Status
Available
Call number
Series
Genres
Publication
London : Gollancz, 1984.
Description
Fiction. Mystery. Thriller. HTML:�V.I. Warshawski is one of the best . . . smart, tough, sexy.��Daily News (New York) �Sara Paretsky makes excellent use of local backgrounds in a carefully plotted tale of murder and great misdeeds in the world of Great Lakes cargo shipping.��Chicago Tribune When Chicago Black Hawks hockey legend Boom Boom Warshawski slips off a wharf and drowns in Lake Michigan, his private-eye cousin questions the accidental death report and rumors of suicide. Armed with a bottle of Black Label and a Smith & Weson, V.I. follows a trail of violence and corruption to the center of the Windy City's powerful shipping industry. Dodging elaborate attempts on her life with characteristic grit and humor, the one-of-a-kind detective wends her way through a maze of grain elevators and thousand-ton freighters, ruthless businessmen and gorgeous ballerinas, to ferret out Boom Boom's killers before they phase her out of the picture�permanently. �Hard-boiled detective fiction . . . a swift-paced and engrossing read.��The Philadelphia Inquirer �Slithers with suspense!��Chicago Sun-Times.… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member CommonReeda
One on of my favourite Vic Warshawski books. because the setting , involving giant grain ships going across the Great lakes, is so vivid. Vic is investigating the death in a whatf of her cousin Boom Boom. As usual she gets into big trouble but gets herself out of .
LibraryThing member riverwillow
I love the VI Warshawski novels and this one is no exception. VI's cousin Boom Boom has been found dead floating in the Chicago docks, VI believes he was murdered and sets out to find out why and how. This book was originally written in the 1980s and has dated a little, but VI is an engagingly
Show More
driven character and the narrative skips along. Show Less
LibraryThing member Darrol
Good stuff about shipping industry. Otherwise rather dead story. Could not really care much. The explosion in the lock was a cool touch.
LibraryThing member edwardsgt
An enjoyable story revolving around shipping in the Great Lakes and rivalries between ship operators and the death of Warshawski's cousin Boom Boom, an ex-hockey pro, working in the shipping industry who falls off a dock and is killed. As usual "Vic" relentlessly pursues the truth behind Boom
Show More
Boom's death, not much caring who gets in the way. Show Less
LibraryThing member leslie.98
I love the main character, V.I. Warshawski -- a strong, humorous female private detective. More gritty than Kinsey Milhone but less vulgar than Stephanie Plum.
LibraryThing member JohnFair
Written 30 years ago, this is a look back into past that even those who lived through it would find almost impossible to recall. The story itself, though, is rather fun as Vic deploys all her considrable charms in pursuit of the murderer of her cousin and we get a look into the economy of the
Show More
shipping magnates of the Great Lakes region of North America. Show Less
LibraryThing member enemyanniemae
This is my first Sara Paretsky but definitely not my last. Everything I look for in a mystery was here: solid characters, an interesting plot and good writing. I know nothing about the shipping industry or about the Great Lakes. I enjoyed delving into something new.
Recommended.
Recommended.
LibraryThing member porch_reader
I was a little under-the-weather this weekend, so I was glad to be distracted by this second book in the V. I. Warshawski series. I started this series when Sara Paretsky came to the Iowa City Book Festival. I read the first book before she came and enjoyed it. But after hearing her talk about
This is another fast paced mystery, but this time, V. I. is personally involved with the death. Her cousin, former hockey star Boom Boom Warshawski, slips off a deck at Chicago's lakefront and dies. But V. I. senses that his death is not an accident. Boom Boom has been working in the shipping industry, and V. I. must learn the ins and outs of the big ships that transport cargo across the Great Lakes. As more deaths occur, the urgency builds, and I couldn't turn the pages fast enough. This is a strong and enjoyable series!
Show More
creating the character of V. I. Warshawski and the growth of this character over the course of the series, I was excited to read more. This is another fast paced mystery, but this time, V. I. is personally involved with the death. Her cousin, former hockey star Boom Boom Warshawski, slips off a deck at Chicago's lakefront and dies. But V. I. senses that his death is not an accident. Boom Boom has been working in the shipping industry, and V. I. must learn the ins and outs of the big ships that transport cargo across the Great Lakes. As more deaths occur, the urgency builds, and I couldn't turn the pages fast enough. This is a strong and enjoyable series!
Show Less
LibraryThing member DabOfDarkness
Note: Even though this is Book 2 in the series, it works just fine as a stand alone novel.
Set in the 1990s in Chicago, Vick Warshawski is a private detective. The story opens with a funeral for her cousin Boom-Boom Warshawski, an ex-hockey player. He was working for a Great Lakes shipping company
I like that Vick likes sports and pays attention to the local games and teams. I don’t care for sports at all, but I like having a main female character that does have a passing interest in professional sports. Vick has a practical kind of toughness that I find irresistible. She’s not tough because she’ll argue back or because she insists on doing things on her own terms. She’s simply a strong personality and would be no matter what gender she was born into. Her practical nature (letting trusted friends know where she’s off too – sometimes, carrying a weapon that she’s proficient in, wearing sensible clothing and shoes, etc.) is what keeps the character grounded for me.
The main subject of this book, the Great Lakes shipping industry, involves the great locks of the lakes. I find locks fascinating and I was pretty excited to see Vick traveling through a major lock or two in this novel. Vick spends a chunk of the book trying to understand the shipping manifests for the company Boom-Boom was working for. As such, she enlists someone in the business to explain the finer details. Here is where my one little quibble with the story lies. In Book 1, Indemnity Only, Vick becomes romantically involved with a man who works at the insurance company that Vick is kinda sorta looking into. Now, here, in this book she becomes romantically interested in a man who is hired by the shipping company she’s looking into. I felt this plot mechanism was a little overused in the series.
Now, back to the good stuff. Paige is a beautiful dancer that was having a secret romance with Boom-Boom. Vick meets her at Boom-Boom’s funeral and Paige asks a small favor – she would like access to Boom-Boom’s apartment so that she could collect her things. While they hadn’t reached the point of exchanging keys yet, she did have a few bits of clothing and makeup at his place. The plot deepens when Vick finds her there going through Boom-Boom’s papers. Paige fesses up to looking for some personal letters the two exchanged while she was on tour. I, like Vick, think she’s hiding something. I really wasn’t sure what until the last bit of the book. Vick figured it out before I did.
Finally, there’s this major accident in the book that I totally didn’t see coming. It slid right in there under my radar and it was well written. Vick got to experience it all first hand and I was worried she would be injured enough for a hospital! I was a little surprised at the body count for this book, but that just keeps me on my toes. I do enjoy a mystery series that can keep me guessing and surprised.
Narration: Once again, Susan Ericksen makes a really good VI Warshawski. She does the Chicago accent quite well. Her male voices are believable. With Book 1, I noted that sometimes I had to turn down the volume during the shouting scenes. That was not an issue with this book. The characters sounded like they were shouting but I didn’t have to adjust my volume control.
Set in the 1990s in Chicago, Vick Warshawski is a private detective. The story opens with a funeral for her cousin Boom-Boom Warshawski, an ex-hockey player. He was working for a Great Lakes shipping company
Show More
and apparently slipped on an icy pier and died in the water. Vick is Boom-Boom’s executor of his will; dealing with his estate and papers leads her to wonder if his death was an accident after all. As she digs into Boom-Boom’s death, her own life is threatened.I like that Vick likes sports and pays attention to the local games and teams. I don’t care for sports at all, but I like having a main female character that does have a passing interest in professional sports. Vick has a practical kind of toughness that I find irresistible. She’s not tough because she’ll argue back or because she insists on doing things on her own terms. She’s simply a strong personality and would be no matter what gender she was born into. Her practical nature (letting trusted friends know where she’s off too – sometimes, carrying a weapon that she’s proficient in, wearing sensible clothing and shoes, etc.) is what keeps the character grounded for me.
The main subject of this book, the Great Lakes shipping industry, involves the great locks of the lakes. I find locks fascinating and I was pretty excited to see Vick traveling through a major lock or two in this novel. Vick spends a chunk of the book trying to understand the shipping manifests for the company Boom-Boom was working for. As such, she enlists someone in the business to explain the finer details. Here is where my one little quibble with the story lies. In Book 1, Indemnity Only, Vick becomes romantically involved with a man who works at the insurance company that Vick is kinda sorta looking into. Now, here, in this book she becomes romantically interested in a man who is hired by the shipping company she’s looking into. I felt this plot mechanism was a little overused in the series.
Now, back to the good stuff. Paige is a beautiful dancer that was having a secret romance with Boom-Boom. Vick meets her at Boom-Boom’s funeral and Paige asks a small favor – she would like access to Boom-Boom’s apartment so that she could collect her things. While they hadn’t reached the point of exchanging keys yet, she did have a few bits of clothing and makeup at his place. The plot deepens when Vick finds her there going through Boom-Boom’s papers. Paige fesses up to looking for some personal letters the two exchanged while she was on tour. I, like Vick, think she’s hiding something. I really wasn’t sure what until the last bit of the book. Vick figured it out before I did.
Finally, there’s this major accident in the book that I totally didn’t see coming. It slid right in there under my radar and it was well written. Vick got to experience it all first hand and I was worried she would be injured enough for a hospital! I was a little surprised at the body count for this book, but that just keeps me on my toes. I do enjoy a mystery series that can keep me guessing and surprised.
Narration: Once again, Susan Ericksen makes a really good VI Warshawski. She does the Chicago accent quite well. Her male voices are believable. With Book 1, I noted that sometimes I had to turn down the volume during the shouting scenes. That was not an issue with this book. The characters sounded like they were shouting but I didn’t have to adjust my volume control.
Show Less
LibraryThing member JenniferRobb
I'd first heard of this author and character many years ago when my mom gave me a list she'd gotten at the local library. I think I may have tried reading a different novel in the series long ago and wasn't overly impressed then, but I'm not sure which title it would have been. This book was on the
The prose felt a bit distant, but perhaps that reflects the time in which it was written. Styles do change over time. You will find out more than you really wanted to know about the shipping industry.
I liked the main character for the most part. I liked her dedication to her cousin and her competence at her job. I didn't like her frequency of drinking, her tendency to keep her discoveries to herself rather than telling the authorities (though given how she was treated the one time she was going to tell the authorities something, I can kind of understand it), and though nothing graphic was in the novel, there is the reference to her sleeping with two men, neither of whom is her husband.
Show More
YMCA book exchange shelves and since I recognized the author, I thought I'd give it another try. I didn't know that this was book 2 in the series until now, though I did suspect it was an early one in the series while reading it.The prose felt a bit distant, but perhaps that reflects the time in which it was written. Styles do change over time. You will find out more than you really wanted to know about the shipping industry.
I liked the main character for the most part. I liked her dedication to her cousin and her competence at her job. I didn't like her frequency of drinking, her tendency to keep her discoveries to herself rather than telling the authorities (though given how she was treated the one time she was going to tell the authorities something, I can kind of understand it), and though nothing graphic was in the novel, there is the reference to her sleeping with two men, neither of whom is her husband.
Show Less
Subjects
Awards
Friends of American Writers Award (Second First — Adult Literature — 1985)
Language
Original publication date
1984
Physical description
252 p.; 21 cm
ISBN
0575034106 / 9780575034105