Justin Peacock a Yale Law graduate sets his legal suspense novel, “Blind Man’s Alley,” in the thrilling  world of contemporary New York Real Estate, complete with Simon Roth head of a real-estate dynasty, underworld figures, and an alluring femme fatale. Join Justin and me as I question Justin and his  romain a clef for all the allusive Trumps and Dursts which I believe are buried in the story, and get to know Justin in the process.

Jonathan Lethem tells me he thinks Chronic City is his best and most complete work. This evaluation becomes interesting in light of the fact that we have a clash of critics in the Times. Michiko Kakutani in the daily New York Times reviewed the novel unkindly while Gregory Cowles on the cover of the New York Times Book Review called it a “bravura eighth novel.” Lethem, a MacArthur Award recipient, who has developed his reputation with “Motherless Brooklyn,” and “Fortress Of Solitude,” and been compared to a young Saul Bellow probably has little to fear from the critics, yet it is interesting to hear him discuss his current work and raison d’etre in his own words.

Colson Whitehead’s new novel SAG HARBOR is a departure for the MacArthur fellow and different from previous novels in that it is to a large degree an autobiographical coming of age story set in the tony black Hamptons. Whitehead who is a gifted writer feels comfortable in this new memoirish style and presents a perfect-to-read story for the beach this summer. Featured on the cover of The New York Times Book Review.

  David Grann, a staff writer at the New Yorker, was so obsessed about what happened to the great British explorer Percy Fawcett when he disappeared in the Amazon jungles in 1925 that he put his life on the line and followed Fawcett’s path to find out.  “The Lost City of Z,” is Grann’s blockbuster adventure narrative about what lies beneath the impenetrable jungle canopy of the Amazon and what really did happen to Fawcett.  If this and the fact that the book is a best seller aren’t enough to make you listen to my interview with David maybe the knowledge that Brad Pitt is making a movie of “The Lost City of Z” will.

Rare books, dead women, and fabulously rich benefactors of the Library can all be found in Linda Fairstein’s new suspense novel, “Lethal Legacy,” which takes place on Manhattan’s upper East Side. Given that Linda and I both live there and love books we found a lot to chat about.

The opening of The Gargoyle may be one of the most horrifying passages in all literature. If you can get through it, you may be surprised at the beauty and range of Davidson’s writing.

Chistopher Reich has written a novel that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Imagine a butterfly that is really an electronic eavesdropper and flies into the window of high level foreign agents and listens. The book is Rules of Deception.

One of America’s great legal experts on crimes of sexual assault and domestic violence. Linda talks about her latest book Killer Heat.