Tribeca Blues

This is ellen in atlanta, and Jim Fusilli's newest Terry Orr book has arrived and the story and character lines are getting more potent and heady -- survivors - like the folks after 9/11 in the TriBeCa area - Orr has been striking out to find the man who he thinks purposely killed his infant son and wife - the last 5 years of his life has been stagnant - and he needs answers and needs to move on with his life, writing career, or pi career, and the lady friend in his life, and the light of his life, his daughter, Bella - he receives answers he did not expect, yet shows how big his heart is and helps closure-Time for Terry to shine in the next novels!Bravo Fusilli!!!

In this third installment in Fusilli's Terry Orr series, Fusilli explores Orr's quest for vengeance for his wife's death five years earlier. As a P.I., Orr is still hunting the mentally ill Ray Weisz whom he believes pushed his infant son's stroller onto the path of a New York subway train causing his wife Marina to follow, plunging both to their deaths. But his quest his put on a temporary hold when friend Leo dies, and Terry and his teenaged daughter Bella travel to The Big Easy for Leo's funeral. Taut and complex, Fusilli's tale is full of unexpected curves, especially when Orr discovers from an eyewitness to his wife's death, that she was kissing an unknown man, and Weisz possibly tried to stop the stroller's ominous descent onto the subway tracks. Not only does this unexpected disclosure stun Terry, it alters his quest for vengeance and allows him to open up to patient girlfriend Julie. At the request of his deceased friend Leo, Orr tries to locate Leo's long absent wife Loretta, whom Leo believes caused financial disaster in their New York restaurant business, forcing Leo to buy the pathetic bar he owned until his death. But Loretta somehow ties into the circumstances surrounding Marina's death, and Orr isn't sure anymore who was responsible for Leo's financial demise. Fusilli has penned a novel that constantly hovers in the gray, where there is no black or white, no right or wrong, and many of the characters are constantly crossing the line, especially Terry, as he attempts to seek closure in the death of his wife. The tightly written plot line will leave even readers unfamiliar with his series eagerly seeking a sequel.

First of all, if you have not read Jim Fusilli's CLOSING TIME and A WELL-KEPT SECRET, please stop reading this right now, obtain those books, read them, and come back. I'll be happy to wait.Thank you. TRIBECA BLUES is the third of Fusilli's novels to feature Terry Orr. Orr is by turns a novelist, an erstwhile pro bono private investigator and occasionally hapless father --- a man quietly but severely damaged by the death of his wife and infant son. You can probably experience TRIBECA BLUES without reading CLOSING TIME and A WELL-KEPT SECRET, but sledding through TRIBECA BLUES is a bit easier if you read its predecessors first. You also will be able to fully appreciate how good Fusilli has been right out of the gate and how he seems to be developing into such a great writer that we may need to start creating new adjectives to describe what he is doing.TRIBECA BLUES begins with Orr and Bella, his (precocious, but not overly so) 15-year-old daughter gently interacting, a scene that is a prelude to the death of a close friend of Orr. Orr's friend leaves him a bequest and a request, one that takes Orr, Bella and their friends to New Orleans for a funeral and the beginning of a quest to bring Orr's friend the justice that was denied him during his life. While in New Orleans, Orr is advised that the mother of Raymond Weisz, the man suspected of murdering Orr's wife and son, has passed away. Orr immediately returns to New York City to attend the funeral, believing that Weisz will be compelled to attend his mother's funeral, if only to assure himself that she is dead. The funeral becomes a catalyst for Orr's discovery that everything he knew about his wife and her death seems to be dreadfully, horribly wrong. It also dovetails into Orr's quest on behalf of his late friend. All is told before the backdrop of New York City, a place that Orr (and Fusilli) knows quite well. Orr in fact personifies the city, as both are badly damaged by tragedy. Both are surviving, existing and even to some extent thriving, but forever damaged and forever changed in ways both known and yet to be. TRIBECA BLUES answers some questions and raises new ones. The only constants for Orr and his city are sorrow and hope.Fusilli is simply incredible. He never goes for the easy shot, choosing instead to quietly aim for the moon and stars and hitting them every single time. His intimate knowledge of his locales is not limited to New York City either. While his characters journey to the French Quarter during their New Orleans visit, Fusilli wisely pulls back from making the area the focal point of their business, focusing instead on The Warehouse and Garden Districts. Fusilli's reference in TRIBECA BLUES to Meyer the Hatter --- a fedora shop tucked away on St. Charles Street --- demonstrates not only a knowledge of but also a love of New Orleans as he captures a detail that only those who know the city well would appreciate.Fusilli is that rare writer who both created and fulfilled the pr

It's been five years since Raymond Weisz allegedly threw his infant son on the railroad tracks in the path of an oncoming train. His wife Marina was also killed when she jumped down to rescue her son. Terry Orr is still determined to track down the man and kill him but in the meantime he and his fifteen-year-old daughter Bella go to New Orleans to attend the funeral of his friend Leo Mallard.Leo wanted Terry to find his wife so she could face justice. Lenore caused their flourishing restaurant to go into bankruptcy because she embezzled company funds. Terry has every intention of fulfilling Leo's last request but while he is in New Orleans he gets a fax stating Weisz's mother died. Believing that his family's killer will finally show at the funeral, Terry rushes back to New York City. As he talks to a person who had seen the subway killings of Terry's family members, the witness is murdered. As Terry searches for Raymond, he begins to learn the truth to that deadly incident five years ago and why Leo's reputation and happiness was destroyed.The protagonist of TRIBECA BLUES, a man readers have come to care about, conducts two different investigations in his own quixotic manner. Having a private investigator's license doesn't harden the man nor does the tragedy that haunts him or seeing the dark side of humanity. Instead it allows Terry to take action and feel he is part of making the world a better place. Jim Fusilli gives his audience an insider's look at the Big Apple he loves so much and come to understand why he loves the city that never sleeps.Harriet Klausner

Tribeca Blues, the third in the Terry and Bella Orr series is, to put it simply, a KNOCKOUT! Fusilli just keeps getting better and better. There are surprises in this book that actually had me gasping. That doesn't happen too often. You don't have to have read the first two books to appreciate Blues. But if you haven't, you'll want to run out and read the other two immediately. Fusilli writes rings around most of them out there. I can't wait until the next. And, no, he's no relation to me!!