Location – Miami FL (Dexter series)
Jeff Lindsay
Jeff Lindsay is the pen name of American playwright and crime novelist Jeffry P. Freundlich, best known for his novels about sociopathic vigilante Dexter Morgan. Many of his earlier published works include his wife Hilary Hemingway as a co-author. Wikipedia
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Robert B. Parker’s Beloved Characters
Location – Boston Area
Spenser / Jesse Stone / Sunny Randall
and the old west with – Cole and Hitch
With the passing of Robert B. Parker, now over ten years ago, his estate has engaged numerous authors to continue his legacy, but more so, to satisfy the longing his readers have for these characters. Throughout, television has engaged these characters. Spenser for Hire as a series, Jesse Stone in regularly released TV movies and a Cole & Hitch western – Appaloosa.
Now, Ace Atkins continues the Spenser series, Michael Brandman, (3) and Reed Farrell Coleman (5) added Jesse Stone stories from 2012-2019, Robert Knott contributed five Cole & Hitch westerns and recently Mike Lupica, known for his books and sports commentary, has brought back Sunny Randall in three books and is about to publish his second novel in continuation of the Jesse Stone saga. The Sunny Randall character continues now with Alison Gaylin providing the narrative and wearing Sunny’s shoes quite well.
In this editor’s opinion, they are all gifts and well worthy of keeping these iconic characters alive in fiction. I read them all and will continue to do so. What fun to hang out in Boston with Spenser, Sunny and Jesse. Thank you all.
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James Crumley
in memorium
Crumley was the quintessential novelist for post Vietnam War America. His disillusion was equal to his romantic streak, the both of them stoked by abundant appetites and consumption of just about every substance under the sun. He was a slumming poet in the vein of his icon, Chandler, and a consummate writer’s writer, capable of more feeling and more beauty in a sentence than many authors could fit into a book. Ask your favorite crime writer for a list of their most admired books and the odds are you’ll find The Last Good Kiss or some other adventure from the C.W. Sughrue or Milo Milodragovitch series among them.
(Crimereads)
A special crime novel 
A look at Vietnam
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James Grippando
Location – Miami
James Grippando is a New York Times bestselling author with more than thirty books to his credit, including those in his acclaimed series featuring Miami criminal defense attorney Jack Swyteck, and the winner of the Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction. He is also a trial lawyer and teaches law and literature at the University of Miami School of Law. He lives in South Florida with his wife, two cats, and a golden retriever named Atlas, who has no idea he’s a dog.
Nearly three years since starring in his last book, On January 9th, 2024, Jack Swyteck returns to bookstores in Goodbye Girl, the brand new thriller from New York Times bestselling author James Grippando.
Jack Swyteck, a Miami criminal defense lawyer, first appeared in Grippando’s 1994 debut, The Pardon. Since then, he’s gone on to anchor seventeen books to date, including Grippando’s 2021 thriller, Twenty. That book, heartbreakingly timely, featured a tragic plot about a school shooting in Florida that claimed the lives of twenty innocent people. Swyteck ended up in the middle of things after his wife and daughter were present when the carnage started, and then later, after the lead suspect enlists his help in an effort to calm anti-Muslim fervor and clear his name. Now, several years later, Jack Swyteck is finally set to return.
Goodbye Girl, the eighteenth book in Grippando’s series, is said to feature a nail-biting new plot that follows a mega-star artist who takes to social media and encourages her fans to illegally download her music for reasons that reach back decades and promises to have more than a few twists and turns. The Real Book Spy
