STRIKE THREE YOU'RE DEAD.

Outfielder Harvey Blissberg probes further than the puzzled police when his roommate, Rudy Furth, is murdered and uncovers a variety of suspects and possible reasons for his team's losing record

Penzler Pick, September 2001: Originally published in 1984 and winner of the prestigious Edgar Award for Best First Novel, Strike Three, You're Dead is a brainy baseball mystery that quickly developed a cult following. Burrowing into the lives of troubled clients, former Red Sox center fielder Harvey Blissberg was a character one could take to heart: all too human in his frailties and able to fit, however uneasily, his morality to the exigencies of the situation. He commonly finished his cases having learned as much about himself as about the crime, the criminal, the victim, or his client.

Three entries in the series followed: Fadeaway, Saturday Night Dead, and World of Hurt. Now, 10 years after the last of these, Rosen is about to resume his hero's career with Dead Ball, coming out in November. In anticipation, Rosen's publisher has reissued Strike Three, You're Dead.

Read it to get acquainted with Harvey, known to his teammates as the Professor because of his fondness for Harris tweed jackets and hardcover books. Read it to learn all about that dysfunctional family, the Providence Jewels, the American League expansion team to which Harvey has descended from the former heights of the Boston Red Sox outfield. Read it to get psyched for Dead Ball and the return of Harvey Blissberg. But, most of all, read it to understand why Strike Three, You're Dead won an Edgar, was called by The Denver Post "one of the best sports detective novels of all time," and was named one of the century's best mysteries by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association. --Otto Penzler