“Carmen’s working on a series about children and the courts,” Francine said. “Kids falling into poverty are a very big problem.” “I’m aware of the problem, Francine. I’ll skip over the question of what has made Read More …
The day had gone badly for Raymond Ambler, a bitterly cold, gray, January day not long after New Year’s, the wind like a knife, slicing into the cavern cut by 42nd Street between the skyscrapers on either side. The wind Read More …
Lyle Deming braked his Mustang hard and aimed for the sandy shoulder of the desert road. Luckily, his daughter Sam had been looking down and didn’t see the body. He passed a thicket of creosote and manzanita and pulled onto Read More …
After five years waiting for this moment, watching you for the first time still catches me off guard. I recognize you from your book jacket, but the reality of you — a three-dimensional object moving through space, flesh and blood and golden hair— Read More …
Layla faced the mirror and took a deep breath. When she went out there, she had to be effortlessly confident. She certainly looked the part, in a rose-colored Givenchy dress that complemented her olive skin and tasteful diamond earrings. She’d Read More …
Teddie Matson had a golden life, until her path had the misfortune of crossing mine. I sat staring out the window of my office, k.d. lang playing in the background. It was a while till the sun would set, that Read More …
Leine checked her watch as she waited for the target to emerge from the concrete block building. Practical as only Soviet-style architecture could be, nevertheless the crumbling façade gave the impression of faded power, like a once-famous tenor now down Read More …
Given the stuff on TV at the time, and especially conditioned by the dreck on which I’d been working for the past few years, I really didn’t expect much. But, alone in that room, within a few minutes I was Read More …
My husband wasn’t in bed with me when I woke up that January morning. The mid-winter sky was bruised purple and yellow outside the window. I shut bleary eyes against light that glared and pounded. A second later I realized Read More …
When I was lying in the hospital three months or so ago, after the boys and their children had gone home, Alan came back and kissed my forehead and said, “It’s time you wrote it down…” I didn’t have to Read More …