The Investigator

November 1, 2021

Baldacci sends private investigator and ex-World War II veteran Aloysius Archer to Los Angeles--that is, Dream Town--for another dangerous case (one million copy first printing). Having crafted two Sam and Remi Fargo adventures with the late Cussler (Pirate and The Romanov Ransom), former California law enforcement officer Burcell takes the daring duo on another far-flung adventure in Clive Cussler's The Serpent's Eye (originally scheduled for Sept. 2021). In the New York Times best-selling Fisher's An Honest Lie, Rainy has been hiding out from her bad-news past atop a remote, fog-cloaked mountain but decides to risk a trip to Las Vegas with some friends, where one of them is trapped by a killer as bait to lure Rainy (10,000-copy hardcover and 200,000-copy paperback first printing). One Crimson Summer, thanks to mega-best-selling Graham, Florida Department of Law Enforcement agent Amy Larson is sent a toy red horse--a sign that she and FBI agent Hunter Forrest didn't wipe out the Doomsday cult that's about to fight a bloody turf war in northern Florida with several South American cartels (75,000-copy first printing). In best-selling Secrets of Midwives author Hepworth's latest, Tully and Rachel have every reason to resent The Younger Wife who's coming on the scene; their father is still married to their mother, now in a care facility for dementia, but plans to divorce her--which leads to the spilling of numerous toxic secrets (250,000-copy first printing). In the latest from the New York Times best-selling Pinborough, has-it-all heroine Emma Averell is beginning to suffer from Insomnia, which she fears may presage a descent into the insanity that destroyed her own mother's life (75,000-copy first printing). In the best-selling, award-winning Reich's Once a Thief, Simon Riske must prove that the Ferrari he's restored and sold for nine figures is not a fake, which brings him in contact with Anna Bildt, whose Swiss banker father has been blown up by a car bomb (75,000-copy first printing). In Rollins's Kingdom of Bones, postponed from March and September 2021, humans have become dullards while flora and fauna are suddenly ascendant; perhaps evolutionary forces have spun out of control, but it could be some fiendish plan (250,000-copy first printing). Letty Davenport, the smart, stubborn daughter of Sandford standby Lucas Davenport, becomes The Investigator, sent by her U.S. senator boss to figure out who's profiting from the theft of Texas crude oil--and why.

Copyright 2021 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 15, 2022
A domestic-terrorist plot gives the adopted daughter of storied U.S. Marshal Lucas Davenport her moment to shine. Veteran oilman Vermilion Wright knows that losing a few thousand gallons of crude is no more than an accounting error to his company but could mean serious money to whomever's found a way to siphon it off from wells in Texas' Permian Basin. So he asks Sen. Christopher Colles, Chair of Homeland Security and Government Affairs, to look into it, and Colles persuades 24-year-old Letty Davenport, who's just quit his employ, to return and partner with Department of Homeland Security agent John Kaiser to track down the thieves. The plot that right-winger Jane Jael Hawkes and her confederates, most of them service veterans with disgruntled attitudes and excellent military skills, have hatched is more dire than anything Wright could have imagined. They plan to use the proceeds from the oil thefts to purchase some black-market C4 essential to a major act of terrorism that will simultaneously express their alarm about the country's hospitality to illegal immigrants and put the Jael-Birds on the map for good. But they haven't reckoned with Letty, another kid born on the wrong side of the tracks who can outshoot the men she's paired with and outthink the vigilantes she finds herself facing--and who, along with her adoptive father, makes a memorable pair of "pragmatists. Really harsh pragmatists" willing to do whatever needs doing without batting an eye or losing a night's sleep afterward. Generations may succeed generations, but Sandford's patented investigation/action formula hasn't aged a whit. Bring it on.

COPYRIGHT(2022) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

February 15, 2022
After more than 30 novels in the Prey series, starring the wily and obliquely funny Minnesota cop Lucas Davenport, and 13 more featuring Davenport's colleague Virgil Flowers, Sandford adds another protagonist to his team, Davenport's 24-year-old stepdaughter, smart-mouthed Letty, here relieved from her dull job as an aide to a DC. politician by an assignment to investigate oil theft in Texas. She's assigned a partner/bodyguard, DHS agent John Kaiser, and as they banter their way across the Texas landscape where "the sun poured down like melted butter," readers are treated to Sandford's well-crafted prose, conversational but never chatty and charged with boisterous humor. A cop surveying a bloody crime scene exults that it's enabled him to connect with the DC. fellow who doles out grant assistance to law enforcement, "for free!" Revelations about oil theft lead to a militia, "hapless goofs with guns," and a spectacular confrontation, automatic weapons and Blackhawks at the Tex-Mex border. A top-line thriller from one of the genre's heavy hitters.

COPYRIGHT(2022) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

February 21, 2022
Introduced in 2003’s Naked Prey, Letty Davenport, U.S. Marshal Lucas Davenport’s adopted daughter, takes center stage in this welcome series spin-off from bestseller Sandford. Letty is bored by her D.C. job working for Senator Christopher Colles, until her unauthorized actions yield proof that two of his staff members stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from the politician’s campaign funds. When she resigns her job in the hope of finding something more suited to her thirst for action, Colles, impressed by her initiative, offers her an acceptable alternative. As a member of a committee overseeing the Department of Homeland Security, he’s able to hire Letty as a researcher to follow up on reports that a gang of crooks may have stolen hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude oil in West Texas. Colles fears that the money the thieves made from selling the oil could be funding a national security threat. That original premise, coupled with Sandford’s rounded portrayal of Letty as more than just a stock action hero, add up to one of his best books in years. Karen Sisco admirers will hope Letty has a long literary life. Agent: Esther Newberg, ICM Partners.

Starred review from March 1, 2022

At 24, Letty Davenport, Lucas Davenport's adopted daughter, is already bored with government bureaucracy. She resigns from her job in Senator Chris Colles's office, but as Chair of Homeland Security and Government Affairs, he offers her a job as a researcher. Someone is stealing oil in Texas; Chris wants to know who it is and what they're doing with the profits. Letty works with an agent from DHS, John Kaiser, who quickly discovers Letty's ability with a gun. They will need to work together to face a former military woman calling herself Lorelei, who runs a site on the dark web urging others to join her militia in opposition to the government and its stand on immigration. With oil money, Lorelei recruits militants from all over the West and Midwest and brings them to a border town in Texas for a show of force. Letty and Kaiser can't take down over 100 militia members, but they can assist the local townspeople and control the carnage. VERDICT Sandford's ("Virgil Flowers" series) first Letty Davenport novel is a violent, topical, fast-paced story that's sure to please action fans.--Lesa Holstine

Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.