Amazon.com: Eureka (9780786244164): William Diehl: Books
Eureka and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle. Learn more

Kindle Edition
 
   
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
Eureka
 
 
Start reading Eureka on your Kindle in under a minute.

Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here, or download a FREE Kindle Reading App.

Eureka [Hardcover]

William Diehl (Author)
4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (45 customer reviews)


Available from these sellers.


Formats

Amazon Price New from Used from
Kindle Edition --  
Hardcover --  
Hardcover, August 2002 --  
Paperback, Import --  
Mass Market Paperback $7.99  
Audio, Cassette, Abridged, Audiobook --  

Book Description

August 2002
Eureka. It’s what you say when you strike gold. It’s also a town in California where the truth might be buried forever.

In New York Times bestselling author William Diehl’s thrilling, accomplished new novel, the seamy past of America’s most glamorous state lies in this deceptively peaceful area, one hundred miles north of Los Angeles. It was the lawless place from which young, rugged Thomas Culhane escaped to fight World War I. Now it’s a place where, two decades later, police detective Zeke Bannon investigates a death that seems a sad accident.

Until you look a bit closer.

The year is 1941. Verna Wilensky has been electrocuted in her bathtub, leaving a lower-middle-class life, no survivors, and a bank account packed with almost a hundred thousand dollars. Mysterious checks have consistently come to her for more than twenty years, most drawn from a bank in San Pietro, a town once known as Eureka.

Eureka was a town that used to be a bootlegger’s paradise and a gangster’s dream. Now it is the rebuilt metropolis where Sheriff Thomas Culhane is launching a bid to be the golden state’s next governor. But something just might threaten his ambitions. As Bannon digs deeper into Wilensky’s demise, he unearths a decades-old secret that starts in a shootout, builds to a bloodbath, and could end up within the upper echelons of California’s elite, forever changing the destiny of a state.

Rich in historical detail, complex in its connection between past and present, and filled with the nonstop action that are the hallmarks of this modern master, Eureka is an epic achievement of storytelling and suspense–William Diehl’s most extraordinary novel yet.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought


Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

William Diehl clearly understands the three essentials of any bestselling 1940s-era crime thriller: gangsters, gunplay, and guilty secrets. But Eureka isn't just another noirish shoot-'em-up, as shallow and forgettable as a stoolie's grave. It's a combustible, epic-aspiring saga about long-ago violence and the limits of justice, about revenge and redemption and two rivalrous lawmen drawn together by common ideals.

Most of the action centers around Zeke Bannon, a young L.A. cop whose probing into the murder of a mysterious widow--electrocuted in her own bathtub--leads him to the once-sinful town of Eureka, now called San Pietro. It's from there that she'd been receiving anonymous cashier's checks over the last two decades, money Bannon figures she earned by her silence. Was she helping to cover up the truth about a 1921 shootout that caused the death of Eureka's frontier-style sheriff? Nobody in modern San Pietro will talk, least of all Thomas "Brodie" Culhane, a World War I hero who cleaned up the town and is now running for governor of California. Torn between admiring Culhane and trying to link him to the widow's killing, Bannon ignites historical enmities that threaten to express both men to their graves.

Although Diehl offers ample cinematic violence here, there's little true menace, and a romantic subplot involving Bannon with a gorgeous banker is neither credible nor effectively exploited. Still, Eureka is a polished work, full of careful character studies and drama, with a gasp-provoking solution that few readers will anticipate. --J. Kingston Pierce --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

HFollowing a four-year hiatus after the somewhat lackluster Reign in Hell, the third volume of the Martin Vail thriller series, legions of this bestselling author's readers will herald this triumphant comeback as his best novel ever. Combining the psychological chiaroscuro of L.A. Confidential with the dramatic sweep and stylish noir of Chinatown, this labyrinthine, multigenerational epic scrolls across the still-lawless frontier landscape of California. At the turn of the 20th century, Eureka, the railhead Sodom and Gomorrah of Southern California, is replete with whorehouses, gambling, dark political intrigues and steamy liaisons. Fast-forwarding through WWI to the last days of WWII, the plot examines the coming of age of this seedy patch. Recovering in 1945 from WWII wounds that earned him a Silver Star, LAPD Det. Zee Bannon is handed a briefcase containing files concerning a mysterious woman found dead in her bathtub. The case was left unresolved in 1941, just before he went off to war, and Bannon is unable to discover the victim's history before her move to L.A. in 1924. But her sizable bank account and a trail of anonymous cashier's checks eventually lead back to Eureka (since renamed San Pietro), where now legendary Sheriff Thomas Culhane's bid for state governor is at stake. Infidelity, murder, murky secrets, a deeply affecting love story and an old-fashioned showdown will keep fans spellbound right up to the fully satisfying if not so surprising denouement. Vividly cinematic, rich in atmosphere and peopled with believable characters, this novel serves notice that Diehl is one of the best thriller writers working today. (Mar.)Forecast: Expect this winner to hit bestseller lists early and hard. Southern regional author appearances and a teaser chapter in the mass market reissue of Primal Fear will further spur sales.

Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

  • Hardcover: 737 pages
  • Publisher: Thorndike Press (August 2002)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 078624416X
  • ISBN-13: 978-0786244164
  • Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.4 x 1.4 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.9 pounds
  • Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (45 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,703,683 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

 

Customer Reviews

45 Reviews
5 star:
 (28)
4 star:
 (6)
3 star:
 (6)
2 star:
 (2)
1 star:
 (3)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.2 out of 5 stars (45 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Diehl redeems himself, March 9, 2002
By 
John Daley (Attica, MI United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Eureka (Hardcover)
Wlliam Diehl redeems himself with Eureka. Every book he's written has been great, until his last one Reign In Hell. And lets just say it was terrible. With Eureka, he's back in top form. It's a mystery set in the early part of the twentieth century. A woman dies accidently in her bathtub. The hero, LA homicide cop, Zeke Bannon finds evidence that points to the woman being murdered. Bannon follows a trail of evidence back to a small town called Eureka. The town is run by Sheriff Brodie Culhane, a war hero, who is beginning a campaign for govenor.
The characters are very real and likeable. Even the bad guys
Nothing is as it appears in this great story, and you'll be racing to finish it and then sorry that you did.
If you've never read Diehl before this is an excellant book to start with. And if you were put off by his last book, don't worry about it he is back at the top of his game.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No


10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A FINELY ARTICULATED READING, March 6, 2002
This review is from: Eureka (Audio Cassette)
"Eureka," according to Webster's, signifies the discovery of something that brings joy or satisfaction. Thus, it is an appropriate title for the latest from William Diehl, a master of storytelling and suspense. Broadway, film and television actor Cotter Smith offers a finely articulated reading of this multi-generational tale.

When Zeke Bannon was sent to fight in World War II some unfinished business is left behind - the mysterious death of one Verna Wilensky who was electrocuted in her bathtub. Almost as puzzling as her demise is her hefty bank account, fattened by anonymous cashier's checks from a bank in San Pietro, a Southern California town once known as Eureka.

A few years and one Silver Star later Zeke is recuperating in an L.A. hospital when he is visited by his ex LAPD partner who has been investigating the Wilensky case. As Zeke digs into old files readers are transported to the Eureka of 1900, a hotbed of graft and prostitution. It is also a place where many secrets were buried.

Jump start to today and popular Sherif Thomas Culhane, who seems certain to become California's next governor until his bid for office is jeopardized by stunning revelations.

Diehl seamlessly weaves past and present to craft a story that keeps readers spellbound until the last.

- Gail Cooke

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No


6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Back to the future., January 5, 2003
By 
Larry Scantlebury (Ypsilanti, MI United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Eureka (Hardcover)
This is one of the top three books I read this year.

Whoops. It's January 5th. OK. If I had finished this book 6 days ago, I would have put it alongside of John LeCarre's "The Constant Gardner" and Lehane's "Mystic River." Forget any naysayers. "Eureka" is a eureka, a great mystery with wonderful conversations that smack of times gone by. An excellent novel.

Growing up on the East Coast, I remember old guys who had fought in WWI. One fellow lived into his late 80's with one lung gone, having given the first one up to mustard gas at Belleau Wood. So there's a 'reaching' aspect of Eureka that transcends a number of years. And we really don't feel it. Diehl is able to interrupt conversations in the past, flash forward, come back chapters later to finish them. Very tricky; very well done.

Diehl captures the chronology swiftly and smoothly. Sometimes he's writing of events a 100 years ago, sometimes 60, sometimes in between. "The bohunk got ironed out in a hit and run." The dialogue is crisp and seemingly accurate. Very timely. Great conversations.

Everyone who reads the reviews knows the plot by now. Honest cop, diamond in the rough, investigating the accidental electrocution of a widow in a 1940 bath tub, with only two things out of order: no will and "100 large in the bank."

A tough WWI veteran about to run for Governor, unanswered questions about the past igniting the future with a 40 year fuse. The quote from Gatsby, 'boats against the current,' is as prescient now as it was then.

Some romance that might be too much but everybody finds someone sometime.

The best dialogue is found in Elmore Leonard. Diehl gives him a run for his money in Eureka. Strongly recommended.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No

Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Most Recent Customer Reviews











Only search this product's reviews



Inside This Book (learn more)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
First Sentence:
If you're a cop, the best thing you can hope for is to have a partner like Ski Agassi. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
central homicide
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
San Pietro, Verna Hicks, Grand View, Wilma Thompson, Eddie Woods, Lila Parrish, Verna Wilensky, Buck Tallman, Los Angeles, Brodie Culhane, Sergeant Bannon, Eli Gorman, Arnie Riker, Ben Gorman, San Francisco, Brett Merrill, Big Redd, Charlie Lefton, Pacific Meadows, Zeke Bannon, Coast Guard, Delilah O'Dell, New York, Arnold Riker, Ocean Boulevard
New!
Concordance | Text Stats
Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Search Inside This Book:


What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?


Suggested Tags from Similar Products

 (What's this?)
Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product).
 

Your tags: Add your first tag
 

Customer Discussions

This product's forum
Discussion Replies Latest Post
No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
 


Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
Search all Amazon discussions
   
Related forums



So You'd Like to...


Create a guide


Look for Similar Items by Category


Look for Similar Items by Subject