Long Time No See [Print] [Mass Market Paperback]

Susan Isaacs (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 2, 2002

It's been twenty years, and Judith's life has definitely changed. Now a history professor and a widow, she hasn't seen Nelson Sharpe of the Nassau County Police Department in all that time. But she still can't get her one-time lover out of her head. Her life takes an unexpected turn, however, when former investment banker turned suburban mommy extraordinaire Courtney Logan vanishes from Long Island into thin air.

Everyone suspects husband, Greg, the darkly handsome son of flashy Long Island mobster Fancy Phil Lowenstein. Ever the good neighbor, Judith offers her services to Greg, but he shows her the door, thinking she's just a nut. His father, however, isn't so sure -- he just may have other plans for the wily Judith...

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In Susan Isaac's Long Time No See, Courtney Logan, former investment analyst, devoted mother, and Long Island housewife, leaves her home on Halloween night for a quick trip to the grocery store. Five months later, her badly decomposed body is found floating in the backyard pool, concealed by the pool cover.

Enter Judith Singer, who helped find a murderer in Isaac's 1978 bestseller, Compromising Positions. Something about the Logan case doesn't make sense to Judith, and she becomes so engrossed in the mystery that she actually knocks on the grieving husband's door and offers to help exonerate him. Long Time No See draws on the best of the light, character-driven mysteries, like those by Janet Evanovich and Mary Daheim. Isaac's first- person heroine is impulsive enough to get herself into trouble, yet thoughtful enough to invite confidences. And her voice is appealingly funny and honest. "Since becoming a widow," she reflects, when faced with a twist in her investigation,

I'd tried hard not to indulge in the lonely person's Happy Hour: talking to oneself. About a year earlier, in the drugstore, I found myself befuddled, dithering between a condom rack and a display of batteries, and was startled when I heard my own loud voice demanding: 'Why am I here?' But now I gave in and had a chat with me.

Although clever and well-written, the novel's real strength lies in its characterization and in Isaac's leisurely unfolding of the implausible dark side of the perky blonde murder victim. This is a welcome outing from a deservedly popular writer. --Regina Marler --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

The 20 years between Isaac's bestselling Compromising Positions and this second book to feature amateur sleuth Judith Singer have not affected the author's talent for snappy dialogue and astringent assessments of cant and pretension. In those two decades, Judith has raised two children, lost her husband, achieved a doctorate in history and is teaching (without much satisfaction) at a local college. When her Long Island neighbor, ex-investment banker and perfect mom Courtney Logan, goes missing, Judith become curious; and when Courtney turns up dead, and the husband is accused, she becomes downright obsessed. Greg Logan, it turns out, is the son of notorious gangster Fancy Phil Lowenstein, who arrives on Judith's doorstep with an offer to hire her to help his son. Naturally, her former lover, Lt. Nelson Sharp of the Nassau County Police Department, admonishes Judith to mind her own business, but she pursues her hunch that brilliant and beautiful Courtney seemed to be missing a certain "something" that no one could put a finger on. Judith suspects the key to the crime lies in the victim's character. How right she is! However, the real trouble with Courtney is that she's not very interesting, even at her worst, and Judith's investigation, despite several clever twists, goes on too long, as does the murderer's bizarre confession. But an upbeat ending will satisfy readers, and it suggests that it won't be 20 years before we encounter Judith Singer again. Agent, Owen Laster. (Sept.)Forecast: The major book clubs see big sales for this title: it's a main selection for BOMC and Mystery Guild, and an alternate for Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club. A 10-city author tour and Isaac's witty ripostes on talk shows should whip up interest.

Copyright 2001 Cahners 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: 482 pages
• Publisher: HarperTorch; First HarperTorch Paperback Printing July 2002 edition (July 2, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061030430
• ISBN-13: 978-0061030437
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 4.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (43 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #167,246 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

First, here's what the critics say::

AFiction done well and done with a difference...A sophisticated storyteller, with a wry view of the world.@ - Washington Post


AJane Austen brought up to date...Highly amusing.@ - Atlantic Monthly


ASusan Isaacs is a witty, wry observer of the contemporary scene.@ - New York Times Book Review

ASardonic humor and dead-on commentary.@ - Houston Chronicle


ASusan Isaacs knows the art of dialogue the way J.S. Bach knew the art of the fugue.@ - Seattle Times


Blockbuster writers tend to be no more than terrific storytellers. Susan Isaacs=s talents go far beyond that. She is a witty, insightful, and elegant writer.@ - Mademoiselle

AI can think of no other novelist--popular or highbrow--who consistently celebrates female gutsiness, brains and sexuality. She=s Jane Austen with a schmear.@ Maureen Corrigan- National Public Radio Fresh Air


AWho....., is our best popular novelist? The nominee for this quarter is Susan Isaacs....[She] is a comic realist, an astute chronicler of contemporary life in the tradition of....Anthony Trollope.@ - Sun Sentinel



Susan's biography

Susan Isaacs, novelist, essayist and screenwriter, was born in Brooklyn and educated at Queens College. She worked as an editorial assistant at Seventeen magazine writing everything from book reviews to advice to the lovelorn. In 1968, Susan married Elkan Abramowitz, then a federal prosecutor. She became a senior editor but left Seventeen in 1970 to stay home with her newborn son, Andrew. Three years later, she gave birth to Elizabeth. During this time she freelanced, writing political speeches as well as magazine articles.

In the mid-seventies, Susan got the urge to write a novel. A year later she began Compromising Positions, a whodunit set on suburban Long Island. It was published in. Her second novel, Close Relations, a love story set against a background of ethnic, sexual and New York Democratic politics (thus a comedy), was published in. Her third, Almost Paradise, was published in 1984. All of Susan's novels have been New York Times bestsellers. Her fiction has been translated into thirty languages.

In 1985, she wrote the screenplay for Paramount's Compromising Positions, which starred Susan Sarandon and Raul Julia. She also wrote and co-produced Disney's Hello Again. The 1987 comedy starred Shelley Long and Gabriel Byrne.

Her fourth novel, Shining Through, set during World War II, was published in 1988. The film adaptation starred Michael Douglas and Melanie Griffith. Then came Magic Hour January 1991, After All These Years in 1993. Lily White in 1996 and Red, White and Blue in 1998. In 1999, Susan came out with her first work of nonfiction, Brave Dames and Wimpettes: What Women Are Really Doing on Page and Screen. During 2000, she wrote a series of columns on the presidential campaign for Newsday. Long Time No See, a sequel to Compromising Positions, came out in September 2001. Anyplace I Hang My Hat, was published in 2004. Past Perfect is her eleventh novel.

Susan Isaacs is a recipient of the Writers for Writers Award and the John Steinbeck Award. She serves as chairman of the board of Poets & Writers and is a past president of Mystery Writers of America. She is also a member of the National Book Critics Circle, The Creative Coalition, PEN, the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the International Association of Crime Writers, and the Adams Round Table. Besides writing innumerable book reviews, Susan has also written about politics, film and First Amendment issues. She lives on Long Island with her husband.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ms. Isaacs continues the story, twenty years later, September 11, 2001

By 

Moe811 (New York USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Long Time No See: A Novel (Hardcover)

Judith Singer, housewife/detective is now twenty years older. Her husband, the egocentric Bob has been dead for two years, a half day after running the NY marathon in just over 4 hrs. She is teaching history at a small catholic college and seems depressed bored and lonely. Then, just like twenty years ago, a headline catches her eye. A woman in her community of Shorehaven has disappeared without a trace. She finds it interesting, but does nothing until a body is found in the woman's swimming pool months later. Presumably, the body is that of Courtney Logan. Judith rather impulsively offers her services as a researcher to the grieving husband, and is rebuffed at the door. Shortly thereafter, his father, organized crime figure, Fancy Phil Lowenstein, shows up in her garage and asks for her help in solving the crime. This brings Nelson Sharpe, now in Special Investigations, back into her life and her investigation.

All of the old characters from Compromising Positions are back, twenty years older. I was interested to find out how they all changed. The mystery in this book was much better than the last, and that one was very good. It was an excellent Long Island suburban mystery.

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Great for an Isaacs Devotee.... BUT., October 17, 2001

By 

D. Rizzo (United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Long Time No See: A Novel (Hardcover)

First, let me say that After All These Years and Shining Through, two books by this author, are two of my favorite books in life... very high praise from an English teacher and natural lifelong voracious reader.

While this sequel to Compromising Positions does somewhat satiate my desire for witty and vibrant Isaacs writing, it leaves me wistful. With this book, Isaccs does her ribald, creative, liberal thing... but like heroine Judith Singer, she's now somewhat predictably paced, a little too readily familiar, and -- dare I say it? -- just a touch YAWN.

Is this author running out of ideas? Must she resort to the vague glimmers of already-told anecdotes and slightly faded allusions? I could almost say Judith's lines with her in this reprise of Compromising Positions... and I figured out the who-done-it well before the end (read After All These Years if you want an amazingly witty murder mystery by this woman... it's a much better illustration of what she can do!).

Don't get me wrong, the mystery itself is terrific, with a powerful punch at the end, when the evil villain emerges. So why does it fail to totally satisfy? I wish the author had saved this idea for a stimulating NEW heroine... someone not quite so liberal, not quite so Semitic, not quite so like all her other heroines. Someone like... Cass, in After All These Years. She's highly intelligent, she's well educated, she's affluent, she's conservative, she's black, she's DIFFERENT.

Oh, and with Nelson, the heroine's adulterous partner in days gone by, expect little of their initial forbidden lustful thrill... Nelson is older, too. It's nice that these two post-menopausal, pre-Medicare folks gained their long-awaited closure, but then I doubt that Judith would either need or much benefit from a twice married, thrice fathered cop-boyfriend, despite Isaacs's efforts to establish Judith's loneliness as a widow and emptiness with "only" her Ph.D. and two grown, successful children.

Most people would have it so good.

Anyway, it's a good -- if not totally fulfilling -- read if you're a devoted Isaacs fan... if you're not yet, don't let this book try to turn you on to her. But read After All These Years. Read Shining Through. Don't watch the movie! Seriously! You'll LOVE them.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Staccato badinage en masse turned me off..., July 2, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Long Time No See (Mass Market Paperback)

Overwritten, the story gets lost in the irritating machine gun
jokey-ness that passes as "wit." Don't they edit these
so-called "best-selling" writers? I really wanted to get into
a juicy story...stuck it out for a few chapters...but was utterly defeated by the neverending "shtick." Sometimes it works.
Here it does not. The author is carried away with her
"style," which is, basically, just a smartass stand-up
routine which, unfortunately, does not stand up. Yawn.