Readers' rating:
Published Nov 2014
200 pages
Genre: Mysteries
Publication Information
When Algy Temple, pool player, sleuth and Ivy League university lawyer, investigates the highly suspicious death of a retired university don, his contemporaneous involvement in a high stakes pool tournament in Providence becomes a tiresome, contentious obligation that must be endured. As he delves into the life of the deceased, he unexpectedly finds himself on a path that leads him to Rome, the vendetta-ridden Boot of Italy and into a haunted past of corruption and conspiracy with a linkage to the tournament, gambling, shylocks, and mobsters unexpected even in Providence where old world shadows hang heavy in the air. Add an abduction, a Ponzi, an outraged Italo-American community locked in a culture war with the University, a hustler's last gambit for recognition, and a fiancé focused on their wedding in two weeks, his investigation becomes a match of wits with a dead man, and a pool wager of life and death.
"Starred Review.Excellent... Partridge adroitly weaves together the different plot points of this witty and well-written whodunit." - Publishers Weekly
"Captures Providence's unique character where 'wheeling and dealing' is the form of government and the citizenry tolerate rogue politicians so long as 't'ings go right." - Robert Knightly, author of The Cold Room and Bodies in Winter, and editor of Queens Noir
"J.J. Partridge makes a claim to membership in an exclusive club of Providence linked writers, with H.P. Lovecraft and S.J.Perelman." - Mark Arsenault, author of Gravewriter, Spiked, and Speak Ill of the Living
This information about Scratched was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
An astute observer of academia politics and politicians, and pool, J.J. Partridge's novels illuminate academic sensibilities and campus foibles, political turf wars and ethnic tensions, civic sleaziness, gaming's relationship with Native Americans, and particularly the murky world of the sport of pool, both amateur and professional. Carom Shot and Straight Pool are the prior titles in the Algy Temple mysteries; Scratched continues the series. J.J. Patridge's distinguished career practicing law provides experience with Providence's high times and low lifes.
The House on Biscayne Bay
by Chanel Cleeton
As death stalks a gothic mansion in Miami, the lives of two women intertwine as the past and present collide.
The Flower Sisters
by Michelle Collins Anderson
From the new Fannie Flagg of the Ozarks, a richly-woven story of family, forgiveness, and reinvention.
The Funeral Cryer by Wenyan Lu
Debut novelist Wenyan Lu brings us this witty yet profound story about one woman's midlife reawakening in contemporary rural China.
Your guide toexceptional books
BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.
