Miranda Corbie returns in this stunning prequel story to Kelli Stanley's acclaimed historical series. San Francisco, 1939. The Golden Gate International Exposition has captured the imagination of the country. The fair is a spectacular blend of mankind's newest innovations and basest urges, and Miranda Corbie is smack in the middle of it, working security at Sally Rand's. A former Spanish Civil War nurse and escort and now a private investigator, she has seen more than her share of the glitter and the grit, not to mention the people looking to make a quick buck off of them. Virginia MacAvoy's grandmother seems to be one of the unfortunate innocents. Mrs. MacAvoy came to the fair to give her granddaughters the inheritance that she had been saving for them, but it was stolen. It consisted of $500, four gold coins, and a memory book—a scrapbook where she has been saving family memories. While Virginia is convinced that Miranda will be able to track them down, her grandmother isn't and only hires Miranda to convince her granddaughters of how there is nothing to be done. Mrs. MacAvoy makes a good point, but Miranda can't understand why she's so quick to give up, and it isn't long before she's looking for more than a stolen bag but for answers as well. With Memory Book, Kelli Stanley takes readers to a time and place where the sordid and the sublime come together, making for a stunning prequel story to her to acclaimed historical series.
Author
An award-winning author of crime fiction, Kelli Stanley's first novel in the Miranda Corbie series, CITY OF DRAGONS, was met with overwhelming critical acclaim. It won the Macavity Award (Sue Feder Historical Mystery Award) and was a finalist for the prestigious Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the Shamus Award. CITY OF SECRETS, her second novel in the series, won the Golden Nugget Award for best mystery set in California. CITY OF GHOSTS—the long-awaited third Miranda Corbie book—will be published August 5th, 2014. Stanley also writes a highly-praised series set in Roman Britain, the latest of which is THE CURSE-MAKER. Her debut novel, NOX DORMIENDA, won the Bruce Alexander Award for best historical mystery of 2008. She makes her home in Dashiell Hammett's San Francisco, earned a Master's Degree in Classics, and loves jazz, old movies, fedoras, Art Deco and speakeasies. For more information about Kelli's books, please visit her website at http://www.kellistanley.com About CITY OF GHOSTS: June, 1940. Art. Spies. Murder. For Miranda Corbie, private investigator and erstwhile escort, there are debts to be paid and memories-long-suppressed and willfully forgotten-to be resurrected. Enter the U.S. State Department and the man who helped her get her license. A man she owes. And playing along may get her a ticket to Blitz-bombed England, if she survives ... Through sordid back alleys and art gallery halls, from drag dress nightclubs to a Nazi costume ball, Miranda's journey into fear takes her on the famed City of San Francisco streamliner and a ticket to Reno, Nevada, the Biggest Little City in the World ... where she finds herself framed for a murder she never anticipated. Miranda must learn the difference between reality and illusion, from despair to deceit and factual to fake, as she tries to get her life back ... and navigates a CITY OF GHOSTS. Miranda's back. And noir will never be the same.
