Book Covers – The Russell Quant Mysteries
Amuse Bouche: A Russell Quant Mystery #1
2003 Arthur Ellis Award for Best First Novel Finalist 2003 ReLit Award shortlist 2nd Printing Mass Paperback (2005) 2004 CNIB version, narrated by John Lane 2010 Translation into Turkish: Ara Sicak (Sel Yayincilik) 2011 Release of New Edition (with Author’s foreward) ISBN: 978-1-55483-020-6 ISBN: 1-894663-91-8; ISBN 13: 978-1-894663-91-5 A gay wedding gone bad. A missing groom. An unsullied reputation at risk. Enter Russell Quant, cute, gay and a rookie private detective. With a nose for good wine and bad lies, Quant is off to France on his first big case. From the smudgy streets of Paris, he cajoles and sleuths his way to the pastel-coloured promenade of Sanary-sur-Mer. Back in Saskatoon, Quant comes face to face with a client who may be the bad guy, a quarry who turns up in the most unexpected place and a cast of colourful suspects: the vile sister, the best friend, the colleague, the ex-lover, the lawyer, the priest, the snoopy neighbour—are they involved? Or is someone else lurking in the shadows? As he works through his case, Quant juggles his detective gig with the responsibilities of a personal life brimful of captivating personalities.
Flight of Aquavit: A Russell Quant Mystery #2
2004 Lambda Literary Award for Best Men’s Mystery Winner 2004 Saskatchewan Book Award Finalist for Saskatoon Book of the Year 2nd Printing Mass Paperback (2006) 2007 CNIB version, narrated by Geoffrey Paterson 2011 Release of New Edition ISBN 13: 978-1-55483-030-5 ISBN: 1-897178-09-3; ISBN 13: 978-1-897178-09-6 At the dead end of desolate country road, a late night meeting suddenly becomes an ambush. Gay private detective Russell Quant is faced with personal threats he can’t ignore, a friend who may be a foe and a cagey client with a treacherous monkey on his back. As Quant trails a menacing blackmailer known only as Loverboy, he finds himself immersed in the midnight world of e-dating and parking lot romance. Lured to New York City, Quant tests his wit, wisdom and wiles from the Old World grandeur of Fifth Avenue to the kaleidoscope world of Broadway’s electric nightspots. The fast pace continues when Quant returns to Saskatoon where he grapples with decoys and deceit, realizing that no one is as they appear. Threat turns into deadly reality and the need to uncover the identity of Loverboy becomes increasingly desperate. Quant deftly maneuvers through the twists and turns of a perilous case and a personal life rife with its own mystique and mayhem.
Tapas on the Ramblas: A Russell Quant Mystery #3
2005 Saskatchewan Book Award Finalist for Fiction 2008 CNIB version, narrated by Al Redmond ISBN: 1-894663-97-7; ISBN 13: 978-1-894663-97-7 Charity Wiser, matriarch of the Wiser clan by virtue of her wealth and power, is an indomitable provocateur…and private detective Russell Quant’s newest employer. There is more than a single rotten apple on this family tree, and Quant has been hired to discover which one is intent on murdering his client. To help him sleuth out the evil culprit, Charity Wiser arranges a family reunion aboard the opulent Friends of Dorothy Cruiseliner as it tours the most exotic ports of the Mediterranean. But smooth sailing is short-lived as undercurrents of clashes—local and tourist, gay and straight, trendy and traditional—offer Russell insight into the Wisers and reveal a family simmering with rage and greed. He begins to wonder: Who doesn’t want Charity Wiser dead? Shifting from his Prairie stomping ground to a sea undulating with murder, Quant’s smarts, senses, and sea legs are challenged. In this captivating yet captive environment, family tensions mount and suspicions build. And Russell must balance his detective duties with safeguarding his client and protecting his own life. From the delight of tapas and sweet sangria in Spain to the bitter taste of death in Sicily, Quant connects and clashes with friends and foes in a series of unforgettable locales. Come aboard a sensual journey of sun and sea brine, caviar and champagne on a cruise replete with the luxury of murder.
Anthony Bidulka Stain of the Berry: A Russell Quant Mystery #4
2007 Saskatchewan Book Award Finalist for Readers Choice Award 2007 Lambda Literary Award Finalist for Best Men’s Mystery 2009 CNIB version, narrated by Michael Saperia ISBN: 1-897178-24-7; ISBN 13: 978-1-897178-24-9 Everyone has their Boogeyman. But who—or what—is scaring Saskatoon locals to death? Private detective Russell Quant is roused from his sleep only to fall into a nightmare case when the family of a suicide victim hires him to uncover the real cause of death. But what is real and what is imaginary? Quant works to narrow his list of suspects only to find the number of victims growing. Russell is mystified as a trail of fear connects him to a vast landscape of people including an elegant potash miner, dubious trailer park denizens, reticent farm folk, the Pink Gopher choir and a gaseous psychiatrist. Compounding Quant’s bewilderment is the complete and perfect disappearance of his once very real friend—Sereena—who has become a ghost he simply can’t find. With the Boogeyman always a few paces ahead, Russell struggles to keep the hounds of failure from baying. From Saskatchewan’s summer storms to the menacing Lotus Land of Vancouver, Quant finally touches down in the Canadian Arctic where tragic hope resides. Russell returns home to bully attacks, a desperate chase through midnight woods and a sadistic abduction. As Russell Quant penetrates the truth of the Boogeyman, he finds himself on a perilous suspension bridge between idyllic childhood and grown-up violence.
Sundowner Ubuntu: A Russell Quant Mystery #5
2008 Lambda Literary Award Finalist for Best Men’s Mystery 2009 CNIB version, narrated by Hank Lobbenberg ISBN 13: 978-1-897178-43-0 A mother’s pain. A million dollars. A missing son. Desperate to right old wrongs, a new client hires Russell Quant to locate her son, Matthew, lost to her for twenty years. But can money relieve remorse? Through good old-fashioned detective work, Russell peels away the layers of a carefully-concealed life, grown from seeds of traumatic childhood and violence. Tracking Matthew’s life from the schoolyard drug culture of a pleasant prairie city’s underbelly to the stunning vistas, vibrant townships and tinderbox safaris of Africa, Russell finds much more than what he was looking for. Ever adept at making both friends and foes, worlds collide as Quant runs a gauntlet of uncharted danger. Thrust into the unfamiliar role of bad guy, stymied by seemingly insurmountable distrust and base fear, Russell cuts a blistering swath through covert threats and overt bullets. But as he searches for his Canadian needle in an African haystack, the brutality escalates. Confronting his own role in the cause and effect of scars and anger, retribution and revenge, Russell Quant faces a difficult question: What happens when the prodigal son resists the return?
Aloha, Candy Hearts: A Russell Quant Mystery #6
2009 Saskatchewan Book Award Finalist for Book of the Year Award 2010 Arthur Ellis Award for Best Crime Novel Finalist 2011 American Library Association GLBT Round Table Over The Rainbow Top Mystery ISBN 13: 978-1-897178-76-8 From Pacific to Prairie, a teasing treasure hunt turns into a frightening game of cat and mouse. PI Russell Quant is plunged into the vagaries of a shocking hometown murder and the blasphemous blackmail of one of the literary world’s most esteemed writers. Russell can’t be sure whether a dead man’s surprising last gift is a treasure map or wild goose chase. With a series of clues that beckon Russell into the annals of suppressed Saskatoon history, he revisits the harsh realities of early homesteaders, investigates an infamous local sports heroine, escapes a second-run movie house, and digs for clues beneath the site of a never-forgotten scourge. As past reveals future, the hunter become the huntee. Attempting to keep pace with his latest mystery, Russell balances his professional life with the demands of a wedding, a memorial, and at least one home-cooked meal at Mom’s. With the Hawaiian sand barely shook free from his hair, Russell is confronted, professionally and personally, with the harsh consequences of indecision. Saying hello and good-bye is never easy.
Date With a Sheesha: A Russell Quant Mystery #7
2010 Rainbow Award for Best Gay Mystery/Thriller 2011 American Library Association GLBT Round Table Over The Rainbow Top Mystery McNally Robinson Saskatoon #1 Fiction Bestseller for 2010 ISBN 13: 978-1-897178-90-4 Neil Gupta travelled to the Middle East to buy carpets. Instead, in a dim corner of an exotic spice market, his lifeless body is found wrapped up in one. From the glitzy, flamboyant, mega-high rises of Dubai, to the frankincense fields of Oman and scorching sand dunes of Saudi Arabia, PI Russell Quant is on one heckuva magical carpet ride; one that skids to a deadly halt on the frozen surface of a Saskatchewan pond. Never one to shy away from a challenge, Russell prepares to face the killing heat, choking sand storms, and pungent, dead-black nights of Arabia. Attempting to find out why Neil Gupta was killed, Quant embarks upon a perilous journey that pits him against a deceitful Bedouin sheikh, shifty souk merchants, a snooty museum curator, quirky antique carpet enthusiasts, and an underground club for “fabulous men”. As Russell’s spicy foreign adventure heats up, he learns valuable lessons about love, life, and learning to seize the moment…before it all disappears like smoke from a genie’s lamp. On the verge of solving his sizzling mystery, Russell finds himself making the biggest personal decision of his life, and discovering that sometimes, bitter endings pave the way for new beginnings.
Dos Equis: A Russell Quant Mystery #8
2012 McNally Robinson Saskatchewan #1 Fiction Bestseller ISBN 13: 978-1-55483-067-1 After a year-long, self-imposed exile, ten whispered words on a cryptic telephone message change everything. Returning to his life as a prairie private eye, Russell Quant comes face to face with the greatest horror of his career. Finding the body wasn’t the worst of it. Realizing it belongs to someone he knows, thrusts Russell Quant into his most personal and dangerous case. Risking everything, including the lives of those he loves, Russell fights to right a wrong at the hands of a nameless, faceless killer. Up against a Machiavellian villain, Russell recruits his entire entourage of family and friends in an unforgettable caper that races from the frigid winterscapes of Saskatchewan to the pristine beaches of Mexico’s Costa Grande, in a tale of love, loss, lies, and coming home.