MYKONOS AFTER MIDNIGHT

I’m ready to pass out cigars. The new baby arrives September 3^rd.  Can’t believe it’s already the fifth in the series.  The mother is doing fine, but she was somewhat surprised when someone named Kirkus wrote to say he’d had an advance glimpse of the soon to be with us little package and it “reads more like an Elmore Leonard caper than a whodunit.”  Mom swears she knew “whodunit” and it wasn’t that Elmore Leonard fellow (God rest his brilliant soul).

Elmore Leonard (1925-2013)

I think I’ll stop now and try to make sense.  Rather, I’ll let Publishers Weekly do it for me, “Siger’s satisfying fifth mystery featuring Chief Inspector Andreas Kaldis… a complicated international plot that threatens to disrupt the easygoing, anything-goes life that Mykonos is famous for—keeps the reader engaged,” or maybe Chicago’s The Greek Star, “[Siger] has so profoundly captured the essence of Modern Greece and its people, you can’t believe he isn’t Greek.  The reader travels to Greece and is right in the center of the action… Siger is a gifted storyteller. His stories grab you and don’t let go.”

Blush, blush, blush. 

Honest, I am blushing, though you might not be able to tell as I’m still on Mykonos and won’t be back in the US on book tour for MYKONOS AFTER MIDNIGHT until November. 

However, I will be in Albany, New York to participate with some of my MIE mates in Bouchercon 2013 and announce MAM’s release with a little promotional surprise at the convention (our Murder is Everywhere Panel, “When in Rome,” kicks off the conference at 12 noon on Thursday, September 19^th).  After all, we must keep our publishers at least thinking we care about doing more than just writing our books. J  And in my case I’ve got the absolute best, most supportive publisher in the mystery world, POISONED PEN PRESS, with a special shout out to my nonpareil editor, Barbara Peters.

So, here’s a quick sketch of the new book, the one in which I return to my home island of Mykonos, scene of my debut novel in the series, Murder in Mykonos—followed by Assassins of Athens, Prey on Patmos, and Target: Tinos (if you’re going to do a BSP piece once a year, you might as well go all the way!):

MYKONOS AFTER MIDNIGHT begins with a legendary nightclub owner found bludgeoned to death in his Mykonos home.  In his lifetime he’d helped transform Mykonos from an obscure, impoverished Aegean island into a world-renown summertime playground for the world’s rich and powerful, and the Mykonian people into some of the wealthiest in Greece. 

All evidence points to obvious killers, but the murder has put long hidden, politically explosive secrets in play and drawn a dangerous foreign investor to the island.  Andreas Kaldis, feared head of Greece’s special crimes division, is certain there’s a far more complex solution to the murder.  Andreas’ quest for answers amid the entrenched cultural contradictions that give Mykonos so much of its magic, soon has him battling ruthless opportunists preying on his country’s weakened financial condition and learning that there is a high, unexpected price to pay for his curiosity.

He finds himself locked in war with a powerful, clandestine international force willing to do whatever it takes to wrest control of Mykonos from its old guard, no matter what the cost, no matter who must die.  It is a struggle of the sort playing out across much of Greece during this time of dire economic crises overrunning a society rooted in the past trying to catch up with the present. 

I’m very proud of this book.  I consider it true to the gracious words on my Kaldis series expressed by Marilyn Stasio of The New York Times when, in selecting Target: Tinos as one of her five picks for the beach in 2012, wrote: “Another of Siger’s thoughtful police procedurals set in picturesque but not untroubled Greek locales.”

I hope you’ll agree, but more importantly, ENJOY!

Thanks.  Our regularly scheduled programming will return next Saturday.

Jeff—Saturday