cover image Crow’s Landing

Crow’s Landing

Brad Smith. Scribner, $12 trade paper (320p) ISBN 978-1-4516-7853-6

In Smith’s outstanding sequel to Red Means Run, upstate New York farmer Virgil Cain lands a heavy metal cylinder while fishing in the Hudson. He secures the cylinder in his boat, which he puts on his trailer, then has lunch at the local roadhouse. After lunch, Virgil finds a stranger hitching the boat trailer to an SUV. When Virgil protests, the man flashes a gold detective badge and identifies himself as “Albany police.” When Virgil further protests, the man sticks a gun in his face and drives off in the SUV with the boat in tow. While Virgil wants nothing more than to get his boat back, others have more interest in the possibly cocaine-filled cylinder, including a Russian drug dealer and the guy who jettisoned the cylinder in the river as the police closed in. Quirky, believable characters headed by laconic, strong-willed Virgil engage in a battle of wits, violence, and foolery that rivals Elmore Leonard at his best. Agent: Victoria Skurnick, Levine Greenberg Literary Agency. (Aug.)