Bruce DeSilva's Blog, page 19

Who’s Reading “A Scourge of Vipers” Now? It’s Blues Singer and Guitar Player Quinn Sullivan!

Blues Guitar Player Quinn Sullivan reading my novel, “A Scourge of Vipers”

Quinn Sullivan first picked up a guitar when he was three years old. He was still a little boy when he showed up with his guitar at a Buddy Guy concert, and Buddy invited him onto the stage to show what he could do. Impressed, Buddy took the kid under his wing.

I first saw Quinn perform a year or so later when he took the stage with at B.B. King’s club in Manhattan. He was just eight years old, but already, I could see his potential.

Now, at age 16, his singing voice has matured and his guitar playing is so good that he, along with Shun Ng, Boogie Long and Ronnie Baker Brooks, make me feel good about what the future holds for the blues. You can learn more about Quinn and his music here.

It’s great to have the photo of Quinn reading A Scourge of Vipers because the hero of the story, Liam Mulligan, is as big a blues fan as I am. The book is the fourth in my Edgar Award-winning series of hardboiled crime novels about Mulligan, an investigative reporter for a dying newspaper in Providence, R.I.

The novels have received rave reviews in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Publishers Weekly, and a host of other publications. You can order them from independent or chain online bookstores by following this link.

AudioFile Magazine Review of “A Scourge of Vipers.”

Lawrence Block reading “A Scourge of Vipers”

Click here for the AudioFile Magazine review of my most recent hardboiled crime novel, A Scourge of Vipers, and listen free as award-winning book narrator Jeff Woodman reads the first chapter.

A Scourge of Vipers by Bruce DeSilva is the fourth in my Edgar Award-winning series of hardboiled crime novels featuring Liam Mulligan, an investigative reporter for a dying newspaper in Providence, R.I.  The novel has received rave reviews in The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, and a host of other publications. You can order any of the books in the series from independent or chain online bookstores by following this link.

Who’s Reading “A Scourge of Vipers” Now? Blues Sax Player Nancy Wright!

Nancy Wright reading “A Scourge of Vipers” by Bruce DeSilva

Nancy Wright is one of the hottest blues saxophone players we have, and she’s been just that for more than three decades. How good is she? Good enough to have toured with the likes of  John Lee Hooker and Lonnie Mack. Good enough to have shared the stage with Stevie Ray Vaughn, Albert King, and Albert Collins.

Last year, she branched out with “Putting Down Roots,” an album of songs that spans blues, R&B, funk, and gospel. On it, she sings and plays a half dozen instruments, and she wrote the songs herself. You can learn more about Nancy and her music here.

I’m a big fan of the blues and of Nancy, and so is Liam Mulligan, the hero of my series of hard-boiled crime novels set in Providence, R.I.

“Why the blues?” Mulligan asks himself in the next  novel, The Dread Line, which will be published next fall. “Why was I always drawn to music about hard times at the bottom of a shot glass? The music of the scorned and shattered. At the end of most every day—even the ones that didn’t involve shaking a tail, tracking down thieves, or staring at a broken body—I’d lean back with a glass of something bitter and drown in Koko Taylor’s growl, Buddy Guy’s soulful riffs, or the vibing wire of Stevie Ray Vaughn’s guitar. Just like my dad did before the cancer took him. He’d come through the door, exhausted from another day of delivering milk, put a scratchy Son Seals album on the turntable, pull out his Comet harmonica, and play along. Like him, I belonged to the downtrodden tribe that turns misery into music—the kind of music that warns us what the world is like and steels us against it. My old job as an investigative reporter, like my new one as a detective, was to probe the dark hearts we pray against. I’d locked eyes with murderers. Wondered, more than once, if something rotten was eating away at me, turning me into the very thing that I fear. Then the twang of a blues guitar would fill the room, preaching that even in the darkest of times, the idea of light exists—and that the purpose of life is just to live it.”

A Scourge of Vipers by Bruce DeSilva is the fourth in my Edgar Award-winning series of hardboiled crime novels featuring Liam Mulligan, an investigative reporter for a dying newspaper in Providence, R.I.  The novel has received rave reviews in The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, and a host of other publications. You can order any of the books in the series from independent or chain online bookstores by following this link.

My Review of “The Last Good Heist,” the Untold Story of the Second Largest Robbery in U.S. History

The Bonded Vault caper of 1975, a case of the mob stealing from the mob, was the second-biggest heist in U.S. history, topped only by the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum robbery in 1990.

The job, pulled off in Providence, R.I., by a motley crew of low-level career criminals on orders from New England’s Mafia boss, netted $32 million in 1975 dollars, the equivalent of $140 million today.

The reason almost nobody knows this, the reason the heist has received so little notoriety outside of New England, is that the authorities first estimated the take at a million dollars and later raised it to just $4 million. Because the victims were mostly organized crime figures and the loot consisted largely of cash, rare coins, silver bars, jewels, and bearer bonds—the fruits of illegal activities that they were trying to conceal from the IRS and the police—it was many years before the facts dribbled out. None of the loot was ever recovered.

Jack White

When it first went down, I was a fledgling investigative reporter at The Providence Journal, which was at the time the finest small-city metropolitan newspaper in America. And boy did I want a piece of that story. But it was quickly scooped up by the newspaper’s dogged, two-man investigative team—Jack White, who had recently won the Pulitzer Prize for disclosing that Richard Nixon had cheated on his income taxes, and Jack’s crackerjack sidekick, Randall Richard, who spent most of his career at The Journal before coming to work for me as an Associated Press national writer.

Wayne Worcester

Tim White

Now, years after Jack’s untimely death, Richard has teamed up with two other fine journalists, Jack’s son Tim and Journal alumnus Wayne Worcester, a retired University of Connecticut journalism professor, to tell the full story in The Last Good Heist: The Inside Story of the Biggest Single Payday in the Criminal History of the Northeast. The true crime book will be published later this year by Globe Pequot Press and is available for pre-order from amazon.com here.

The Last Good Heist is a rollicking yarn of betrayal, murder, and expert detective work superbly told in prose largely written by Worcester, one of the

Raymond L.S. Patriarca

finest writers The Journal ever produced. It is also a stark reminder of the days when Mafia chieftain Raymond L.S. Patriarca was the most powerful and feared man in New England, and offers a loving tribute to the heyday of a once great newspaper, a time when “if the paper didn’t print something, it may as well have never happened.”

The authors offer a richly detailed account of the robbery itself, the criminal and personal histories of the men who pulled it off, and the stupid mistakes and the investigative tactics that eventually brought some, but not all of them, to justice.

How great is the detail? The writers spill everything down to the name of the Las Vegas valet who catered to the lead robber’s every whim during a reckless post-heist spending spree, the name of the myna bird one of the criminals was allowed to keep in his jail cell while awaiting trial, and even the slur the guy taught the bird in order to insult his keepers.

The writing falls off a bit in the last few chapters, which were not written by Worcester, but readers interested in organized crime, criminal detection, and the story behind of one of the country’s greatest heists will find this book richly satisfying.

Who’s Reading “A Scourge of Vipers?” It’s Buddy Guy’s Keyboard Player, Marty Sammon!

Blues keyboard player Marty Sammon reading my novel, “A Scourge of Vipers”

Marty Sammon was born and raised in Chicago, where he immersed himself in the local blues scene. He performed for five years with Otis Rush before hooking on as the keyboard player for the great Buddy Guy.

You can learn more about Marty here.

I met him last fall on a blues cruise, and that’s when I snapped this picture.

Liam Mulligan, the hero of my series of hardboiled crime novels, is a big blues fan too.

 

 

“Why the blues?” Mulligan asks himself in the next  novel, The Dread Line, which will be published next fall. “Why was I always drawn to music about hard times at the bottom of a shot glass? The music of the scorned and shattered. At the end of most every day—even the ones that didn’t involve shaking a tail, tracking down thieves, or staring at a broken body—I’d lean back with a glass of something bitter and drown in Koko Taylor’s growl, Buddy Guy’s soulful riffs, or the vibing wire of Stevie Ray Vaughn’s guitar. Just like my dad did before the cancer took him. He’d come through the door, exhausted from another day of delivering milk, put a scratchy Son Seals album on the turntable, pull out his Comet harmonica, and play along. Like him, I belonged to the downtrodden tribe that turns misery into music—the kind of music that warns us what the world is like and steels us against it. My old job as an investigative reporter, like my new one as a detective, was to probe the dark hearts we pray against. I’d locked eyes with murderers. Wondered, more than once, if something rotten was eating away at me, turning me into the very thing that I fear. Then the twang of a blues guitar would fill the room, preaching that even in the darkest of times, the idea of light exists—and that the purpose of life is just to live it.”

A Scourge of Vipers by Bruce DeSilva is the fourth in my Edgar Award-winning series of hardboiled crime novels featuring Liam Mulligan, an investigative reporter for a dying newspaper in Providence, R.I.  The novel has received rave reviews in The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, and a host of other publications. You can order any of the books in the series from independent or chain online bookstores by following this link.

Who’s Reading “A Scourge of Vipers?” It’s Buddy’ Guy’s Keyboard Player, Marty Sammon!

Blues keyboard player Marty Sammon reading my novel, “A Scourge of Vipers”

Marty Sammon was born and raised in Chicago, where he immersed himself in the local blues scene. He performed for five years with Otis Rush before hooking on as the keyboard player for the great Buddy Guy.

You can learn more about Marty here.

I met him last fall on a blues cruise, and that’s when I snapped this picture.

Liam Mulligan, the hero of my series of hardboiled crime novels, is a big blues fan too.

 

 

“Why the blues?” Mulligan asks himself in the next  novel, The Dread Line, which will be published next fall. “Why was I always drawn to music about hard times at the bottom of a shot glass? The music of the scorned and shattered. At the end of most every day—even the ones that didn’t involve shaking a tail, tracking down thieves, or staring at a broken body—I’d lean back with a glass of something bitter and drown in Koko Taylor’s growl, Buddy Guy’s soulful riffs, or the vibing wire of Stevie Ray Vaughn’s guitar. Just like my dad did before the cancer took him. He’d come through the door, exhausted from another day of delivering milk, put a scratchy Son Seals album on the turntable, pull out his Comet harmonica, and play along. Like him, I belonged to the downtrodden tribe that turns misery into music—the kind of music that warns us what the world is like and steels us against it. My old job as an investigative reporter, like my new one as a detective, was to probe the dark hearts we pray against. I’d locked eyes with murderers. Wondered, more than once, if something rotten was eating away at me, turning me into the very thing that I fear. Then the twang of a blues guitar would fill the room, preaching that even in the darkest of times, the idea of light exists—and that the purpose of life is just to live it.”

A Scourge of Vipers by Bruce DeSilva is the fourth in my Edgar Award-winning series of hardboiled crime novels featuring Liam Mulligan, an investigative reporter for a dying newspaper in Providence, R.I.  The novel has received rave reviews in The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, and a host of other publications. You can order any of the books in the series from independent or chain online bookstores by following this link.

Who’s Reading “A Scourge of Vipers” Now? It’s Acclaimed Vocalist Marcella Simien!

Marcella Simien reading my novel, “A Scourge of Vipers.”

Marcella Simien grew up in Lafayette Louisiana, the daughter of acclaimed Zydeco accordion player and singer Terrence Simien. As a young woman, she moved to Memphis and developed her own style, a unique blend of Creole, Memphis soul, and the blues.

Today, she records with her own group, Marcella and Her Lovers, and is featured on her father’s most recent album, the Grammy-winning Dockside Sessions. You can learn more about her and her music here.

I met her and her dad last fall on a blues cruise, and that’s when I snapped this picture.

Liam Mulligan, the hero of my series of hardboiled crime novels, is a big blues fan too.

“Why the blues?” Mulligan asks himself in the next  novel, The Dread Line, which will be published next fall. “Why was I always drawn to music about hard times at the bottom of a shot glass? The music of the scorned and shattered. At the end of most every day—even the ones that didn’t involve shaking a tail, tracking down thieves, or staring at a broken body—I’d lean back with a glass of something bitter and drown in Koko Taylor’s growl, Buddy Guy’s soulful riffs, or the vibing wire of Stevie Ray Vaughn’s guitar. Just like my dad did before the cancer took him. He’d come through the door, exhausted from another day of delivering milk, put a scratchy Son Seals album on the turntable, pull out his Comet harmonica, and play along. Like him, I belonged to the downtrodden tribe that turns misery into music—the kind of music that warns us what the world is like and steels us against it. My old job as an investigative reporter, like my new one as a detective, was to probe the dark hearts we pray against. I’d locked eyes with murderers. Wondered, more than once, if something rotten was eating away at me, turning me into the very thing that I fear. Then the twang of a blues guitar would fill the room, preaching that even in the darkest of times, the idea of light exists—and that the purpose of life is just to live it.”

A Scourge of Vipers by Bruce DeSilva is the fourth in my Edgar Award-winning series of hardboiled crime novels featuring Liam Mulligan, an investigative reporter for a dying newspaper in Providence, R.I.  The novel has received rave reviews in The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, and a host of other publications. You can order any of the books in the series from independent or chain online bookstores by following this link.

Look Who’s Reading “A Scourge of Vipers.” It’s Blues Legend Magic Dick!

Magic Dick, aka Richard Salwitz, is best known as one of the founding members of the J. Geils Band. His brilliant harmonica playing on unforgettable cuts like “Whammer Jammer”  led The Rolling Stone Record Guide to proclaim him perhaps the finest white blues harmonica player ever (although Rick Estrin might have a thing or two to say about that.)

Subsequently, he teamed up with J. Geils again in a band called Bluestime, which often toured as part of as part of B.B. King’s Bluesfest. Later, he became a regular with the Legendary Rhythm & Blues Revue led by Tommy Castro, appearing regularly on blues cruises. These days, he’s touring and recording with Shun Ng, an astonishing young vocalist and blues guitarist.

I first met Magic Dick on a blues cruise last fall, and we fell into a long conversation on the pool deck. As it happens, we have a lot in common. We both spent our formative years in Massachusetts. We both love books, with him having a surprising interest in book design. And, of course, we both love the blues.

You can learn more about Magic Dick and watch a video of a recent performance with Ng by clicking here.

Liam Mulligan, the hero of my series of hardboiled crime novels, is a big blues fan too.

“Why the blues?” Mulligan asks himself in the next  novel, The Dread Line, which will be published next fall. “Why was I always drawn to music about hard times at the bottom of a shot glass? The music of the scorned and shattered. At the end of most every day—even the ones that didn’t involve shaking a tail, tracking down thieves, or staring at a broken body—I’d lean back with a glass of something bitter and drown in Koko Taylor’s growl, Buddy Guy’s soulful riffs, or the vibing wire of Stevie Ray Vaughn’s guitar. Just like my dad did before the cancer took him. He’d come through the door, exhausted from another day of delivering milk, put a scratchy Son Seals album on the turntable, pull out his Comet harmonica, and play along. Like him, I belonged to the downtrodden tribe that turns misery into music—the kind of music that warns us what the world is like and steels us against it. My old job as an investigative reporter, like my new one as a detective, was to probe the dark hearts we pray against. I’d locked eyes with murderers. Wondered, more than once, if something rotten was eating away at me, turning me into the very thing that I fear. Then the twang of a blues guitar would fill the room, preaching that even in the darkest of times, the idea of light exists—and that the purpose of life is just to live it.”

A Scourge of Vipers by Bruce DeSilva is the fourth in my Edgar Award-winning series of hardboiled crime novels featuring Liam Mulligan, an investigative reporter for a dying newspaper in Providence, R.I.  The novel has received rave reviews in The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, and a host of other publications. You can order any of the books in the series from independent or chain online bookstores by following this link.

 

Who’s Reading “A Scourge of Vipers” Now? Blues Sax Player Keith Crossan!

Keith Crossan reading my novel, “A Scourge of Vipers”

Keith Crossan is one of the best blues sax players in creation. I first became aware of him during the years he played with Tommy Castro, but these days he’s got his own band and recently cut a new record.

If you don’t know Keith’s work, you can learn more about him here. And if you click here, you can give him a listen.

My wife Patrica Smith, one of the greatest poets working in English, and I finally met Keith on a Blues Cruise last fall, and he graciously took the stage with her, backing up her performance of Map Rappin’, a poem about John Coltrane. A few lines:

Patricia performing with Keith Crossan

 

Don’t play me that way

The way the saxman plays his woman,

blowing into her mouth until she cries,

allowing her no breath of her own.

As readers familiar with my writing  know, Liam Mulligan, the hero of crime novels, is a big blues fan — and so am I.

‘“Why the blues?” Mulligan asks himself in the next  novel, The Dread Line, which will be published next fall. “Why was I always drawn to music about hard times at the bottom of a shot glass? The music of the scorned and shattered. At the end of most every day—even the ones that didn’t involve shaking a tail, tracking down thieves, or staring at a broken body—I’d lean back with a glass of something bitter and drown in Koko Taylor’s growl, Buddy Guy’s soulful riffs, or the vibing wire of Stevie Ray Vaughn’s guitar. Just like my dad did before the cancer took him. He’d come through the door, exhausted from another day of delivering milk, put a scratchy Son Seals album on the turntable, pull out his Comet harmonica, and play along. Like him, I belonged to the downtrodden tribe that turns misery into music—the kind of music that warns us what the world is like and steels us against it. My old job as an investigative reporter, like my new one as a detective, was to probe the dark hearts we pray against. I’d locked eyes with murderers. Wondered, more than once, if something rotten was eating away at me, turning me into the very thing that I fear. Then the twang of a blues guitar would fill the room, preaching that even in the darkest of times, the idea of light exists—and that the purpose of life is just to live it.”

A Scourge of Vipers by Bruce DeSilva is the fourth in my Edgar Award-winning series of hardboiled crime novels featuring Liam Mulligan, an investigative reporter for a dying newspaper in Providence, R.I.  The novel has received rave reviews in The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, and a host of other publications. You can order any of the books in the series from independent or chain online bookstores by following this link.

Who’s Reading “A Scourge of Vipers” Now? Bluesman Jonathon “Boogie” Long.

Yes, that’s blues singer and guitarist Jonathon “Boogie” Long with my most recent crime novel,  A Scourge of Vipers. 

Boogie is a young guy who’s starting to make his mark on the blues scene, and I really dig him. If you’re not familiar with his work, check out this live performance.

As readers familiar with my writing  know, Liam Mulligan, the hero of crime novels, is a big blues fan — and so am I.

‘“Why the blues?” Mulligan asks himself in the next  novel, The Dread Line, which will be published next fall. “Why was I always drawn to music about hard times at the bottom of a shot glass? The music of the scorned and shattered. At the end of most every day—even the ones that didn’t involve shaking a tail, tracking down thieves, or staring at a broken body—I’d lean back with a glass of something bitter and drown in Koko Taylor’s growl, Buddy Guy’s soulful riffs, or the vibing wire of Stevie Ray Vaughn’s guitar. Just like my dad did before the cancer took him. He’d come through the door, exhausted from another day of delivering milk, put a scratchy Son Seals album on the turntable, pull out his Comet harmonica, and play along. Like him, I belonged to the downtrodden tribe that turns misery into music—the kind of music that warns us what the world is like and steels us against it. My old job as an investigative reporter, like my new one as a detective, was to probe the dark hearts we pray against. I’d locked eyes with murderers. Wondered, more than once, if something rotten was eating away at me, turning me into the very thing that I fear. Then the twang of a blues guitar would fill the room, preaching that even in the darkest of times, the idea of light exists—and that the purpose of life is just to live it.”

A Scourge of Vipers by Bruce DeSilva is the fourth in my Edgar Award-winning series of hardboiled crime novels featuring Liam Mulligan, an investigative reporter for a dying newspaper in Providence, R.I.  The novel has received rave reviews in The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, and a host of other publications. You can order any of the books in the series from independent or chain online bookstores by following this link.

And you can learn more about  Boogie Long, including where you can see him live, here.