The Way of All Fish

Martha Grimes "goes entertainingly wonky with this sequel to her best-selling foul matter...delivering insider-publishing stuff with acidulous wit". (Library Journal)

In Grimes's new sendup of a world she knows very well, Candy and Karl, hit men with a difference - they have scruples - once again venture into the murky Manhattan publishing scene. This time they come to the aid of a writer who is being sued by her unscrupulous literary agent, L. Bass Hess, a man determined to get a 15 percent commission for a book he didn't sell.

The contract killers join forces with publishing mogul Bobby Mackenzie and mega-best-selling writer Paul Giverney to rid the mean streets of Hess, not by shooting him, but by driving him crazy. They are helped by other characters from Foul Matter and a crew of new colorful personalities, including an out-of-work Vegas magician, an alligator wrangler, a glamorous Malaysian con lady, and Hess' aunt in Everglades City, who has undergone a wildly successful sex change.

This wickedly funny sequel to Grimes's best-selling novel Foul Matter is another character-driven "satire of the venal, not to say murderous, practices of the New York publishing industry" (The New York Times Book Review).