This image is the cover for the book Denial, The Lew Fonesca Mysteries

Denial, The Lew Fonesca Mysteries

A Florida process server trying to pick up the pieces of his life looks into a hit-and-run mystery in this “compelling” crime novel by the Edgar Award winner (Kirkus Reviews).

Lew Fonesca is a man who does things for people. He makes small problems go away and tries to keep the larger ones from landing his clients in jail. He finds deadbeats and errant spouses, and generally keeps the populace of Sarasota on the up and up.

Now Lew is faced with one case that will try his patience . . . and another that may break his heart.

The first involves an elderly woman who swears she’s witnessed a murder in her old age home despite the fact that everyone she tells her story to—her family, the hospital staff, and finally the cops—tell her that it just couldn’t have happened. The other has Lew trying to identify a hit-and-run driver who killed a fourteen-year-old boy, and dredges up some very painful memories.

As Lew begins to dig deeper into both cases he finds that they’re tied together in ways he can’t hope to untangle. And when someone tries to run him down, he knows he’s getting close to some nasty home truths . . .

Praise for the Lew Fonesca series

“A psychologically acute and fast-moving crime series.” —Booklist

“Kaminsky is such a pro that the pages fly by, and even though Lew is often such a sad sack, it’s hard not to root for him.” —Chicago Tribune

“Grabs readers and takes them on a memorably tumultuous ride.” —Publishers Weekly

Stuart M. Kaminsky

Stuart M. Kaminsky (1934–2009) was one of the most prolific crime fiction authors of the last four decades. Born in Chicago, he spent his youth immersed in pulp fiction and classic cinema—two forms of popular entertainment which he would make his life’s work. After college and a stint in the army, Kaminsky wrote film criticism and biographies of the great actors and directors of Hollywood’s Golden Age. In 1977, when a planned biography of Charlton Heston fell through, Kaminsky wrote Bullet for a Star, his first Toby Peters novel, beginning a fiction career that would last the rest of his life. Kaminsky penned twenty-four novels starring the detective, whom he described as “the anti-Philip Marlowe.” In 1981’s Death of a Dissident, Kaminsky debuted Moscow police detective Porfiry Rostnikov, whose stories were praised for their accurate depiction of Soviet life. His other two series starred Abe Lieberman, a hardened Chicago cop, and Lew Fonseca, a process server. In all, Kaminsky wrote more than sixty novels. He died in St. Louis in 2009. 

Tom Doherty Associates