Synopses & Reviews
"[McBain] departs still at the top of his game and, like every great entertainer, leaving us both satisfied and hungry for more."
San Diego TribuneEd McBains last installment in the 87th Precinct series finds the detectives stumped by a serial killer who doesnt fit the profile. A blind violinist taking a smoke break, a cosmetics sales rep cooking in her own kitchen, a college professor trudging home from class, a priest contemplating retirement in the rectory garden, an old woman walking her dogthese are the seemingly random targets shot twice in the face. But most serial killers dont use guns. Most serial killers dont strike five times in two weeks. And most serial killers prey share something more than being over fifty years of age. Now Detective Steve Carella and his colleagues must find out whator whomthe victims had in common before another body is found. With trademark wit and sizzling dialogue, McBain examines the dreams we chase in the darkening hours before the fiddlers have fled.
"Vintage 87th Precinct: the dialogue crisp, the pace swift, the humor wry, and every charactereven the minor onessuperbly drawn."Associated Press
"A fast and engrossing book . . . McBain is the true king of American dialogue."The Atlantic Monthly
The author of more than one hundred books, Ed McBain (1926-2005) held the Mystery Writers of Americas prestigious Grand Master Award and was the first American to receive the Diamond Dagger, the British Crime Writers Associations highest award.
Review
"[A] single-plot mystery that feels far more generous, and one of the most comprehensive portraits of McBain's fictional kingdom of Isola ever." Kirkus Reviews
Review
"[McBaine] create[s] a broad array of interesting characters, each with a checkered history of his or her own. Even the briefest passing character comes across with a living, breathing individuality that fairly jumps off the page." Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Review
"McBain had been ill for some time. Probably he knew that Fiddlers would be his last novel and set out to say some goodbyes....McBain was a master, and his tales of the city are timeless." Washington Post
Review
"There is an elegant symmetry to McBain's last dance, which times its steps to 'the brilliant fiddlers of the 87th Squad' whose tightly choreographed criminal investigations do indeed follow a musical structure." Marilyn Stasio, New York Times Book Review
Review
"McBain just keeps getting better and better. This one will have readers waking in the middle of the night wondering if they, too, have killers inside themselves." Booklist
Synopsis
Ed McBain's latest installment in the 87th Precinct series finds the detectives stumped by a serial killer who doesn't fit the profile. A blind violinist taking a smoke break, a cosmetics sales rep cooking an omelet in her own kitchen, a college professor trudging home from class, a priest contemplating retirement in the rectory garden, an old woman out walking her dog these are the seemingly random targets shot twice in the face with a Glock. But most serial killers don't use guns. Most serial killers don't strike five times in two weeks. And most serial killers' prey share something more than being over fifty years of age. Now it falls to Detective Steve Carella and his colleagues in the 87th Precinct to find what the victims' had in common before another body is found.
With trademark wit and sizzling dialogue, McBain unravels a mystery and examines the dreams we chase in the darkening hours before the fiddlers have fled.
About the Author
The author of more than one hundred books, Ed McBain (19262005) held the Mystery Writers of America's prestigious Grand Master Award and was the first American to receive the Diamond Dagger, the British Crime Writers' Association's highest award.