Andrew Lanh

Caught Dead: a Rick Van Lam Mystery Andrew Lanh

Publisher Marketing: When one of the beautiful Le sisters is killed, Hartford, Connecticut s small Vietnamese community is stunned. Mary Le Vu, wife of a poor grocery store owner, is gunned down in a drive-by shooting. Her twin sister insists that dutiful Mary wouldn t be caught dead in that drug-infested zone, but the police rule it an unlucky accident. Skeptics hire private eye Rick Van Lam to get to the truth. Amerasian Rick is one of the "bui doi" children of the dust who are so often rejected by Vietnamese culture. But his young sidekick, Hank Nguyen, a pureblood Vietnamese man, can help Rick navigate the closed world of Little Saigon. Surrounded by close friends a former Rockette landlady, his crusty mentor, and his ex-wife Liz Rick immerses himself in a world that rejects him but now needs his help especially when a second murder strikes Little Saigon. Rick and Hank delve into the families of the Le sisters, one poor, one very rich, and uncover a world of explosive ethnic tension and sinister criminal activity ranging from Hartford s exclusive white suburbs to the impoverished inner city. To solve the murders and bring closure to Mary s grieving circle, Rick looks to long-buried memories of his Buddhist childhood for the wisdom that will lead him to a murderer." Review Citations: Booklist 10/01/2014 pg. 36 (EAN 9781464203336, Open Ebook) Publishers Weekly 09/01/2014 pg. 46 (EAN 9781464203305, Hardcover) - *Starred Review Booklist 10/01/2014 pg. 36 (EAN 9781464203305, Hardcover) Kirkus Reviews 10/15/2014 (EAN 9781464203305, Hardcover) Publishers Weekly 09/01/2014 (EAN 9781464203329, Paperback) - *Starred Review Booklist 10/01/2014 pg. 36 (EAN 9781464203329, Paperback) Kirkus Reviews 10/15/2014 pg. 54 (EAN 9781464203329, Paperback) Contributor Bio:  Lanh, Andrew Andrew Lanh is a pseudonym of Ed Ifkovic. Ifkovic taught literature and creative writing at a community college in Connecticut for over three decades, and now devotes himself to writing fiction. A longtime devotee of mystery novels, he fondly recalls his boyhood discovery of Erle Stanley Gardner s Perry Mason series in a family bookcase, and his immediate obsession with the whodunit world. MAKE BELIEVE is the third mystery in his Edna Ferber Mystery series for Poisoned Pen Press. Previous books are LONE STAR (2009). ESCAPE ARTIST (2011), and MAKE BELIEVE (2012).