Recommendations based on "The Indian Rope Trick and Other Violent Entertainments"

Amazon.com ReviewEditors' pick:Brings together two of the smartest, wittiest investigators—a knife-throwing circus runaway and a PI with MS."—Vannessa Cronin, Amazon Editor

Rusty Young was backpacking in South America when he heard about Thomas McFadden, a convicted English drug trafficker who ran tours inside Bolivia's notorious San Pedro prison. Intrigued, the young Australian journalisted went to La Paz and joined one of Thomas's illegal tours. They formed an instant friendship and then became partners in an attempt to record Thomas's experiences in the jail. Rusty bribed the guards to allow him to stay and for the next three months he lived inside the prison, sharing a cell with Thomas and recording one of the strangest and most compelling prison stories of all time. The result is Marching Powder.This book establishes that San Pedro is not your average prison. Inmates are expected to buy their cells from real estate agents. Others run shops and restaurants. Women and children live with imprisoned family members. It is a place where corrupt politicians and drug lords live in luxury apartments, while the poorest prisoners are subjected to squalor and deprivation. Violence is a constant threat, and sections of San Pedro that echo with the sound of children by day house some of Bolivia's busiest cocaine laboratories by night. In San Pedro, cocaine--"Bolivian marching powder"--makes life bearable. Even the prison cat is addicted.Yet Marching Powder is also the tale of friendship, a place where horror is countered by humor and cruelty and compassion can inhabit the same cell. This is cutting-edge travel-writing and a fascinating account of infiltration into the South American drug culture.

When a serial killer crashes Detective Michael Bennett's wedding, he and his new partner uncover a gruesome string of cold-case homicides across the country.Weeks before NYPD Detective Michael Bennett is to marry his longtime love, Mary Catherine, an assassin announces his presence in the city with a string of grisly murders. Each victim is a young woman. And each has been killed in a manner as precise as it was gruesome.Tasked with working alongside the FBI, Bennett and his gung-ho new partner uncover multiple cold-case homicides across the country that fit the same distinctive pattern—proving the perpetrator they seek is as experienced at ending lives as he is at evading detection.Bennett promises Mary Catherine that the case won't affect their upcoming wedding. But as Bennett prepares to make a lifetime commitment, the killer has a lethal vow of his own to fulfill.

Don’t miss the TV series, Dark Winds, based on the Leaphorn, Chee, & Manuelito novels, now on AMC and AMC+!“All of Tony Hillerman’s Navajo tribal police novels have been brilliant, but A Thief of Time is flat-out marvelous.”—USA TodayFrom New York Times bestselling author Tony Hillerman, A Thief of Time is the eighth novel featuring Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn and Officer Jim Chee as they find themselves in hot pursuit of a depraved killer.At a moonlit Indian ruin where "thieves of time" ravage sacred ground in the name of profit, a noted anthropologist vanishes while on the verge of making a startling, history-altering discovery. Amid stolen goods and desecrated bones, two corpses are discovered, shot by bullets fitting the gun of the missing scientist.There are modern mysteries buried in despoiled ancient places, and Navajo Tribal Policemen Leaphorn and Chee must plunge into the past to unearth an astonishing truth and a cold-hearted killer. In his breakout novel, Hillerman paints a stunning portrait of the psychology of murder—and offers a heart-rending example of love and forgiveness.

A CLASSIC NOVEL BY THE MASTER OF HARD-BOILED CRIME, THE HIGH WINDOW IS RAYMOND CHANDLER'S THIRD STORY FEATURING LACONIC PI PHILIP MARLOWE.'He lay crumpled on his back. Very lonely, very dead. The safe door was wide open. A metal drawer was pulled out. It was empty now. There may have been money in it once.'Los Angeles PI Philip Marlowe's on a case: his client, a dried-up husk of a woman, wants him to recover a rare gold coin called a Brasher Doubloon, missing from her late husband's collection. That's the simple part. It becomes more complicated when Marlowe finds that everyone who handles the coin suffers a run of very bad luck: they always end up dead. That's also unlucky for a private investigator, because leaving a trail of corpses around LA puts cops' noses seriously out of joint. If Marlowe doesn't wrap this one up fast, he's going to end up either in jail or in a wooden box in the ground . . .'Chandler's books should be read and judged, not as escapist literature, but as works of art' W.H. Auden'Chandler grips the mind from the first sentence' Daily Telegraph'One of the greatest crime writers, who set standards others still try to attain' Sunday Times'Chandler is an original stylist, creator of a character as immortal as Sherlock Holmes' Anthony Burgess

Return of the Spider is the stunning companion to Along Came a Spider, the New York Times bestselling series debut that introduced Detective Alex Cross, "the real deal, a character who matters" (Rolling Stone). The suspense classic Along Came a Spider introduced an unsurpassed rivalry: Detective Alex Cross; the "human superhero" (New York Times) versus Gary Soneji; the "most deliciously wicked character since Hannibal Lecter" (Lexington Herald-Leader). But that wasn't their first meeting... Police discover that Soneji kept a murder book, Profiles in Homicidal Genius, detailing his transformation from substitute teacher to hardened serial killer--including clues that imply missteps that Alex Cross may have made a rookie homicide detective. Now, Alex must retrace the steps of that long-ago investigation and face...the Return of the Spider. Enter the world of the #1 bestselling detective series behind the #1 streaming show Cross.

In 1993 Marie Gesto disappeared after walking out of a supermarket. Harry Bosch worked the case but couldn't crack it, and the twenty-two-year-old was never found. Now, more than a decade later, with the Gesto file still on his desk, Bosch gets a call from the District Attorney. A man accused of two heinous murders is willing to come clean about several others, including the killing of Marie Gesto. Taking the confession of the man he has sought-and hated-for thirteen years is bad enough. Discovering that he missed a clue back in 1993 that could have stopped nine other murders may just be the straw that breaks Harry Bosch.

Defense attorney Mickey Haller returns with a haunting case in the gripping new thriller from #1 New York Times bestselling author Michael Connelly. Mickey Haller gets the text, "Call me ASAP - 187," and the California penal code for murder immediately gets his attention. Murder cases have the highest stakes and the biggest paydays, and they always mean Haller has to be at the top of his game.When Mickey learns that the victim was his own former client, a prostitute he thought he had rescued and put on the straight and narrow path, he knows he is on the hook for this one. He soon finds out that she was back in LA and back in the life. Far from saving her, Mickey may have been the one who put her in danger.Haunted by the ghosts of his past, Mickey must work tirelessly and bring all his skill to bear on a case that could mean his ultimate redemption or proof of his ultimate guilt. The Gods of Guilt shows once again why "Michael Connelly excels, easily surpassing John Grisham in the building of courtroom suspense" (Los Angeles Times).

24 hours to stop the crime of the centuryThe race against time is about to begin...THE TOWER OF LONDON...Impenetrable. Well protected. Secure. Home to the most valuable jewels on earth. But once a year, when the Queen attends the State Opening of Parliament, the Metropolitan Police must execute the most secret operation in their armory as they transport the Crown Jewels across London.SCOTLAND YARD...For decades, the elite squad at Scotland Yard have been in charge of the operation. And for decades, it's run like clockwork.THE HEIST...But this year, everything is about to change. Because a master criminal has set his sights on pulling off the most outrageous theft in history--and with a man on the inside, the odds are in his favor.Unless the team can stop him before it's too late...An unputdownable new thriller from the master storyteller"Only someone like Jeffrey Archer . . . could have written a compelling story like this."--David Baldacci"Archer is a master entertainer."--Time"One of the top ten storytellers in the world."--Los Angeles Times"A storyteller in the class of Alexandre Dumas."--The Washington Post

In Dead in the Water, Stone has barely arrived in St. Marks, a lovely Caribbean island nation, on a sailing vacation when something very strange happens: A beautiful young woman sails into the harbor, entirely alone on a large yacht. Before long she is under the intense scrutiny of local authorities in the very considerable person of Sir Winston Sutherland, the minister of Justice. The problem is, though she arrived alone, she had departed the other side of the Atlantic in the company of her husband, a well-known writer, who is no longer in evidence. Evidence is what fascinates Stone Barrington, and before many pages have been turned, he is all that stands between the apparently innocent Allison Manning and the patently evil intent of Sir Winston, whose motives are unclear. What is clear is that the St. Marks' system of justice bears little resemblance to the American courts to which Stone is accustomed and that his smallest error could prove fatal to his client.