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Loading... The Bookman's Promise (Cliff Janeway Novels) (original 2004; edition 2005)by John Dunning (Author)
Work InformationThe Bookman's Promise by John Dunning (2004)
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. I really wanted to love this series. Alas, I do not. ( ) The discovery and purchase of an old Richard F Burton book triggers a series of stories that become nested mysteries. The first mystery is who was Charles Warren. Burton inscribed the book he gifted to Warren. That happened in 1860 pre US Civil war. The book is purchased by Cliff Janeway a former homicide cop who has become a book dealer and collector of rare books. He is contacted by an elderly woman who turns out to be the grand daughter of Charles Warren. We learn that Warren had a nearly complete collection of Burton’s books. They were swindled away from his daughter’s husband by a pair of shady book dealers from Baltimore. The elderly woman dies before Janeway can learn a lot more. Then he discovers she had been befriended by a younger woman when she was living in an elder care home. That woman had a series of tapes she had made of the elderly woman speaking under anesthesia. She reveals her grandfather’s story of traveling to Charleston and Fort Sumter before the war and suggests that advice given by Burton may have lead to the opening act of the Civil war. It turns out Burton kept a notebook and diary and Janeway goes first to Baltimore and then Charleston in search of that volume. The story of that search is one of the nested mysteries. Another mystery was triggered by the smothering of a woman who had befriended the elderly woman when she came to Denver to speak with Janeway. And their is the Pulitzer Prize winning friend of a Judge friend of Janeway who is somehow mixed up with Burton’s story and his books. In the end the mysteries are unraveled thanks to a few unexpected coincidences. There is a night spent camping at Fort Sumter that involves a confrontation with a thug from Baltimore and a romance between Janeway and a young woman protégée of the Judge’s. I did agree, but I was no expert. The man said, "So we have a mystery here as well as a valuable book " and it all began then. Its roots went back to another time, when Richard Francis Burton met his greatest admirer and then set off on a secret journey, deep into the troubled American South. Because of that trip a friend of mine died. An old woman found peace, a good man lost everything, and I rediscovered myself on my continuing journey across the timeless infinite world of books.
After an eight-year hiatus, author and antiques book collector John Dunning has returned Cliff Janeway --- the tough guy, Denver ex-cop turned bookstore owner and hero of two prior novels, BOOKED TO DIE and THE BOOKMAN'S WAKE --- to his fans. Janeway is plunged into a new mystery when Josephine Gallant, a frail and dying old woman, is brought to his shop. She had heard Janeway on a radio interview about a rare first edition he had acquired by 19th century explorer Richard Francis Burton. She contends that the book is rightfully hers and was part of a vast collection of her grandfather's. The collection mysteriously disappeared shortly after her grandfather's death, and she has always suspected that a crooked Baltimore bookstore dealer was responsible. None of the books had surfaced in almost 80 years, but she is certain Janeway's new acquisition was part of that collection. Belongs to SeriesCliff Janeway (3)
When Cliff Janeway investigates the provenance of a signed first edition of a memoir by nineteenth-century explorer Sir Richard Burton, he becomes embroiled in a mystery involving a lost library of rare Burton material. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.54Literature English (North America) American fiction 20th Century 1945-1999LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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