Devil Went Down to Austin, The

Rick Riordan, triple-crown winner of the Edgar, Anthony, and Shamus Awards, has already emblazoned his name on the map of crime fiction with his Tres Navarre novels -- a fast, funny, totally hip series that blends masterful writing with richly drawn characters and nonstop action.

Now Riordan brings his P.I. Tres Navarre to the heart of Texas -- Austin -- with a fiercely original thriller that explores family ties as deep and twisted as the waterways of Lake Travis.

Tres Navarre, private eye and sometimes English professor, is hoping for a laid-back working vacation when he accepts a teaching gig at the University of Texas at Austin, even if it means shacking up for six weeks with his big brother Garrett, who calls Austin home.

Garrett Navarre -- computer programmer extraordinaire, Jimmy Buffett fanatic, and all-around eccentric -- is hoping to retire a multimillionaire thanks to a high-tech start-up company he and two buddies have launched. Garrett has bet everything from his career to the Navarre family ranch that the company will stay alive long enough to make a public stock offering, allowing him to ride the Austin high-tech boom right into the saddle of luxury.

Both Tres's and Garrett's hopes are shattered with a single gunshot. Garrett's oldest friend and business partner ends up murdered at his lakefront home -- and Garrett is the only suspect.

As Tres delves into Garrett's bizarre world to find the truth behind the murder, he comes face-to-face with the damaged relationships, violent lives, and billion-dollar schemes of a brave new high-tech world.

Among the players: a corporate takeover artist with a trail of broken enemies in his wake and an overzealous desire to make Garrett's company his own; the victim's wife, a hard-edged beauty haunted by three generations of family failure; and the head of an oil-rich clan with more power than morals and enough skeletons in the closet to man a ghost ship. Connecting them all -- the beautiful waters of Lake Travis and an unspeakable evil that lies within its depths.

A suspense novel of depth and sizzling emotional power, The Devil Went Down to Austin is Rick Riordan's most entertaining work to date.

Rick Riordan is the author of three previous Tres Navarre novels -- Big Red Tequila, winner of the Shamus and Anthony Awards; The Widower's Two-Step, winner of the Edgar Award; and The Last King of Texas. A middle-school English teacher by day, Riordan lives with his wife and family in San Antonio, Texas.