The Crime of Julian Wells

Book excerpt: A renowned true-crime writer’s suicide opens up a continent-crossing mystery in this Edgar Award–winning author’s “spellbinding thriller” (Publishers Weekly). When the body of true-crime writer Julian Wells is found in a boat drifting on a Montauk pond, the question is not how he died, but why? Philip Anders, Wells’s best friend and literary executor, vows to find out what drove the enigmatic author to take his own life. The first clue is a map of Argentina that Wells had been examining on the day he died. Years ago, he and Anders made a fateful trip to Buenos Aires, where they met their tour guide, Marisol. Her subsequent disappearance during Argentina’s Dirty War haunted the author. Had he discovered some new clue to her tragic fate? Was he planning to return to South America? And what, if anything, does Marisol’s disappearance have to do with the curious dedication in Wells’s first book: For Philip, sole witness to my crime? Anders soon finds himself on a journey into his friend’s haunted, secret life. Spanning four decades and traversing three continents, The Crime of Julian Wells is a tour-de-force from one of America’s most acclaimed suspense novelists. “Intelligent and elegant.” —The Wall Street Journal “[A] striking example of a suspense writer working at the top of his form, and an agreeable diversion for those who enjoy a bit of style with their substance . . . Cook’s characterizations are richly balanced and finely nuanced.” —Los Angeles Times