Blood Lake

“The Ecuadorian Andes is one of the few places on earth where you can get a sunburn and freeze to death at the same time.“

When New York City PI Filomena Buscarsela takes her teenaged daughter, Antonia, to see their extended family in Ecuador, it’s more than a homecoming. Filomena hasn’t been back in years, and the trip brings back memories of her previous life as a revolutionary.

Before she’s even had time to adjust to her new surroundings, a priest is murdered, a man who, years ago, saved her life and helped her escape to the United States. She owed him her life; now it’s time for the debt to be repaid, and she vows to find his killer. It’s an election year, and the dirty hands of politics seem to be everywhere, perhaps even in this senseless death. Filomena’s investigation promises to lead her back to the very people she escaped, all those years ago.

As the country is wracked by natural and man-made disasters—landslides, floods, food shortages, protests, crackdowns—Filomena becomes a fugitive from the law, racing across the country toward a climactic confrontation in the Amazon jungle. Wishnia provides a novel rich with the sights, sounds—and dangers—of Ecuador, and a compelling look at the provenance of one of mystery fiction’s most dynamic heroines.

Praise:

“In a stunning portrait of a country just over the line between law and chaos, Blood Lake gives the reader urgent, pulse-pounding prose, an unstoppable, appealing narrator, and a sense that the veneer of civilization may be, in places, very thin indeed.
—S.J. Rozan, author of Ghost Hero

“The first page of Blood Lakeis strong, on a dead run; and the rest of the book ain’t too dusty, neither.“
—Harlan Ellison, winner of the Edgar, Hugo, Nebula, and Emmy Awards

“Wishnia’s brand of gritty surrealism jolts the reader with startling images and jarring contrasts. [He] evokes a country and a culture vividly and unforgettably.“
—Publishers Weekly

“Successfully serves up exotic atmosphere, complex family relations, social unrest, and dazzling characterization.“
—Booklist

“Enormously engaging. It’s as if Wishnia were attempting to rescue the thriller from the bloat and preposterousness of Ludlumization in order to return it to its more Graham Greene-like roots in a recognizably mean real world—just as Chandler and Hammett rescued detective fiction from drawing-room gentility and yanked it down to the mean streets that had always been its natural habitat.“
—The Washington Post

About Kenneth Wishnia:

About the Editor:

Kenneth Wishnia’s novels include 23 Shades of Black, an Edgar Allan Poe Award and Anthony Award finalist; Soft Money, a Library Journal Best Mystery of the Year; and Red House, a Washington Post “Rave” Book of the Year and The Fifth Servant, an Indie Notable selection, a Jewish Press Best Mystery of the Year, winner of a Premio Letterario ADEI-WIZO, and a finalist for the Sue Feder Memorial Historical Mystery Award. His short stories have appeared in Ellery Queen, Alfred Hitchcock, Queens Noir, Long Island Noir, Send My Love and a Molotov Cocktail, and elsewhere. His latest novel, The Fifth Servant, was an Indie Notable selection, a Best Jewish Book of the Year according to the Association of Jewish Libraries, won a Premio Letterario ADEI-WIZO (the Italian chapter of the Women’s International Zionist Organization), and was a finalist for the Sue Feder Memorial Historical Mystery Award, a category of the Macavity Awards. Most recently, he edited the Anthony Award-nominated anthology Jewish Noir for PM Press. He teaches writing, literature and other deviant forms of thought at Suffolk Community College on Long Island.

About Liz Martínez:

Liz Martínez’s stories have appeared in Manhattan Noir, Queens Noir, and Cop Tales 2000. She is the coeditor of Indian Country Noir, the author of the nonfiction book The Retail Manager’s Guide to Crime and Loss Prevention, and her articles about security and law enforcement have appeared in publications around the world. She is a member of Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers. She lives in New York.

See and hear author interviews, book reviews, and other news on Kenneth Wishnia's page HERE

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