Nameless had told Mitchell Krochek that he'd do whatever he could to find his missing wife, Janice. She'd run away before--propelled by a gambling fever that grew ever higher--and Mitch had always taken her back. This time, when Nameless, his partner Tamara, and the agency's chief operative Jake Runyon finally found her in a sleazy San Francisco hotel, she demanded a divorce.
A few days later, a beaten and bloody Janice stumbled into the agency begging to go home. No one is surprised when, soon after her homecoming, she disappears again.
But gambling addiction has a way of twisting things, and the blood on Mitchell and Janice Krochek's kitchen floor was a card off the bottom of the deck.
Janice is missing again, Mitchell is the prime suspect, and as Nameless searches for the truth behind her disappearance, he uncovers a vicious racket that preys on gambling fever victims…
Pronzini’s Nameless Detective and his San Francisco investigative agency have survived for more than three decades because of a never-ending supply of people who screw up their lives. Nameless used to operate alone but now runs an agency with the varied talents (and narrative points of view) of a twentysomething black woman and a fortysomething ex-cop. Nameless himself, of course, remains the moral center of the agency and the series, as well as the lead narrator. Fever focuses on how one woman’s addiction to internet gambling leads her from her suburban home to a derelict San Francisco rooming house, where she turns tricks to finance her next run at the virtual casino. It also touches on other fevers that can consume people’s lives. Pronzini is justly celebrated as a chronicler of San Francisco, but this novel also showcases his deft touch with interiors—how an unmade bed, the stench of cigarette smoke, or an antiseptically clean and empty home can say volumes about the tail ends of desperate lives. Another Pronzini winner. --Connie Fletcher
Description:
Nameless had told Mitchell Krochek that he'd do whatever he could to find his missing wife, Janice. She'd run away before--propelled by a gambling fever that grew ever higher--and Mitch had always taken her back. This time, when Nameless, his partner Tamara, and the agency's chief operative Jake Runyon finally found her in a sleazy San Francisco hotel, she demanded a divorce.
A few days later, a beaten and bloody Janice stumbled into the agency begging to go home. No one is surprised when, soon after her homecoming, she disappears again.
But gambling addiction has a way of twisting things, and the blood on Mitchell and Janice Krochek's kitchen floor was a card off the bottom of the deck.
Janice is missing again, Mitchell is the prime suspect, and as Nameless searches for the truth behind her disappearance, he uncovers a vicious racket that preys on gambling fever victims…
From Publishers Weekly
Once again Pronzini, soon to be designated an MWA Grand Master, captures the quiet despair of his characters' lives in the 33rd entry in his noirish whodunit series featuring the Nameless Detective (after 2007's Savages). Mitchell Krochek, who's worried about the gambling addiction of his wife, Janice, hires Nameless to trace Janice, who's disappeared for the fourth time in four years. When Jake Runyon, Nameless's associate, traces Janice to an apartment hotel near their San Francisco office, Nameless and Jake decide to honor Janice's request not to reveal her location to her husband. Later, a battered Janice shows up at the detective agency's office, where she agrees to go home, only to vanish again amid circumstances strongly indicating foul play. In an affecting subplot, Jake investigates the mysterious beating of a devoted churchgoer's son. This insightful novel will appeal to those who like the mean streets portrayed with understatement and subtlety rather than gory violence. (June)
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From Booklist
Pronzini’s Nameless Detective and his San Francisco investigative agency have survived for more than three decades because of a never-ending supply of people who screw up their lives. Nameless used to operate alone but now runs an agency with the varied talents (and narrative points of view) of a twentysomething black woman and a fortysomething ex-cop. Nameless himself, of course, remains the moral center of the agency and the series, as well as the lead narrator. Fever focuses on how one woman’s addiction to internet gambling leads her from her suburban home to a derelict San Francisco rooming house, where she turns tricks to finance her next run at the virtual casino. It also touches on other fevers that can consume people’s lives. Pronzini is justly celebrated as a chronicler of San Francisco, but this novel also showcases his deft touch with interiors—how an unmade bed, the stench of cigarette smoke, or an antiseptically clean and empty home can say volumes about the tail ends of desperate lives. Another Pronzini winner. --Connie Fletcher