it, Philip will risk becoming history himself. The book was stolen on its way from the Library of Congress to California, and the detective guarding it vanished as well. Mired in snow-choked Washington, DC, St. Ives must arrange for a pair of ransoms to avoid becoming a victim of book collectors who value a nice first edition over an investigator’s life.

Ah, Treachery!, the last novel Thomas wrote before his death, tells the story of one Captain Edd "Twodees" Partain, drummed out of the Army and hounded by rumors of his involvement in a secret operation in El Salvador. Twodees gets hired on to help a fundraiser for the "Little Rock folks" recover funds that were stolen from an illicit stash used to smooth over problems and pay off hush money. Meanwhile, Partain is involved in a storefront operation called VOMIT (Victims of Military Intelligence Treachery) trying to defend former intelligence operatives such as Partain from those who are trying to cover up the past permanently.

Quasi-P.I.s Wu and Durant of Wudu, Ltd. call in a couple of less-than-reputable cronies to help solve a rich playboy''s murder--then find their own lives on the line.

Missionary Stew follows political fundraiser Draper Haere on a quest to uncover the secret behind a right-wing coup in an unnamed Central american country. He seeks the information in order to get dirt on his boss''s opponent in the 1984 US Presidential election. Haere''s pursuit of the truth repeatedly puts Haere''s life in danger, as the powers-that-be stop at nothing to keep the episode buried. Along the way, Haere carries on an affair with the wife of his candidate and enlists the aid of Morgan Citron, an almost-Pullitzer winning journalist who has recently been released from an African prison where the prisoners where fed human flesh--the titular missionary stew. Together, Citron and Haere face up against cocaine traffickers, Latin American generals, corrupt US officials, and Citron''s estranged, tabloid-publisher mother.

The Fourth Durango is not your ordinary Durango. It''s not in Spain, or Mexico, and it''s not a ski town in the Colorado Rockies, although Durangos do exist in all of those places. This Durango has an industry, albeit a rather odd one-it is a hideout business, a place where people pay to find sanctuary from former friends and associates who are either trying to kill them, or have them killed. Into this Durango comes a former chief justice of a state supreme court, followed by son-in-law Kelly Vines to act as his emissary to the beautiful and savvy mayor. Following them come a false priest, and a run of murders. It takes a Ross Thomas to stir these characters into a witty and ingenious mix readers will not be able to- -and certainly would not want to--resist.

From the Edgar Award–winning author: “[A] highly readable novel of political adventure . . . a cracking good story and the Africa mentality is fascinating” (Kirkus Reviews). Clinton Shartelle doesn’t seem like a good choice to run a political campaign in Albertia. For one thing, he’s American, and Albertia is a small coastal republic in Africa, about to be cut loose from the English Crown. For another, Shartelle is Southern and fiercely proud of it, and his ideas about racial politics veer unpredictably from progressive to rigidly old-fashioned. But Shartelle is the best, and the political future of Albertia is too important to be left to anyone else. If history is any indication, this first fair election will probably be the country’s last. Rich natural resources make it attractive to businessmen on both sides of the Atlantic, opening Albertia up to political corruption. For his part, Shartelle is hired to make sure that a British industrialist’s favored candidate wins the presidency. But the opposition is backed by the CIA, for whom murder is just another political tool.

A tragic past traps a former Hollywood stuntman in a web of international intrigue—from “America’s best storyteller” (The New York Times Book Review). Two pirates do battle on an old junk ship in Singapore Harbor. They leap nimbly from deck to rigging, crossing swords like fencing masters. And then one surprises the other, slicing a rope and sending the unfortunate pirate tumbling into the bay. This is how stuntman Angelo Sacchetti dies. Edward Cauthorne was his opponent, a fellow stuntman whose career died along with Sacchetti. He’s selling used cars when two thugs approach him. They’re emissaries from Sacchetti’s godfather, a Mafia don. Sacchetti is alive after all—alive enough to be blackmailing the don—and they firmly request that Cauthorne find him. The search takes Cauthorne back to Singapore, to risk his own life for the sake of the man he thought he’d killed.

Winner of the Edgar Award for Best First Novel At the height of the Cold War, two Americans are runnng a bar in the West German capital, called Mac''s place. One of the pair, Michael Padillo, isn''t around a lot; he keeps disappearing on "business trips." McCorkle, his partner, wisely doesn''t ask questions; he knows Padillo has a second job -- he''s a (reluctant) US agent. But McCorkle is ready to answer a call for help from Padillo, and he joins his friend in a blind journey with no inkling of what they will encounter at the turn of each dark and dangerous corner.

A journalist tries to save an abducted ambassador—even though he despises the man—in this entertaining thriller by an Edgar Award–winning author. Philip St. Ives loses his first job in journalism as soon as he realizes he hates the man who gave it to him. Chicago Post editor Amfred Killingsworth is a pompous blowhard, and fires his newest reporter for failing to fawn over him. St. Ives goes to New York, where he lands a daily column and the close friendship of an assortment of crooks. Killingsworth goes in a less respectable direction, becoming the US ambassador to Yugoslavia. By the time the ambassador gets himself kidnapped, the only man who can save him is his former cub reporter. The kidnappers demand the release of a Slavic poet in exchange for the ambassador, and St. Ives goes behind the Iron Curtain to arrange the hand-off. To protect a trove of ugly Washington secrets, he’ll have to save the life of a universally disliked man.

An ex-political operative is a master of dirty tricks, but now he’s mixed up in something far worse: “Ross Thomas is without peer in American suspense” (Los Angeles Times). There are few jobs that Harvey Longmire hasn’t had. He’s been a crime reporter, Louisiana state legislator, foreign correspondent, and—briefly—a decoy for the CIA. But he made his name as campaign trail fixer, an expert in the art of exploiting an enemy’s secrets. For nearly a decade, Harvey was the sharpest man in the Beltway, but he quit in 1972, trading political dirty work for a quiet life on a farm. Now two old friends want him back in the game. A millionaire named Vullo has started a foundation to investigate conspiracies, and Harvey happens to be the expert on the most prominent case: the infamous disappearance of a man named Arch Mix. The trail is not as cold as Harvey thought. Soon he’ll either find Mix—or suffer a disappearance of his own.

Der bekannte Gewerkschaftsboss Arch Mix ist spurlos verschwunden. Als Ermittlungen von FBI und CIA scheinbar erfolglos bleibe, wird der frühere Wahlkampfberater Harvey Longmire von einer neugegründeten Organisation, die sich der Aufdeckung von Verschwörungen verschrieben hat, hinzugezogen. Auf seinen Nachforschungen im Washington kurz nach der Watergate-Affäre gerät er in ein raffiniert gesponnenes Netz politischer Intrigen und Verschwörungen, das sich nicht nur auf Gewerkschaften, sondern auch auf die kommenden Wahlen auszuwirken droht. Doch wer steckt dahinter? Eine Reihe von Morden macht Harveys Ermittlungen nicht einfacher ...

Ein neuer Fall für McCorkle und Pa- dillo: Der plötzliche Tod eines CIA-Propagandaexperten hinterläßt sei- nem Sohn und Erben eine Bombe: seine brisanten Memoiren. Längst vergessen geglaubte Informationen aus dem Kalten Krieg drohen ans Licht zu kommen. Daher will die Agency das gefährliche Manuskript kaufen und so tief wie möglich ver- graben. McCorkle und Padillo, in deren Bar Mac''s Place die Dokumente sicher deponiert werden sollen, finden sich schnell in einem tödlichen Intrigennetz wieder. ''Nach seinen Romanen sind Kenner süchtig.''Der Spiegel ''Es tut gut, die welt durch den coolen, scharfen Blick von Ross Thomas noch einmal zu sehen.'' L. A. Times

I wonder what the Samaritan woman who met Jesus at Jacob’s Well was like. What were the circumstances that led to her being there, drawing water in the heat of the day? The New Testament does not give us much background on the people involved in some of the familiar stories. This book brings those characters to life by letting the reader imagine what their life might have been like. Consider Joseph as a man wondering how he got himself into a situation where he and his pregnant wife were traveling to Bethlehem. What happened at the birth of Jesus from the perspective of another guest in the Inn? Did the jailer in Philippi have a son? If he did, how might he have viewed the events that happened while Paul was a prisoner? A Centurion had a servant who was ill. What was the relationship between the Centurion and the servant? How did the Centurion happen to get sent to Galilee? These stories take New Testament stories as a starting place and consider a different possibility. They will challenge you to think again about the people who might have met Jesus in person.

In this stinging critique of our legal system, Thomas Ross reveals how in making and justifying their opinions, judges rely to a startling degree on personal constructs that often perpetuate the deep biases in society. While these terrible societal prejudices have become the basic building blocks of our law, Ross suggests that they don''t have to be. Instead, he posits that knowledge of the problem offers a first step toward imagining a different and better future.

Bearbeitete Neuausgabe. Der dicke Chinese Artie Wu, sein Geschäftspartner Quincy Durant, der Hochstapler "Otherguy" Overby, der alternde Terrorismusexperte Booth Stalling und die mit allen Wassern gewaschene Ex-Agentin Georgia Blue, das sind die Protagonisten des dritten und letzten Artie-Wu-und-Quincy-Durant-Falls. "Die Wudu, Ltd. ist eine straff geführte Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung, die für andere das tut, was sie selbst für sich nicht tun können", sagt Artie Wu, Chef der exklusiven Agentur Wudu, Ltd. Mit anderen Worten, sie lösen Fälle für einen Haufen Kohle - Fälle wie den Mord an dem Hollywood-Produzenten Billy Rice. Am Neujahrsmorgen 1991 wird die Film-Diva Ione Gamble volltrunken und mit abgefeuerter Tatwaffe in der Hand neben der Leiche ihres millionenschweren Ex-Verlobten aufgefunden. Vor dem Hintergrund des ersten Irakkriegs beginnt das Spezialistenteam Wudu, Ltd. mit seinen Ermittlungen.

""It was while jogging along the beach just east of the Paradise Cove pier that Artie Wu tripped over a dead pelican, fell, and met the man with six greyhounds."""- "from "Chinaman''s Chance" Thus begins what may be the most popular of Ross Thomas''s unique stories. The combination of Wu, pretender to the Imperial throne of China, and Quincy Durant, who has his own colorful past, makes for a heady experience. After starting with the deceased pelican on a California beach, the plot mixes in the disappearance of a large sum of money that should have been buried in Vietnam, and the search for the missing member of a trio of singing sisters from the Ozarks. Only Thomas could have stirred this concoction with the style, humor, and suspense that captures the reader at the very beginning and doesn''t let go until the last word.

When a valuable brass shield is stolen from a Washington, D.C. museum, a professional go-between is assigned to recover it

Assigned to deliver the ransom money to whomever stole thief Abner Procane''s diaries, professional go-between Philip St. Ives finds himself stumbling across dead bodies and cops on the make. Reprint. NYT.