Silence

May 28, 2007
Edgar-winner Perry (Pursuit
) delivers another intelligent, literate thriller. Jack Till, a retired LAPD detective turned PI, has settled into a somewhat monastic existence, at the center of which is his 21-year-old daughter, Holly, who has Down syndrome. Six years earlier, Till helped restaurateur Wendy Harper escape from would-be assailants. Showing her the techniques the police use to track down fugitives, Till taught the woman to assume a new identity and begin a new life. When Harper disappeared, many assumed she was murdered. Now, years later, someone is trying to frame Eric Fuller, Harper’s business partner and sometime boyfriend, for her murder. The only way for Till to prove Fuller’s innocence is to produce Harper in the flesh, but first he has to find her and persuade her to come back while evading assassins Paul and Sylvie Turner, who have been hired to kill Harper when she resurfaces. As always, Perry excels at the procedural details, keeps up the pace throughout and will have readers guessing until the end. Author tour.

July 30, 2007
Kramer's smooth, slightly sardonic delivery is a good fit for Perry's latest mixture of dark humor and suspense. The chase thriller focuses on four characters—the hunted (private eye Jack Till and Wendy Harper, a beauty he helped “disappear” from assassins six years before) and the hunters (the bickering, tango-dancing hit team of Paul and Sylvie Turner who've been assigned to wipe out Wendy). Kramer barely alters his reading voice for Till and Wendy, adding a wary flatness for the sleuth and a softer tone of uncertainty for the hapless woman-in-jeopardy. For the Turners, however, he shows a bit more vocal dexterity. Paul has the deep, vaguely hollow sound of a very effective con man, while Sylvie's bogus East Coast socialite drawl loses much of its cool refinement when the going gets rough. The plot is tricky—Wendy is forced from hiding when her former partner is accused of her murder—but as convoluted and complex as it gets, Kramer's well-paced presentation makes every twist register. Simultaneous release with the Harcourt hardcover (Reviews, May 28).