Liars Anonymous [Hardcover]

Louise Ure (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 14, 2009

“Hands On Emergency. This is Jessie. Is there an emergency in the vehicle?”

Roadside Assistance Operator, Jessie Dancing, knows what it’s like to take a life, and she’s trying to put that memory behind her. But when the call comes in from real estate tycoon Darren Markson, she thinks she hears him being killed while she’s on the phone with him. This can’t be, but she knows the world of violence and death is never far away. Jessie travels from Phoenix to her hometown of Tucson to let Markson’s wife hear that last communication from her husband. But according to Emily he’s very much alive...

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. At the start of this taut crime novel from Shamus Award–winner Ure (The Fault Tree), Jessie Dancing, an operator for a roadside emergency service in Phoenix, Ariz., receives a call from a driver in Tucson, Darren Markson, who sounds as if he's being murdered. Not content to merely contact the local police, Jessie tracks down Markson's family and is surprised when his wife tells her he's still alive. Back in her hometown of Tucson, Jessie's past returns to haunt her, including her acquittal three years earlier for a cold-blooded murder she may or may not have committed. When a young woman she meets near the site of Markson's phone call gets blown up in her car, Jessie is once again thrown into a world where the lines between guilty and not guilty blur. As Ure slowly peels back the layers of scar tissue to reveal Jessie's past crimes, the investigation of the woman's murder takes on even more depth as readers come to realize just how damaged the feisty heroine truly is. (Apr.)
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From Booklist

*Starred Review* Jessica Dancing Gammage got away with murder—as she admits in the opening sentence of Ure’s latest novel (following 2008’s The Fault Tree)—but she paid a price. Her new life three years after the event (revealed ever so gradually) involves a move, a dropped surname, estrangement from her adoptive family, a history that follows her, and a dreadful change to her own psyche (being found not guilty is not the same as being innocent). Working for a roadside assistance service, Jessie takes a disturbing call that indicates foul play, and she’s forced back to her old home ground, where her past is remembered and resented. To understand the call and absolve herself from blame in the situation, Jessie plays detective, uncovering a tangled plot as violence threatens and escalates around her, meanwhile turning up information about the truth of her past and ultimately proving herself a vigilante who puts justice first. A powerful, masterfully constructed, action-packed novel with fiercely moral underpinnings and a strong protagonist, this cements Ure’s position alongside such psychological-thriller masters as Ruth Rendell and Minette Walters. --Michele Leber

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Minotaur Books; First edition (April 14, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312375867
• ISBN-13: 978-0312375867
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,649,206 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I'm an Arizonan who lives in San Francisco. A child of the desert who can't stand the heat. A woman who built a career around thirty second TV commercials and then sat down to write an eighty thousand-word novel.

And that last one was done on a dare. I spent almost thirty years working in advertising agencies and marketing departments around the world -- from New York and San Francisco to Singapore and Sydney -- evaluating headlines and slogans for cruise ships, the Dancing California Raisins and Shake 'n Bake. Then, not long after 9/11, while reflecting on the "what ifs" in life with a friend, I took her dare to do the one thing I'd dreamt of doing for most of my life: write a book.

Of course it would be a mystery. The bookshelves at my house are organized geographically by where the murder took place.

That was the impetus for writing my first novel, FORCING AMARYLLIS, a 2005 release from Time Warner's Mysterious Press. It's the story of Calla Gentry, a jury consultant in Tucson, Arizona, who is defending a man on a murder charge when she realizes he could be the man who brutally attacked her sister seven years ago and left her for dead.

I've never regretted the change from advertising executive to author. No more commuting. No pantyhose. And there's that euphoria when the words on the page sing, or a character comes to life.

My motto for the daily challenge of writing is taken from Hemingway's "A Moveable Feast":

"All you have to do is write one true sentence.
Write the truest sentence you know."

That's what I try to do. Every day.

Please visit my web page at www.louiseure.com for updates, musings and information on new books.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, surprising and dark, April 19, 2009

By 

coupedejour "sylmarino" (Mill Valley, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Liars Anonymous (Hardcover)

I've been a Louise Ure fan from her first book Forcing Amaryllis and was equally as spellbound with The Fault Tree.

I bought Liars Anonymous for a cozy weekend read and I must say I couldn't put the book down. It was much, much darker than Ure's prior novels and left me chilled at times. It has twists and turns that you don't anticipate and like any great mystery writer, Ure had prepared you for the discovery with subtle and what appears to be effortless writing.

This is by far Ms. Ure's best book to date. The dialogue between characters is excellent and you can feel the Arizona and Mexico heat. The descriptive landscape carries us along as a character all onto its own without overshadowing the villians, victims and hero(s).

I was surprised by the darkness of the female protagonist, Jessie. In comparison to her first two novels, this shows Ure's expanding reach and depth as a writer.

Congratulations, Ms. Ure - it's a fantastic read.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Sue Grafton Lite, January 3, 2010

By 

Zoeeagleeye (Belfast, ME United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Liars Anonymous (Hardcover)

I'm writing this review, not for those who will obviously enjoy it, but for those who will not. This is a heads-up for those of you who want a little emotion in your novels, who want a little logic in your heroines, who want some intelligence in the plotting, and who want a likeable main character.

Jessie is a board. A board who pumps iron and gets tattooed with a nail. A board who is neither very smart nor intuitive and who has a decidedly nasty streak in her from long years of emotional abuse at the hands of her adoptive mother. Maybe I'm old fashioned, but normally that sort of description fits the heroine's best friend, a minor character or even the villain. It still comes down to the fact that in order to have a good read you have to care about the hero. In order to care about the hero, you have to like him or her.

The book is short on characterizations and allowing the plot to hang together, scene to scene. Normal timelines of action are skipped and there are holes in the reasoning you could drive a tank through. The heroine is a tough lady and that's fine, but she's also used as a punching bag by Author Louise Ure. Frankly, I've never understood the need for writers, especially female writers, to mess up their heroines. You know, let them get kicked, raped, knifed, punched, shot, bloodied 20 ways from Sunday. Perhaps some female writers think they won't be accepted unless their female protagonists are just as macho and hardened as their male counterparts (Elvis Cole comes to mind), but that ain't a bit true except for a few creeps out there. For most of us, we want our women protagonists tough, tender, safe, in danger, dangerous, but mostly unharmed, outsmarting the crook rather than filleting him with a serrated switchblade. So if you don't want to see your main female character go all tough guy/masochist/sadist, don't read this book.

Another heads up: Ure is not afraid to be nasty with her characters in ways that are sometimes too terrible to contemplate. She cannot be trusted to slide around the horror shows with a gesture or reference. She will put your face right into it. But, hey, if that's your crap of tea, go for it. Not mine.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars unique thriller, April 17, 2009

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Liars Anonymous (Hardcover)

In Phoenix, Arizona, HandsOn Emergency roadside emergency service operator Jessie Dancing receives a frantic call from developer Darren Markson, whose car was rear-ended in the Tucson area, but the background noise led her to believe someone is killing him. She calls the police, but breaks company regulations by also following up on her own time by visiting his wife Emily who insists he is alive and well to her shock.

Jessie lived in Tucson until three years ago when she was arrested for the murder of cruel Walter Racine, who had abused his niece, her friend Catherine Chandliss, and apparently targeted his grand niece Katie. Jessie was not convicted in court and moved away. However, when teenager Felicia Villalobos, whom she meets at the site of the Markson accident and is a witness to the incident, dies in a car explosion, PPD Detective Len Sabin and Tucson DA Ted Dresden salivate as they have a second chance at the Queen of Liars Anonymous who they feel got away with one homicide.

Jessie makes this a vigorous unique thriller as the police and the DA plan to throw the book at her, not so much for the current homicide, but because they strongly feel she got away with murder a few years ago. Though Jessie has issues and somewhat wilts under the pressure, she also gets stronger and feistier. As the violence surges, with a great final spin Louise Ure provides an excellent tale of a woman in trouble from both sides of the law.

Harriet Klausner