Day of Atonement (Peter Decker/Rina Lazarus Mysteries) [Mass Market Paperback]

Faye Kellerman (Author)

Book Description

Series: Peter Decker/Rina Lazarus Mysteries | Publication Date: December 30, 2003

Peter Decker of the L.A.P.D. never dreamed he'd be spending his honeymoon with his new wife, Rina Lazarus, in an Orthodox Jewish enclave in Brooklyn, New York -- or that a terrible event would end it so abruptly. But a boy has vanished from the midst of this close-knit religious community, a troubled youth fleeing the tight bonds and strictures he felt were strangling him. The runaway, Noam, is not traveling alone. A killer has taken him under his wing to introduce Noam to a savage world of blood and terror. And now Decker must find them both somewhere in America before a psychopath ends the life of a confused and frightened youngster whose only sin was to want something more.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Kellerman's fourth mystery to feature Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus lacks the passion and suspense of earlier outings.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

When Los Angeles detective Peter Decker and new wife Rina Lazarus visit her Jewish kinfolks in Brooklyn, startling events disturb their honeymoon. Quite unexpectedly and with great antipathy, Decker--an adoptee--recognizes his natural mother at a holiday gathering. Before he can confront her, though, her troubled 14-year-old grandson goes missing and Decker, fortuitously on hand, begins the search. Soon after he learns that the boy has taken up with a dangerously disturbed and vicious young man, the scene switches to Los Angeles. Hard-hitting details, vignettes of Jewish life, and uncomfortably close glimpses of a cold-hearted psycho make this an entrancing page turner. Not to be missed.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: HarperTorch; First Edition edition (December 30, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060554894
• ISBN-13: 978-0060554897
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 4.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #896,912 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Faye Kellerman is the author of twenty-six novels, including nineteen New York Times bestselling mysteries that feature the husband-and-wife team of Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus. She has also penned two best selling short novels with her husband, New York Times bestselling author Jonathan Kellerman, and recently has teamed up with her daughter, Aliza, to co-write a teen novel, entitled PRISM. She lives in Los Angeles, California, and Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Characters with surprising depth; intriguing plot, February 6, 1999

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Day of Atonement (Peter Decker & Rina Lazarus Novels) (Mass Market Paperback)

After reading one Peter Decker/Rina Lazarus novel almost by accident, I was immediately hooked on this series. Peter, Rina, and their family and colleagues are characters of depth, endearingly human, honest, and appealing. Every novel in this series is a winner, and I especially liked Day of Atonement. Not only is it an engrossing, gritty, edge-of-the-seat detective novel, it is also a heartfelt story of complex emotional relationships. The setting within the Orthodox Jewish community--still an ongoing mystery to semi-outsider, LAPD detective Peter Decker--seems to the reader much as it does to him: a fascinating, perplexing, comforting, challenging world. This reader--coincidentally the parent of an adult adopted son--was intrigued and deeply touched by the subplot of Peter's struggle to deal emotionally with his own adoption. It is rare to find as compelling a storyteller as Faye Kellerman!

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars My favorite of the series, April 13, 2000

By 

Sheila L. Beaumont (South Pasadena, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Day of Atonement (Peter Decker & Rina Lazarus Novels) (Mass Market Paperback)

In this series, Faye Kellerman gives us exciting stories, likable protagonists in Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus, and an interesting picture of Orthodox Jewish life. The only thing that mars the series is the ugly language employed whenever Decker gets together with his LAPD colleagues. I guess this is in there because it's "realistic," but I for one don't need such realism in my recreational reading. (I've found it's possible to skim over most of this dialogue without losing track of the story.) "Day of Atonement" is my favorite of the series so far. Not only is it a compelling story involving the search for a teenage boy who runs away from his Orthodox community in New York; much of the action takes place away from Los Angeles and thus we are largely spared the unpleasant conversations of the cops.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Stayed up all night, could not put any of her books down, January 11, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Day of Atonement (Mass Market Paperback)

Faye Kellerman has the ability to involve the reader from page one. Her entire series of Peter Decker/Rina Lazarus books are spellbinders. She follows the relationship between Peter and Rina from when they first met in Ritual Bath through to Prayers for the Dead. She weaves her books beautifully around the life of orthodox Jews and those who are both less religous and those who are not Jewish. You watch the characters grow from the first word to the last. I always end her books wanting to read another