It’s bad enough when someone you know is brutally murdered; it’s worse when the guy was a paranoid schizophrenic helplessly bound to a wheelchair. Sam Acquillo and Jackie Swaitkowski tried to look after Alfie Aldergreen, as had others around the Village of Southampton, but now they were forced to wonder what else they could have done.
One thing is for certain, Alfie’s killers are about to know what it means to murder a friend of Sam—former corporate troubleshooter, former professional boxer, and all-around ornery bulldog—and Jackie, a defense lawyer often described as an avenging angel.
This sixth installment in the Sam Acquillo Hamptons mystery series brings back Knopf’s ensemble of famously eccentric and involving characters, not the least of which is Sam’s mutt, Eddie Van Halen. Not just a crime story, it examines the fraught intersection of wealth, culture, politics, and the ravages of an ugly war. Combining beautiful watery settings with a unique look into the underbelly of the Hamptons, it’s a mystery you won’t find anywhere else.
Chris Knopf ’s mystery novels have received exceptional awards and accolades, with critics likening his character Sam Aquillo to Dashiell Hammett’s Sam Spade, Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe, and Robert B. Parker’s Spenser, while repeatedly comparing Knopf’s work to that of Elmore Leonard, John D. MacDonald, and Ross Macdonald. Two Time was one of thirteen mysteries listed as recommended summer reading in the New York Times Book Review, and Publishers Weekly chose it as one of the “Best 100 Books for 2006.” Head Wounds won the 2008 Benjamin Franklin Award for Best Mystery. Dead Anyway was listed on the 2012 Best Fiction lists of both Publishers Weekly and Kirkus Reviews. Knopf is a sailor, cabinetmaker, and advertising executive in Connecticut. He and his wife Mary also spend considerable time at their Long Island home in Southampton.
Keith Szarabajka has appeared in many films, including The Dark Knight, Missing, and A Perfect World, and on such television shows as The Equalizer, Angel, Cold Case, Golden Years, and Profit. Szarabajka has also appeared in several episodes of Selected Shorts for National Public Radio. He won the 2001 Audie Award for Unabridged Fiction for his reading of Tom Robbins’s Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates and has won several Earphones Awards.