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Short Squeeze: A Mystery [Hardcover]

Chris Knopf (Author)
4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)

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Book Description

January 19, 2010
The outside world thinks living in the Hamptons requires a Bentley, a face-lift, and a shingle-style home the size of Buckingham Palace. The truth is a lot more complicated than that. Dig a little deeper and you're as likely to find a saint--or a Mensa genius--as you are a deviant or certified nut job lurking right below the surface.
 
I know this because these are my beloved clients.
 
Meet Jackie Swaitowski, a smart-aleck attorney whose legal turf is supposed to be the buzzing Hamptons real-estate market. But when a new client turns up dead, things take a sudden and decidedly dangerous turn. In a client's pocket is an envelope that contains a shocking piece of evidence that suggests that the death was anything but an accident.
 
Jackie has bigger fish to fry--like her old flame Harry's surprise return to town--until a late-night car chase changes her priorities. Now she has every reason to believe that the next name on the killer's list is her own.
 
Chris Knopf has been praised for his quick-witted writing and broad knowledge of the highs and lows of Hamptons life, and his books have been included on best-of-the-year lists complied by The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, and others. Now, in Short Squeeze, he brings an irresistible new heroine to center stage.

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Short Squeeze: A Mystery + Bad Bird: A Mystery + Hard Stop (Sam Acquillo Hamptons Mystery)
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Lawyer Jackie Swaitkowski, Sam Acquillo's friend, turns a brief contact with client Sergey Pontecello into a personal crusade in Knopf's entertaining fifth mystery set in the Hamptons (after 2009's Hard Stop). Hapless Sergey, whose battered body turns up one night in a Sagaponack street shortly after he retains Jackie, was involved in an unequal battle with his sister-in-law, Eunice Wolsonowicz, over the house he and his wife, Elizabeth, shared until her death. Eunice and Elizabeth's family tree contains some pretty twisted limbs, and Jackie, who has limited respect for the speed of the law, presses her own investigation even after someone runs her off the road. Readers should be prepared for some shocks as body parts from an old hit-and-run victim occasionally pop up. While Knopf offers a vivid setting, sharp characterizations and devious plotting, Jackie's starring role doesn't entirely compensate for the bit part played by Sam, hitherto the series' lead character. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Guilt can be a powerful motivator. After lawyer Jackie Swaitkowski ignores a call from pesky client Sergey Pontecello, who is found dead hours later, she becomes obsessed with determining how the recently widowed man died. Eventually, her investigation turns up a tangled mess of strange financial transactions, dysfunctional family relationships, a fatal hit-and-run, mysterious body parts, and an extortion plot—not to mention that Jackie herself is threatened with disbarment by various bigwigs who prefer to leave the dirt under the carpet. She’s aided by her best friend, engineer turned carpenter Sam Acquillo, and her ex-boyfriend Harry Goodlander, but it’s Jackie, persistent to the point of bullheadedness, who sweeps up the dirt and puts the pieces together. This spin-off features the same vividly evoked Hamptons setting and the same crisp prose, brisk plotting, and sharp dialogue as Knopf’s critically acclaimed Sam Acquillo series, but here center stage switches from ex-boxer and construction worker Acquillo to a resolute first-person female protagonist who was widowed in her twenties but likes living alone just fine. More engaging hard-boiled crime fiction from a rising star. --Stephanie Zvirin

Product Details

  • Hardcover: 288 pages
  • Publisher: Minotaur Books; 1 edition (January 19, 2010)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0312551231
  • ISBN-13: 978-0312551230
  • Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 6.7 x 1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #729,436 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

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Average Customer Review
4.8 out of 5 stars (5 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars entertaining whodunit, January 22, 2010
This review is from: Short Squeeze: A Mystery (Hardcover)
In the Hamptons, widower Sergey Pontecello demands his sister-in-law Eunice Wolsonowicz and her retinue (daughter Wendy and adopted son Fuzzy) leave his home. Eunice refuses. Sergey turns to his lawyer Jackie Swaitkowski to evict the unwanted "guests".

Soon afterward, Sergey is found battered to death in Sagaponack. Southampton Town cop Joe Sullivan tells Jackie her client had her card and a nipple on him; the nipple belonged to the late scuba shop bookkeeper Edna Jackery whose body parts are everywhere except inside her coffin. Unable to remain patient while the cops investigate and feeling she owes Sergey as she blew away his concerns the night before his death, Jackie investigates only to find a family so blighted she concludes anyone of them could be the culprit.

Using a role reversal with Jackie starring and Sam Acquillo playing the second banana minor role as opposed to the lead (see Hard Stop and Head Wounds), Short Squeeze is an entertaining whodunit as the lawyer shows her moxie searching for the killer. Filled with body humor and a horde of miscreants whose family fell out of the tree onto their heads, the story line is fast-paced, but owned by Swaitkowski who proves she can star in a fun investigative mystery.

Harriet Klausner
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Sharp and Sassy, February 28, 2010
This review is from: Short Squeeze: A Mystery (Hardcover)
Chris Knopf starts off in a different direction with a new lead character - female Long Island attorney Jackie Swaitkowski. For those who may be mourning the absence of Sam, who is the lead in Knopf's earlier mysteries, fear not. He makes for a charming supporting character here, as Jackie's friend and ally. Jackie is a real pistol - funny, flawed and refreshingly original. She probably drinks and smokes pot a little too much more than is good for her, but a girl's gotta have some fun, right? The plot is a doozy - her new client is killed shortly after he hires her for what appears to be a fairly straightforward family estate issue. Of course it's anything but - and the Pandora's Box that Jackie opens is filled with nasty surprises. The client's various family members are all dysfunctional, deceitful and possibly very dangerous. As Jackie wrangles with getting to the bottom of this mess, she is aided by her former and possibly current boyfriend Harry, a unique character in his own right.

The author does an amazingly realistic job of getting inside his leading lady's head which is no small feat. Add to that a brisk and engaging plot, vivid Long Island setting, razor sharp dialogue and it looks like he's got another winner on his hands. I can only hope Jackie has many more adventures to come!
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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars "Short Squeeze" -- another winner from Chris Knopf, February 16, 2010
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I have bought and read every one of Chris Knopf's works and wish there were many, many more. He is on my small list of authors whose works I simply buy and read, rather than troubling with reviews and ratings. As I emailed Mr. Knopf after finishing his most recent book, "I love [his] work!"
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