V. I. Warshawski

18 primary works • 35 total works

Indemnity Only

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 January 1982

Meeting an anonymous client late on a sizzling  summer night is asking for trouble. But trouble is  Chicago private eye V.I. Warshwski's specialty.  Her client says he's the prominent banker, John  Thayer. Turns out he's not. He says his son's  girlfriend, Anita Hill, is missing. Turns out that's  not her real name. V.I.'s search turns...Read more

Meeting an anonymous client late on a sizzling  summer night is asking for trouble. But trouble is  Chicago private eye V.I. Warshwski's specialty.  Her client says he's the prominent banker, John  Thayer. Turns out he's not. He says his son's  girlfriend, Anita Hill, is missing. Turns out that's  not her real name. V.I.'s search turns up someone  soon enough -- the real John Thayer's son, and  he's dead. Who's V.I.'s client? Why has she been  set up and sent out on a wild-goose chase? By the  time she's got it figured, things are hotter --  and deadlier -- than Chicago in July. V.I.'s in a  desperate race against time. At stake: a young  woman's life.

Deadlock

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 January 1984

When Chicago Black Hawks hockey legend Boom Boom Warshawski slips off a wharf and drowns in Lake Michigan, his private-eye cousin questions the accidental death report and rumors of suicide. Armed with a bottle of Black Label and a Smith & Weson, V.I. follows a trail of violence and...Read more

When Chicago Black Hawks hockey legend Boom Boom Warshawski slips off a wharf and drowns in Lake Michigan, his private-eye cousin questions the accidental death report and rumors of suicide. Armed with a bottle of Black Label and a Smith & Weson, V.I. follows a trail of violence and corruption to the center of the Windy City's powerful shipping industry. Dodging elaborate attempts on her life with characteristic grit and humor, the one-of-a-kind detective wends her way through a maze of grain elevators and thousand-ton freighters, ruthless businessmen and gorgeous ballerinas, to ferret out Boom Boom's killers before they phase her out of the picture—permanently.

Praise for Deadlock

“V.I. Warshawski is one of the best . . . smart, tough, sexy.”—Daily News (New York)

“Sara Paretsky makes excellent use of local backgrounds in a carefully plotted tale of murder and great misdeeds in the world of Great Lakes cargo shipping.”—Chicago Tribune

“Hard-boiled detective fiction . . . a swift-paced and engrossing read.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer

“Slithers with suspense!”—Chicago Sun-Times

Killing Orders

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 January 1986

Years ago V.I. Warshawski's Aunt Rosa treated the detective's beloved mother in an unforgiveable way. Now, after she's accused of stealing $3 million from the Dominican priory where she works, Rosa calls upon the ties of blood to clear her name.

V.I. is not prepared to forgive so easily....

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Years ago V.I. Warshawski's Aunt Rosa treated the detective's beloved mother in an unforgiveable way. Now, after she's accused of stealing $3 million from the Dominican priory where she works, Rosa calls upon the ties of blood to clear her name.

V.I. is not prepared to forgive so easily. Until suddenly no one else - the FBI, a threatening phone caller, and even Aunt Rosa herself - appears to want her on the case either. V.I. turns to an old friend for help. But the stakes are higher than she could have realised . . .

Blood Shot

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 August 1988

“No one, male or female, writes better P.I. books than Paretsky.”—The Denver Post 

V. I. Warshawski isn’t crazy about going back to her old south Chicago neighborhood, but a promise is something she always keeps. Caroline, a childhood friend, has a dying mother and a problem—after twenty-five years she wants...Read more

“No one, male or female, writes better P.I. books than Paretsky.”—The Denver Post 

V. I. Warshawski isn’t crazy about going back to her old south Chicago neighborhood, but a promise is something she always keeps. Caroline, a childhood friend, has a dying mother and a problem—after twenty-five years she wants V.I. to find the father she never knew. But when V.I. starts probing into the past, she  stumbles onto some long-buried secrets—and a very new corpse. Now she’s stirring up a deadly mix of big business and chemical corruption that may become a toxic shock to a snooper who knows too much. 

“[Paretsky’s] work does more than turn the genre upside down: her books are beautifully paced and plotted, and the dialogue is fresh and smart.”—Newsweek 

“Her best and boldest work to date . . . a criminal investigation that is a genuine heroic quest.”—The New York Times Book Review

Burn Marks

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 February 1990

Someone knocking on the door at 3 A.M. is never  good news. For V.I. Warshawski, the bad news  arrives in the form of her wacky, unwelcome aunt Elena.  The fire that has just burned down a sleazy  SRO hotel has brought Elena to  V.I.'s doorstep. Uncovering an arsonist  -- and the secrets hidden behind Elena's...Read more

Someone knocking on the door at 3 A.M. is never  good news. For V.I. Warshawski, the bad news  arrives in the form of her wacky, unwelcome aunt Elena.  The fire that has just burned down a sleazy  SRO hotel has brought Elena to  V.I.'s doorstep. Uncovering an arsonist  -- and the secrets hidden behind Elena's boozy  smile -- will send V.I. into the  seedy world of Chicago's homeless... into the Windy  City's backroom deals and bedroom politics, where  new schemers and old cronies team up to get V.I.  off the case -- by hook, by crook, or by  homocide.

Guardian Angel

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 January 1992

The seventh novel in the V.I. Warhawski crime series, set in Chicago, from prize-winning author Sara Paretsky.

V.I. Warshawski's Chicago neighbourhood is prospering. As it's out with the old and in with the new, long-term residents like elderly Hattie Frizell find themselves viciously under threat . . .

But...

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The seventh novel in the V.I. Warhawski crime series, set in Chicago, from prize-winning author Sara Paretsky.

V.I. Warshawski's Chicago neighbourhood is prospering. As it's out with the old and in with the new, long-term residents like elderly Hattie Frizell find themselves viciously under threat . . .

But that's not all that's troubling V.I. When the body of her neighbour's friend is found washed up in the Sanitary Canal, her investigations lead her to uncover a world of corporate conspiracy and political corruption involving some of Chicago's most prestigious industrial players. And after several attempts on her life, it seems that this time, V.I. may have dug too deep . . .

Tunnel Vision

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 May 1994

Stubbornness has landed private eye V.I. Warshawski in big trouble at her Chicago office.  With her grand old Loop building set to be razed, she's become a hold-out tenant amid frayed wiring and scary, empty corridors.  Then she finds a homeless woman with three kids in the basement, and before she...Read more

Stubbornness has landed private eye V.I. Warshawski in big trouble at her Chicago office.  With her grand old Loop building set to be razed, she's become a hold-out tenant amid frayed wiring and scary, empty corridors.  Then she finds a homeless woman with three kids in the basement, and before she can rescue them, they disappear.  Worst of all, she's been implicated in a murder--after the body of Deirdre Messenger, a prominent lawyer's wife, turns up sprawled across her desk.

V.I., who had volunteered with Deirdre at a women's shelter, suspects her death is linked to a case of upper-class domestic abuse so slickly concealed that the police refuse to believe it.  Increasingly at odds with the cops, V.I. is blindly plunging ahead after the truth.  And her path may lead to corruption at the highest levels.or deep into the abandoned tunnels beneath Chicago's streets, where secrets are hiding in the dark like a child's--or V.I.'s--worst nightmare.

Hard Time

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 January 1999

Among the first, and perhaps the most compelling, female private investigators of contemporary fiction, Sara Paretsky's incomparable character V. I. Warshawski at last returns to the page in her first full-length appearance since 1994's Tunnel Vision. Hard Time is the work of a master--a riveting novel of suspense that...Read more

Among the first, and perhaps the most compelling, female private investigators of contemporary fiction, Sara Paretsky's incomparable character V. I. Warshawski at last returns to the page in her first full-length appearance since 1994's Tunnel Vision. Hard Time is the work of a master--a riveting novel of suspense that is indisputably Paretsky's best V.I. Warshawski novel yet. Multimedia conglomerate Global Entertainment has purchased the Chicago Herald-Star, forcing the paper's staff to scramble to stay employed. Reporter Murray Ryerson, V.I.'s longtime friend and sometime rival, manages to reinvent himself as the host of a television show on Global's network.

On her way home from a party celebrating Murray's debut, V.I. almost runs over a woman lying in the street. Stopping to help, V.I. soon learns that her Good Samaritan act will drop her squarely in a boiling intrigue. In a case that forces her to go head-to-head with one of the world's largest providers of private security and prison services, a case that exposes dark hidden truths behind the razzle-dazzle of the entertainment industry, V.I. will be ahead of the game if she gets out alive.

Sin Previo Aviso

by Sara Peretsky and Sara Paretsky

Published 1 September 2001

Total Recall

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 September 2001

TOTAL RECALL follows VI Warshawski on a road that winds back more than fifty years - and into an intricate maze of wartime lies, heartbreaking secrets and harrowing retribution. The journey begins with a national conference in downtown Chicago, where angry protestors are calling for the recovery of Holocaust...Read more

TOTAL RECALL follows VI Warshawski on a road that winds back more than fifty years - and into an intricate maze of wartime lies, heartbreaking secrets and harrowing retribution. The journey begins with a national conference in downtown Chicago, where angry protestors are calling for the recovery of Holocaust assets. Replayed on the evening news is the scene of a slight man who has stood up at the conference to tell an astonishing story of a childhood shattered by the Holocaust - a story that has devastating consequences for VI's cherished friend and mentor, Lotty Herschel.

Blacklist

by Sara Paretsky

Published 6 September 2003

When an old woman becomes suspicious of goings on in her old home, V.I. Warsharwski is called in. A dead journalist puts her on a trail that leads back to the McCarthy era and to the distinguished Calvin Bayard. There is more than a whiff of anti-Communism and anti-Islamic...Read more

When an old woman becomes suspicious of goings on in her old home, V.I. Warsharwski is called in. A dead journalist puts her on a trail that leads back to the McCarthy era and to the distinguished Calvin Bayard. There is more than a whiff of anti-Communism and anti-Islamic hysteria in the air.

Fire Sale

by Sara Paretsky

Published 28 June 2005

A favour to an old friend means a return to the streets of South Chicago for VI Warshawski. But the neighbourhood where she grew up is now a dangerous, depressed place that reeks of bad memories. And the high school basketball team she has come to coach is a...Read more

A favour to an old friend means a return to the streets of South Chicago for VI Warshawski. But the neighbourhood where she grew up is now a dangerous, depressed place that reeks of bad memories. And the high school basketball team she has come to coach is a group of gang-bangers, fundamentalists and teenage moms.

The mother of one of the girls asks VI to look into claims of sabotage at the flag-making factory where she works. If it closes, the only other employer is By-Smart, a behemoth superstore that discounts its wages as heavily as its wares. But VI has barely agreed to help when the factory blows up.

As VI investigates she finds herself confronting the powerful family who own By-Smart. Founder William 'Buffalo Bill' Bysen is a difficult old man, at odds with both VI and his sons. And when his favoured grandson, Billy, runs away with one of her basketball players, VI is squeezed between the needs of two very different families, as she tries to find the errant teenagers and track down a particularly cruel murderer.

Hardball

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 September 2009

When V.I. Warshawski is asked to find a man who's been missing for four decades, a search that she thought would be futile turns lethal. Old skeletons from the city's racially charged history rise up to force her back with a vengeance -- a nun who marched with Martin...Read more

When V.I. Warshawski is asked to find a man who's been missing for four decades, a search that she thought would be futile turns lethal. Old skeletons from the city's racially charged history rise up to force her back with a vengeance -- a nun who marched with Martin Luther King Jr. dies without revealing crucial evidence, and on the city's South Side, people spit when she shows up. The elderly sisters who hired her are also keeping important information to themselves. Then V.I. finds that her family is keeping secrets of their own. A young cousin whom she's never met arrives from Kansas City to work on a political campaign, but disappears under mysterious circumstances. Afraid to learn that her adored father might have been a bent cop, deception and corruption following her at every step, V.I. finds all her certainties under threat, but takes the investigation all the way to its frightening end.

Breakdown

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 January 2012

Carmilla, Queen of the Night, is a shape-shifting raven whose fictional exploits thrill girls all over the world. When tweens in Chicago's Carmilla Club hold an initiation ritual in an abandoned cemetery, they stumble on an actual corpse, a man stabbed through the heart in a vampire-style slaying. The...Read more

Carmilla, Queen of the Night, is a shape-shifting raven whose fictional exploits thrill girls all over the world. When tweens in Chicago's Carmilla Club hold an initiation ritual in an abandoned cemetery, they stumble on an actual corpse, a man stabbed through the heart in a vampire-style slaying. The girls include daughters of some of Chicago's most powerful families: the grandfather of one, Chaim Salanter, is one of the world's wealthiest men; the mother of another, Sophy Durango, is the Illinois Democratic candidate for Senate. For V.I. Warshawski, the questions multiply faster than the answers. Is the killing linked to a hostile media campaign against Sophy Durango? Or to Chaim Salanter's childhood in Nazi-occupied Lithuania? As V.I. struggles for answers, she finds herself fighting enemies who are all too human.

Critical Mass

by Sara Paretsky

Published 1 August 2013

Chicago’s V. I. Warshawski “is at her stubborn, reckless, compassionate best in this complicated page-turner about selfish secrets passed down through generations” (Booklist).

In 1939, Dr. Lotty Herschel, V. I. Warshawki’s closest friend in Chicago, escaped the Holocaust in Vienna with her childhood playmate, Kitty Saginor Binder. Though...Read more

Chicago’s V. I. Warshawski “is at her stubborn, reckless, compassionate best in this complicated page-turner about selfish secrets passed down through generations” (Booklist).

In 1939, Dr. Lotty Herschel, V. I. Warshawki’s closest friend in Chicago, escaped the Holocaust in Vienna with her childhood playmate, Kitty Saginor Binder. Though the two drifted and animosities grew between them over the years, when Kitty’s daughter finds her life in danger, she turns to Lotty for help. In turn, Lotty summons V. I. to take the case.

The threats on the daughter’s life at first seem a simple case of bad drug dealings, but V. I. soon discovers that they are just the tip of an iceberg of lies secrets and silence whose origins trace back to the deadly race among America, Germany, Japan, and England to develop the atomic bomb. And while the secrets may be old, the people who continue to guard them will do anything to make sure they stay buried...

Brush Back

by Sara Paretsky

Published 16 July 2015

The seventeenth V.I. Warshawski thriller from one of America's greatest female crime writers.

Twenty-five years ago, Stella Guzzo beat her daughter to death and then walked up the street to play bingo at her parish church.

Chicago detective V.I. Warshawski grew up with the Guzzo family. She dated Frank Guzzo...

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The seventeenth V.I. Warshawski thriller from one of America's greatest female crime writers.

Twenty-five years ago, Stella Guzzo beat her daughter to death and then walked up the street to play bingo at her parish church.

Chicago detective V.I. Warshawski grew up with the Guzzo family. She dated Frank Guzzo when they were teens and knew Stella's murderous rages first-hand, so she was relieved when a judge sent Stella to prison for a long stretch.

V.I. and Frank went their different ways, V.I. to university and law school, Frank to marriage, children, and a job as a truck driver. She didn't think about the family again until the day Frank came to her office, wanting V.I. to help his mother with an exoneration claim. The detective wants no part of Stella Guzzo's world, but she realizes how hard life has been for Frank, stuck in the gang-ridden streets around Chicago's dead steel mills, and she doesn't feel able to say no.

V.I. starts asking questions, but the answers leave her puzzled. Was Stella's daughter Annie the ardent girl V.I. remembers, looking for a college education as a way out of South Chicago? Or was she a calculating, amoral person, as Stella claims? And what about the lawyers Annie worked for - why did they insist on representing Stella in her murder trial?

V.I.'s inquiries put her smack in the path of a notorious Mob enforcer. When she gets jumped in her old 'hood, her biggest question becomes whether she will live long enough to find the answers.

Dead Land

by Sara Paretsky

Published 21 April 2020

Chicago is the city of broad shoulders, but V.I. Warshawski knows its politics: "Pay to Play". Money changes hands in the middle of the night; by morning, buildings and parks have been replaced by billion-dollar projects.

Private investigator V.I. gets pulled into one of these clandestine deals when...Read more

Chicago is the city of broad shoulders, but V.I. Warshawski knows its politics: "Pay to Play". Money changes hands in the middle of the night; by morning, buildings and parks have been replaced by billion-dollar projects.

Private investigator V.I. gets pulled into one of these clandestine deals when her impetuous goddaughter Bernie tries to rescue a famed singer-songwriter, now living on the streets. Thanks to Bernie, V.I. finds herself in the path of some developers whose negotiating strategy is simple: they bulldoze - or kill - any obstacle in their way.

Questions pile up almost as fast as the dead bodies. When she tries to answer them, the detective finds a terrifying conspiracy stretching from Chicago's parks to a cover-up of the dark chapters in the American government's interference in South American politics. Before finds answer, V.I. will be pushed closed to breaking point. People who pay to play take no prisoners.

(P) 2020 Hodder & Stoughton Ltd

Pay Dirt

by Sara Paretsky

Published 16 April 2024

Bleeding Kansas

by Sara Paretsky

Published 27 December 2007

The Grelliers and the Schapens are two families who have been farming in the Kaw River Valley for over a hundred and fifty years, their lives connected through the generations by history and geography. Gina Haring, bringing with her the liberal air of the big city, moves into a...Read more

The Grelliers and the Schapens are two families who have been farming in the Kaw River Valley for over a hundred and fifty years, their lives connected through the generations by history and geography. Gina Haring, bringing with her the liberal air of the big city, moves into a dilapidated house near both families' properties. Gina has secrets, her own reasons for being in the Kansas countryside, and they're not necessarily what the people around her imagine. Susan's involvement with her stirs up the wrath of the Schapen clan - and has cataclysmic results for her own family.

Shell Game

by Sara Paretsky

Published 16 October 2018

A SUNDAY TIMES CRIME BOOK OF THE MONTH PICK

******

The new V.I. Warshawski novel from the New York Times bestselling author pits acclaimed detective V.I. Warshawski against some of today's most powerful figures.

'The 19th Warshawski novel is also a panoramic vision of Chicago at a time when the city is...

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A SUNDAY TIMES CRIME BOOK OF THE MONTH PICK

******

The new V.I. Warshawski novel from the New York Times bestselling author pits acclaimed detective V.I. Warshawski against some of today's most powerful figures.

'The 19th Warshawski novel is also a panoramic vision of Chicago at a time when the city is so polarised that decent people don't know who to trust' The Sunday Times

'Paretsky is a genius' Lee Child

Legendary sleuth V.I. Warshawski returns to the Windy City to save an old friend's nephew from a murder arrest. The case involves a stolen artifact that could implicate a shadowy network of international criminals. As V.I. investigates, the detective soon finds herself tangling with the Russian mob, ISIS backers, and a shady network of stock scams and stolen art that stretches from Chicago to the East Indies and the Middle East.

In Shell Game, nothing and no one are what they seem, except for the detective herself, who loses sleep, money, and blood, but remains indomitable in her quest for justice.