shopping cart
Save up to 30% on our Staff Picks
Call us:  800-878-7323 HELP
McAfee SECURE helps keep you safe from identity theft, credit card fraud, spyware, spam, viruses and online scams.
Interviews | December 1, 2009

Megan: IMG A Meaty Tale: The Powells.com Interview with Julie Powell



juliepowellJulie Powell charmed readers with Julie and Julia, in which she chronicled her quest to cook, in one year, every recipe out of Julia Child's... Continue »
  1. $17.49 Sale Hardcover add to wish list

The Burnt House

by Faye Kellerman

The Burnt House Cover

ISBN13: 9780061227363
ISBN10: 0061227366
Condition: Standard
All Product Details

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

At 8: 15 in the morning, a small commuter plane carrying forty-seven passengers crashes into an apartment building in Granada Hills, California. Shock waves ripple through Los Angeles, as L.A.P.D. Lieutenant Peter Decker works overtime to calm rampant fears of a 9/11-type terror attack. But a grisly mystery lives inside the plane's charred and twisted wreckage: the unidentified bodies of four extra travelers. And there is no sign of an airline employee who was supposedly on the catastrophic flight.

Decker and his wife, Rina, have personal reasons for being profoundly shaken by the tragedy, since the accident occurred frighteningly close to their daughter Hannah's school. Luckily, their child and her schoolmates escaped unscathed. But the fate of the unaccounted-for flight attendant--twenty-eight-year-old Roseanne Dresden--remains a question mark more than a month after the horrific event, when the young woman's irate stepfather calls, insisting that she was never onboard the doomed plane. Instead, he claims, she was most likely murdered by her abusive, unfaithful husband. But why, then, was Roseanne's name included on the passenger list?

Under intense pressure from the department to come up with answers, Decker launches an investigation that carries him down a path of tragic history, dangerous secrets, and deadly lies--and leads him to the corpse of a three-decades-missing murder victim. And as the jagged pieces slowly fall into place, a frightening picture begins to form: a mind-searing portrait of unimaginable evil that will challenge Decker's and Rina's own beliefs about guilt and innocence and justice.

Combining relentless suspense with intense, multilayered humandrama, The Burnt House is Faye Kellerman at her mesmerizing best.

Synopsis:

Investigative duo Peter Decker and his wife, Rina Lazarus, work to determine if a flight attendant's death is an accident or an act of terrorism, in this latest masterwork of suspense by a "New York Times"-bestselling author.

Synopsis:

L.A.P.D. Detective Peter Decker and his wife, Rina, are profoundly shaken by this terrible "accident" that has occurred frighteningly close to their daughter's school. And an irate call from the unaccounted-for flight attendant's stepfather further tangles an already twisted mystery. The man insists twenty-eight-year-old Roseanne Dresden was never on the doomed flight, but was probably murdered by her abusive, unfaithful husband—a revelation that propels Decker down a path of tragic history and deadly lies toward an unimaginable evil that will challenge his and Rina's cherished beliefs about guilt and innocence and justice.

About the Author

Faye Kellerman lives with her husband, New York Times bestseller Jonathan Kellerman, in Los Angeles, California; Santa Fe, New Mexico; and New York.

What Our Readers Are Saying

Add a comment for a chance to win!
Average customer rating based on 1 comment:
Douglas Cobb, August 27, 2008 (view all comments by Douglas Cobb)
When WestAir flight 1324 goes down in flames claiming the lives of everyone on board, one person's remains are conspicuous by their absence: those of flight attendant Roseanne Dresden. Her parents, Shareen and Farley Lodestone, think it's because she never was on the plane in the first place, and that her unfaithful husband, Ivan Dresden, murdered her, and made up the story that she was on the flight list so he could collect the insurance money. Lieutenant Peter Decker isn't sure what to think, but does his best to calm the Lodestones down and assure them he will help them find out what happened to their daughter. Is it just that they are in denial, and that for some reason they don't get along well with their son-in-law? Or is it that Roseanne really was murdered? Check out The Burnt House, Faye Kellerman's latest suspenseful page-turning novel, to find out!

The intrigue deepens when the remains of a woman are discovered below the foundation of a burnt house at the crash site. She is burned so much she is unrecognizable, and she is wearing a pink tour jacket of a 1970's musical duo called Priscilla and the Major. Her teeth - what's left of them - don't match up with the dental records of Roseanne Dresden, though, and now Decker and his officers have their work compounded for them. Instead of one missing persons and possible murder case to solve, now they have two. And, talk about a cold case - the woman in the pink jacket has been dead for thirty-two years! What, if anything, is the connection between the two women?

There are no psychotic serial killers in The Burnt House, as is the fare of many popular mystery bestsellers. It is a nuts-and-bolts procedural crime novel, sort of a Cold Case Files story but with heart. Part of the enjoyment of reading a Decker and Rina novel is reading about their home lives and how much Judaism plays a large role in their lives and relationships. You get to know them and love them, as if they were members of your own family. When Decker agonizes over a case, you feel for him, and when he makes headway in it, you are included in his rejoicing.

The Burnt House is a novel that any mystery lover or anyone who likes procedural crime stories will be glad to make a space in his library for. It is a New York Times bestseller already, and has enough suspense in it to keep you reading until late into the night. An added bonus is that it, like many paperbacks lately, has a chapter at the end from the next book in the series, The Mercedes Coffin. Both off these books should be very good news for fans of Decker and Rina, and are sure to attract even more fans to Faye Kellerman's suspenseful and dynamic novels.
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
(1 of 1 readers found this comment helpful)

Product Details

ISBN:
9780061227363
Author:
Kellerman, Faye
Publisher:
Harper
Author:
by Faye Kellerman
Subject:
Mystery & Detective - Police Procedural
Subject:
Suspense
Subject:
Romance - Suspense
Subject:
Police
Subject:
Missing persons
Subject:
Mystery fiction
Subject:
Aircraft accidents
Publication Date:
August 2008
Binding:
Mass Market Paperbound
Grade Level:
General/trade
Language:
English
Pages:
464
Dimensions:
6.50x4.10x1.30 in. .50 lbs.

Other books you might like

  1. $4.50 Used Mass Market add to wish list
  2. $4.00 Used Hardcover add to wish list
  3. $3.50 Used Mass Market add to wish list

    Jupiter's Bones

    Faye Kellerman
  4. $4.00 Used Mass Market add to wish list

    Hand of Evil

    J A Jance
  5. $4.95 Used Mass Market add to wish list

    Foul Play

    Janet Evanovich
  6. $2.50 Used Mass Market add to wish list

    The Perfect Husband

    Lisa Gardner

Related Aisles

  • back to top

Powell's City of Books is an independent bookstore in Portland, Oregon, that fills a whole city block with more than a million new, used, and out of print books. Shop those shelves — plus literally millions more books, DVDs, and eBooks — here at Powells.com.