Bluff

November 15, 2018
An aging debutante and card shark commits the perfect revenge crime in Hitchcock's (Mortal Friends, 2009, etc.) social noir.When "Mad" Maud Warner walks into the Four Seasons and shoots Sun Sunderland, "the Pope of Finance," then drops the gun and walks out again undetected, the upper-class grapevines in New York and Washington begin working overtime. It's generally accepted that she was probably aiming at Sunderland's lunch companion, Burt Sklar, a shady financial planner Maud blames for the fleecing of her mother and the death of her brother. It's also generally admired that Maud has taken advantage of her relative social obscurity as a financially disgraced older woman to evade arrest, especially when the victim is revealed to be a bigamist. For her part, Maud takes shelter in the dingy world of underground poker, where she has become a consummate player. There's a metaphor here of course; as an expert poker player, Maud knows how to plan and how to bluff, and soon the shooting is revealed to be part of a much larger plot to expose Sklar and punish both men for many egregious personal sins. The novel hums along with a chatty, sometimes hyperbolic tone; some chapters are written in Maud's first-person and others in third-person as the details of the crime and depth of the conspiracy are slowly exposed. Hitchcock pokes fun at the gossipy upper class, at the verbal tics of crass hangers-on, at the street-smart capability of former strippers and former advertising executives alike. The biggest takeaway: He who underestimates women of a certain age certainly does so at his own peril.Frothy fun with a backbone of feminist steel; as quick-moving and intricate as any heist movie.

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December 1, 2018
The axiom write what you know deliciously foretells this poker-themed thriller. Hitchcock (Mortal Friends, 2009) is a Brearley and Sarah Lawrence graduate who was defrauded by a man assigned to oversee the nearly $80 million estate left by Hitchcock's father to her mother. The fictitious Maud Warner is a former socialite turned mature card shark (another link to the author's life: Hitchcock won her first poker tournament at age 71). Maud's claims that famed accountant Burt Sklar squandered her family fortune have fallen on deaf ears among Manhattan's elite for years. But when she walks into the Four Seasons restaurant and shoots Sklar's lunch companion, millionaire Sun Sunderland, her former friends suddenly take notice. Maud turns the invisibility of a middle-aged woman to her advantage as she hides out among her poker cronies. It soon becomes clear, though, that Maud is playing a long game. Her bluff is more audacious than anyone could imagine. And if she pulls it off, she'll get the payout she's been waiting years to collect. A smartly plotted upper-crust caper.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)