Howard Shrier follows up last year’s prize-winning Buffalo Jump with a foray into another American city in High Chicago that I thought was, if anything, even better than the first. When Jonah Geller first appeared last year, in Buffalo Jump, he was a rather low-profile employee of Beacon Security, where he spent his time largely doing [...]
Tikkun olam. It’s a Hebrew phrase that translates roughly to “making the world a better place,” and an expression that ended up on Jonah Geller’s newly hung shingle in Toronto. Last year, Shrier won an Arthur Ellis Award from the Crime Writers of Canada for Buffalo Jump, his memorable introduction of Geller, a Jewish P. I. [...]
Howard Shrier starts with the canvas of a crackling good mystery, then paints a compelling portrait of modern secular Jewish life complete with its wisdom, contradictions, and abiding humor. High Chicago is often funny, sometimes violent, and always thoughtful, with a powerful sense of place throughout. Toronto may have just found its Spenser in PI Jonah [...]
What a great book High Chicago is. I thoroughly enjoyed it, could not put it down. You and Jonah Geller have an avid new fan. -- Deon Meyer, bestselling author of Thirteen Hours, Devil's Peak and Blood Safari
Toronto author Howard Shrier’s took the prize at this year’s Arthur Ellis Awards for excellence in Canadian crime writing. And you can see why. Shrier, who counts crime reporter and comedy writer among his accomplishments, writes with an easy assurance and a killer sense of humour. This is the second book in his series featuring Toronto [...]
Howard Shrier’s second novel, High Chicago, is even better than his award-winning debut. Toronto investigator Jonah Geller becomes convinced a suicide is murder linked to the upmarket construction of a piece of Toronto’s old waterfront. But the evidence is insufficient for the police to act. The suspect, the victim’s father’s business partner, is eliminating everything that gets [...]
Howard Shrier’s debut novel, Buffalo Jump, was a strong beginning for the Toronto writer, and I suggested at the time that readers would want to keep an eye out for its sequel. Turned out, that was an understatement.... Combining fast-paced action with well-structured plots, and featuring a complex but likeable protagonist, Shrier’s novels are fast winning [...]
Howard Shrier’s first novel, Buffalo Jump, won the Arthur Ellis Award for best first novel. High Chicago, his second, will definitely be short-listed for another. It’s got the same stellar characters, the same clever plotting, and, if anything, an even better story. If you missed Buffalo Jump, you might not know that investigator Jonah Geller, of [...]
Dialogue so sharp you could cut your tongue on it. That’s what makes this second novel by Howard Shrier so appealing. His fictional gumshoe Jonah Geller needs to solve the problem of a young girl who apparently committed suicide by leaping from the balcony of a high rise apartment. He’s not so sure the girl did [...]
Howard Shrier’s second novel, High Chicago, again features the Toronto-based Jewish detective Jonah Geller. It ups the ante from his previous novel in terms of the forces Jonah is confronting, but more significantly in terms of the damage the world ends up inflicting on him. Whereas Shrier’s award-winning debut novel Buffalo Jump dealt as much with [...]
Howard Shrier is a two-time winner of the Arthur Ellis Award, Canada’s highest prize for crime fiction. The author of the acclaimed Jonah Geller series and other works, he publishes new stories and helps emerging authors finish their books, all on this site.
