Louis
Auchincloss
The Scarlet Letters. HM, 2003.
A modern (the time is 1953) twist on the legendary Hawthorne tale, in which
secrets, sin, and suspense collide among the fabulously rich inhabiting the
coastal village of Glenville, on the opulent north shore of Long Island.
Russell
Andrews
Hades. Mysterious Press, 2007.
Justin Westwood, the troubled police chief
of the quiet Long Island community of East End Harbor, finds himself in a tight
spot when the husband of a woman he is having an affair with is murdered. Third
in a series after Aphrodite (2003) and Midas (2005).
Cynthia
Baxter
Dead Canaries Don't Sing. Bantam. 2004.
While on a house call, rather a farm call, veterinarian Jessica Popper discovers a half-buried corpse in the woods. Curious to know why someone wanted the victim, a notorious PR hot-shot dead, she decides to do a bit of amateur sleuthing, much to the chagrin of her sometimes lover PI Nick Burby. Followed by: Putting on the Dog (2004), Lead a Horse to Murder (2005), Hare Today, Dead Tomorrow (2007), Right from the Gecko (2007), Who's Kitten Who? (2007), & Monkey See, Monkey Die (2008).
James
Brady
Further Lane. St. Martin's, 1997.
Who killed lifestyle guru Hannah Cutting? With the rich and famous of East
Hampton among the suspects, foreign correspondent Beecher Stowe aims to find out. By the same author: Gin Lane: A Novel of Southampton
(1998); The House That Ate the Hamptons:
A Novel of Lily Pond Lane (1999).
Gene
Breaznell
Deadly Divots. Bridge Works, 2003.
Det. Karl Kanopka investigates the murder of a land developer whose corpse
is found floating in a water hazard of an exclusive golf club.
Jay Cantor
Great Neck. Knopf, 2003.
During the 1960s a 6th-grade class of mostly Jewish kids learns about the
Holocaust, with its moral imperative to “make justice” in the world. When the
older brother of one of the students is murdered in Mississippi during Freedom
Summer, they think they have found their mission, and when they receive letters
from him seemingly written after his death they plunge into the civil rights
and peace movements, joining their lives to a multitude of others. .
Carol Higgins
Clark
Twanged. Warner Vision, 1999, 1998. Sleuth Regan Reilly
(Decked, Snagged, etc.) finds crime & danger
in the celebrity-studded Hamptons.
Thomas Cook
Peril. Bantam, 2004.
Haunted by the shattering secrets of her past and fearful of her husband's
mobster father, Sara Labriola flees her lovely Long Island home and attempts
to reinvent her life in NYC. But she learns that escape comes with a price.
Gordon Cotler
Artist's Proof. St. Martin's Press, 1997.
Ex-cop turned artist Sid Shale becomes the target of an overzealous L.I.
detective when a young woman who posed nude for him is murdered.
Mara Goodman-Davies
When Harry Hit the Hamptons. Sourcebooks, 2005.
Harry Raider has been exiled by his father to "sleepy" Long Island
to get his act together or lose the family fortune. Too bad dad doesn't know
that he has just plopped Harry down in the middle of the hottest party scene
on the East Coast. Soon every bulimic socialite within heaving distance sets her sights on Harry and
his potential billions.
Margaret Dawe
Nissequott. New Directions, 1992.
Follows the turbulent youth of a Long Island girl c. 1968-73 as she tries
to make sense of her family, her friends, and her world.
Jonathan Dee
The Liberty Campaign. Doubleday, 1993.
An ad executive learns that his reclusive neighbor has a hidden past of
cruelty & suffering.
Jim DeFilippi
Duck Alley. Permanent, Press, 1999.
Jay Tasti and Albert Nikozak grow up together in one of Long Island's toughest
neighborhoods, known as Duck Alley. Jay becomes a school teacher and Albert
a pimp with ties to organized crime. When the decomposed body of a teenage girl
is found in upstate New York, their life-long friendship is put to the test.
Nelson DeMille
Plum Island. Warner, 1997.
A NYC homicide detective who is recuperating from wounds is hired by the
Chief of the Southold Police Dept. to consult on the double murder of two biologists
who worked in the animal disease research facility on Plum Island. By the same author: The Gold Coast (1990); Night Fall (2004); The Gate House (2008).
Dominick Dunne
The Two Mrs. Grenvilles. Bantam, 1986, 1985.
A showgirl marries into a socially prominent family and causes a scandal
when she "accidentally" shoots her husband. Dunne based his novel on the 1955
killing of William Woodward, Jr.
Ellen Feldman
God Bless the Child. Simon & Schuster, 1998.
After quitting her fast-paced job in TV news and "retiring" to the Hamptons,
Bailey Bender makes up her mind to find the child she gave up for adoption 25
years earlier and becomes unexpectedly embroiled in the lives-and deaths-of
the Hampton's rich and famous.
David E. Feldman
Bad Blood. 1stBooks, 2002.
Someone is giving patients at a major hospital the HIV virus, and Bennett
James, art director at a fictional Nassau County ad agency, finds himself playing
amateur sleuth in order to solve the mystery of the deadly attacks
F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Great Gatsby
Fitzgerald's classic story of the rise and fall of self-made millionaire Jay
Gatsby and his love for Daisy Buchanan, who is married to the rich but brutish
Tom.
Nancy Geary
Misfortune. Warner, 2001.
When snooty Clio Pratt, who planned to block Dr. Henry Lewis--who is black--from
membership to the Fair Lawn Country Club, turns up dead, Lewis becomes the prime
suspect. But Clio's long-suffering stepdaughter, Assistant DA Frances Pratt,
learns that any number of disgruntle Southamptonites may have done the deed.
Tanya Egan Gibson
How to Buy a Love of Reading. Dutton, 2009.
Carley Wells is a high-school junior at a private school in upscale Fox Glen, Long Island, who is overweight and hates reading. So her wealthy, obnoxious parents-- themselves non-readers—decide to “buy” her the love of reading and hire an author to write a made-to-order book for Carley. As Carley deals with the very real alcoholic struggle of Hunter, one of her few friends, she begins to understand for the first time the power of stories.
Julia Glass
Three Junes. Pantheon, 2002.
Traces the lives of a Scottish family over a decade--from rural Scotland
to Greece to Greenwich Village to Long Island--as they confront the joys and
longings, fulfillments and betrayals of love in all its guises.
Leonard Harris
The Hamptons. Wyndham, 1981.
Bea Fletcher's upcoming expose of Hampton society sparks a combination of
envy and fear among the Gliterati of America's most luxurious summer playground.
And when one of them is murdered, the clue to the killer's identity may be found
in Bea's manuscript.
Alice Hoffman
Seventh Heaven. Putnam, 1990.
The year is 1959. Life on Hemlock Street will never be the same after the
arrival of Nora Silk--a strong, sexy, and unconventional divorced mother of
two little boys.
John Irving
A Widow for One Year. Random, 1998.
Follows the life of novelist Rith Cole, whose emotional scars from her childhood
in Sagaponack become the impetus behind her distinguished literary career and
less-than-successful personal life.
Susan Isaacs
After All These Years. HarperCollins, 1993.
A Long Island housewife gets an unpleasant surprise when her husband announces
that he is leaving her for a younger woman, then becomes the prime suspect in
his murder. By the same author: Lily White (1996).
Velda Johnston
The Underground Stream. St. Martin's, 1991.
The old whaling village of Hampton Harbor seems a perfect place for Gail
Loring to recover from a shattering experience, but when she moves into the
charming house she has rented, she feels as if she has been there before. By the same author: The People From the Sea
(1979); Fateful Summer
(1981); Walk a Winter Beach (1982).
David A. Kaufelt
The Winter Women Murders. Pocket, 1994.
The Fat Boy Murders. Pocket, 1997.
The Ruthless Realtor Murders. Pocket, 1997.
Mystery series set in mythical Waggs Neck Harbor featuring wily realtor
and occasional sleuth Wyn Lewis.
Michael Kenyon.
Kill the Butler! St. Martin's, 1993, 1991.
Henry Peckover, "the bard of Scotland Yard," is sent to pose as a butler
for the wealthy Langleys at their palatial Long Island summer home in order
to find out who killed the family patriarch.
Laird Koenig
The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane. Coward, McCann &
Geoghegan, 1973.
Rynn is the little girl who lives in the rented house at the end of the
leaf-swept lane with her poet father-or so she says. Even though there are intimations
of his presence, no one has seen him for a long time. A chilling novel of suspense.
Eric Kraft
Leaving Smalls Hotel. Picador, 1998.
The owner of Small's Hotel, located on an island just off of Long Island,
tries to save both his business and his marriage in a most unusual way.
George Suthie
King
The Last Slaver. Putnam, 1933.
A novel based on the history of "Wanderer," a ship built at Setuaket in
1857.
Chris Knopf
The Last Refuge. Permanent Press, 2005.
Divorced from his wife and estranged from his daughter, former boxer and corporate rat-race dropout Sam Acquillo spends most of his time sitting in his parents’ dilapidated house in Southampton reading, sipping vodka and doing the occasional odd job. But his life of leisure takes a turn when he discovers the body of his elderly neighbor drowned in her bathtub. The police chalk it up as an accidental drowning, but Sam comes to doubt this theory and sets out to find the truth. Followed by: Two Time (2006), Head Wounds (2008) & Hard Stop (2009).
Chris Jordan
Trapped. Mira, 2007.
When her teenage daughter disappears from her bedroom one night, single mom is shocked to learn that Kelly has been involved with a man she had met on the Internet and hires an ex-FBI agent to rescue her from the man who has kidnapped her.
Marc Lacard
Vinnie's Head. Minotaur, 2007.
Small-time Long Island criminal, Johnnie LoDuco, gets caught holding the short end of the stick after a failed convenience store robbery and is bailed out by childhood buddy Vinnie, who promptly enlists him in a scam that puts them on the bad side of the mafia. How does Johnnie figure this out? He’s out fishing one day and reels in Vinnie's head.
Chang-rae Lee
Aloft. Riverhead, 2004.
Jerry Battle's favorite diversion is to fly his small plane over the neighboring
towns and villages of Long Island. When his daughter and her fiancé arrive
from Oregon to announce their marriage plans, he looks back on his life and
faces his disengagement with it and the people he loves.
Mike Lupica
Too Far. GPPS, 2004.
After high school senior and novice sportswriter Sam Perry begins investigating
a rumor about a hazing incident that went over the line--way over the line--and
how it may be connected to the murder of the teams' basketball coach, he is
subjected to stonewalling, intimidation and threats. He recruits Ben Mitchell,
a former sportswriter and television commentator who quit the business after
one of his columns lead to the suicide of a major league manager, to help him
uncover the truth.
Hope McIntyre
How to Marry A Ghost. Myterious, Press, 2007.
Ghostwriter Lee Bartholomew comes to Long Island to interview former rock
star Shotgun Marriot (whose autobiography she is working on) and subsequently
stubles upon the body of his son on the beach...dressed in a wedding gown.
Clare McNally
Ghost House. Bantam, 1979.
Something evil in the house is determined to possess Melanie Van Buren,
destroy her husband, and sacrifice her three children to satisfy a thirst for
revenge that 200 years have not quenched. Followed by Ghost House Revenge 1981)
Nick Mamatas
Under My Roof. Soft Skull, 2007.
The world is just seems to be going to Hell, so an out-of-work Long Island father and his telepathic son build a nuclear bomb, hide it in a lawn gnome and declare their property to be independent kingdom of Weinbergia. When the media picks up on the story Weinbergia mania sweeps the nation, making the duo cult heroes.
Ellen Meister
The Smart One. Avon, 2008.
Bev Bloomrosen, the middle of three sisters, has always been envious of her siblings. Now divorced and resolved to become a teacher after a series of entry-level design jobs, she moves into her parents' Long Island home while they're in Florida and gets to bond with her older and younger sister in a way she couldn’t have imagined: they discover a body concealed in a drum found in the crawl space beneath a neighbor's home.
Mark Mills
Amagansett. Putnam, 2004.
In 1947, first-generation Basque fisherman Conrad Labarde nets the body
of a beautiful young woman. Deputy Chief of Police Tom Hollis must traverse
the shoals of class and community in order to determine if a crime has been
committed and, if so, by whom.
Gloria Nagy
A House in the Hamptons. Delacorte, 1990.
Four divergent couples meet and become friends in the Hamptons, where jockeying
for social position and power is a competitive sport.
Stewart O'Nan
A World Away. Henry Holt, 1998.
During World War II, James Langer and his family take up temporary residence
with his dying father where they struggle to regain the balance the family once
had before war and infidelity tore them apart.
Charles R. Pellegrino
Dust. Avon Books, 1998.
A group of scientists from the Brookhaven National Laboratory must find
a means of reversing a massive ecological nightmare.
Robin Pilcher
An Ocean Apart. St. Martin's, 1999.
After losing his wife to cancer, David Corstorphine's only solace is working
in the gardens of his parent's home in Scotland. When circumstances bring him
to America, he begins to reconstruct his shattered life while working as a gardener
on a Long Island estate.
Douglas Preston
and Lincoln Child
Brimstone. Warner, 2004.
After a series of murders committed in the same manner--in rooms smelling
of brimstone and with the unmistakable imprint of a claw burned into the wall,
FBI Special Agent Aloysius Penergast teams with Police Officer Vincent D'Agosta
in an investigation that takes them from the luxury estates of Long Island to
the crumbling, legend-shrouded castles of the Italian countryside, where Pendergast
faces the most treacherous and dangerous adversary of his career.
Everett T. Rattray
The Adventures of Jeremiah Dimon: A Novel of Old East Hampton.
Pushcart, 1985.
The coming-of-age of a 16 year-old growing up on the South Fork in 1887.
Barbara Rogan
Suspicion. Simon & Schuster, 1999.
When novelist Emma Roth and her family move into an isolated Victorian house
overlooking the Long Island Sound, she scoffs at the rumors that the house is
haunted, until inexplicable things begin to occur.
Saralee Rosenberg
Claire Voyant. Avon, 2004.
Can things possibly get worse for aspiring actress Claire? The 30-year-old
is still living in Plainview with her parents and loser siblings, her last film
was an x-ray and her boyfriend and agent both dumped her the same week--to be
with each other. So, can things get worse? Stick around.
Roger Rosenblatt
Lapham Rising. Ecco, 2006.
Harry March, an eccentric and reclusive writer living on a secluded island in the Hamptons with his talking, born-again Evangelical dog named Hector, declares war on his new neighbor, a millionaire who is building a grotesquely enormous new home next door.
John Saul
Perfect Nightmare. Ballantine, 2005.
In this thriller, a middle-class Long Island family is stalked by an anonymous
menace.
Tom Savage
The Inheritance. Dutton, 1998.
From the moment she steps across the threshold of the mansion she has inherited,
Holly Smith knows she is not welcomed by those who feel she has robbed them
of what should have been rightfully theirs.
Sandra Scoppettone
Gonna Take a Homicidal Journey. Little, Brown, 1998.
Greenwich Village PI Lauren Laurano thinks her excursion to the quaint village
of Seaview will be a yawn-fest, until the bodies start to pile up.
Rochelle Jewel
Shapiro
Miriam the Medium. S&S, 2004.
Miriam is a Long Island housewife and professional phone psychic (she also
sees dead people). When a persistent agent proclaims her talents marketable.
But will going "public" ruin her family's already questionable standing
in their prim Long Island community?
James Siegel
Derailed. Warner, 2005.
One fine day ad exec Charles Schine begins a flirtation with a sexy younger
woman on the Long Island Rail Road and finds himself embroiled in a nightmare
of blackmail and revenge.
Tony Spinosa
Hose Monkey. Bleak House, 2006.
After covering up for his drug-addicted partner, NYPD undercover narcotics cop Joe Serpe lost his job, then his marriage. Then his fire-fighter brother perished on 9/11. Now Joe lives a solitary existence delivering home heating oil on Long Island. When a coworker is murdered, he teams up with another ex-cop, Bob Healy, who happens to be the guy who cost him his job, to investigate. Followed by: The Fourth Victim (2008). .
Laura Van Wormer
Just for the Summer. MIRA, 1997.
When Mary Liz Scott agrees to help her godmother sort out her late husband's
estate she learns that his death may not have been an accident.
Phyllis P. Whitney
Golden Unicorn. Doubleday, 1976.
Adopted as a child, beautiful and successful Courtney Marsh is determined
to learn who her real parents were and against all advice travels to East Hampton
to discover the dangerous truth about her past.
Rainsong. Doubleday,
1984.
Still trying to recover from the death of her musician husband, Hollis Sands
seeks refuge at Windtop in Cold Spring Harbor, but soon unsettling things start
to happen-such as voices singing the lyrics to the song she wrote for her deceased
husband and guitars playing from nowhere.
Created and maintained by: Lynne M. Kennedy.
© Copyright 2009, 1999 Sachem
Public Library. All rights reserved.
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