Like to Die

April 9, 2018
In this intriguing 15th novel featuring former St. Paul, Minn., cop Rushmore McKenzie by Edgar-winner Housewright (after 2017’s What the Dead Leave Behind), McKenzie, who’s now a millionaire with a penchant for off-the-books investigations, tries to figure out who’s sabotaging Salsa Girl, a small food business run by the enigmatic Erin Peterson. When the disruptions move from minor vandalism to the planting of a bomb in the truck she uses for deliveries, McKenzie digs in, even as Erin becomes evasive and reluctant to share any details that might uncover the villains. While the business mystery’s solution is telegraphed pretty clearly, another puzzle about a violent antagonist from Erin’s murky past, who’s on a single-minded quest for revenge, leads to some good action sequences. McKenzie proves an able protector of life, limb, “and the deep dark secrets that... people want hidden” in an entry sure to please old and new fans alike. Agent: Alison Picard, Alison J. Picard Agency.

April 15, 2018
"Roving troubleshooter" Rushmore McKenzie agrees to look into a case of industrial sabotage and ends up shooting a lot more trouble than he expected.McKenzie's poker buddy Ian Gotz, an accountant, may be better at keeping books than at filling inside straights, but even he knows something's gone seriously wrong for Erin Peterson, the friend he wishes were much more. The founder of Salsa Girl Salsa has evidently been riding too high for the taste of whomever's squirted superglue into the locks in her latest manufacturing plant. A prank, she tells McKenzie when he drops by to ask how she is and she realizes that her aspiring lover has given him the news she shared in confidence. But McKenzie (What the Dead Leave Behind, 2017, etc.) brushes that explanation away: The plant is in the middle of nowhere, and there's zero chance that teenage kids would have taken that much trouble to mess with someone they didn't know and couldn't watch. Soon enough McKenzie's suspicions of some darker motive are confirmed when someone superglues the door locks on a delivery truck that has to get the refrigerated salsa to Minnesota stores before it warms up and spoils. Since Erin has never had time for a boyfriend, let alone an ex-lover with a grudge, McKenzie focuses on the obscenely rich Bignell family, whose wastrel scion, Randy Bignell-Sax, loaned Erin the money she needed to launch Salsa Girl, and whose family-held company, Minnesota Foods, distributes her six flavors. Although a bombing at the plant jolts McKenzie, it'll take several more nudges before he realizes that Salsa Girl has been built on a foundation that's been rotten from the beginning and that bigger threats are on the way.A fast-moving, dialogue-driven tale so effortlessly and irresistibly spun that you may well finish it before you notice that nobody has died, except for a couple of faceless gangbangers executed offstage, and that the elaborately choreographed denouement doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

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May 1, 2018
Rushmore McKenzie, the independently wealthy Minnesota ex-cop turned unlicensed private investigator, is at first reluctant to do a favor for a friend. McKenzie figures there's probably not much more to recent goings-on at a local food company than some vandalism (somebody sealed up the locks on the building with glue). When he pays a visit to the place and speaks to his friend, however, McKenzie begins to suspect that something bigger is going on and that the vandalism might have been the first shot in what could turn out to be a war. But one question nags at him: Is his friend being entirely straight about the situation? Or is she keeping secrets that could put her life, not to mention McKenzie's, at risk? This is the fifteenth in the series, and it's just as fresh as the first. Housewright makes telling a cracking-good mystery look effortless, and that means fans are in store for another thoroughly enjoyable read.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)