Black Swan: A Sam Acquillo Hamptons Mystery

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Chris Knopf

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Overview

Sailing back from Maine, Sam Acquillo, the hero of four Sam Acquillo Hamptons Mysteries from The Permanent Press, his girlfriend Amanda Anselma and screwball mutt Eddie Van Halen get blown off course by a dangerous gale. With damaged boat and frayed nerves, they limp into the closest harbor, which happens to be on Fishers Island, NY, a distant and altogether disassociated scrap of Long Island.

A summer preserve for the oldest old money in America, and defended by year-round denizens who safeguard their i s l a n d 's insularity with xenophobic fervor, Sam and Amanda are hardly welcomed with open arms. Unless they're the arms of the young and beautiful Anika Fey, daughter of the owner of the Black Swan, the island's only hotel, who's only too eager to fold Sam into her embrace.

But feminine wiles aren't the only hazard faced by Sam and Amanda. They're soon swept up in big-money intrigue, dark conspiracy, brutality, murder and the machinations of high- tech millionaires, to say nothing of the autumn storms that lash the island with wind and wave.

In the years since losing everything, Sam has fought his way back, to an existence that even he believes is worth preserving. And now, bad timing and a broken rudder could result in the greatest loss of all—his life.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

A sudden storm drives Sam Acquillo and his girlfriend, Amanda Anselma, and their sailboat into harbor at Fishers Island in Knopf's tense fifth mystery featuring the ex-corporation man turned Long Island carpenter (after 2009's Hard Stop). While the couple await parts for their disabled boat, Christian Fey, the owner of the Black Swan, a small hotel Fey runs with his grown daughter and son, reluctantly gives them lodging. Other guests at the Black Swan, equally unwelcome, are Fey's three former business partners in a software company he helped found and to whom he apparently sold. When one of the former partners dies in circumstances that suggest a killer in their midst, Sam must ferret out the corporate secrets that threaten to engulf him and Amanda as well as the Feys. The vivid descriptions of an angry sea and the monster storm that strikes the island fairly dwarf the human threats facing Sam and Amanda. (May)

Kirkus Reviews

Despite its title, Sam Acquillo's fifth adventure has nothing to do with the movies (Hard Stop,2009, etc.)—at least not movies about high-strung, overworked ballerinas.

As a favor to his wealthy lawyer friend Burton Lewis, engineer-turned-carpenter Sam and his girlfriend, banker-turned-contractor Amanda Anselma, are sailing Burton's boat,Carpe Mañana,down from Maine when rough seas on Long Island Sound force them to put in at Fishers Island. Christian Fey, the retired computer genius of Subversive Technologies, is less than enthusiastic about putting them up at the Black Swan, the inn he's recently purchased, and his son Axel, an autistic savant, is no more effusive. But Fey's daughter Anika welcomes Sam with open arms and bedclothes. The Edenic temptations she offers are complemented by the arrival of the serpent Derrick Hammon, Subversive's new CEO, with an entourage that includes his put-upon female companion Del Rey; Bernard 't Hooft, who's more than just muscle, and Jock and Pierre, who are just muscle. The guest list is completed by Subversive co-founder Myron Sanderfreud, who's barely checked in when he checks out, and his wife Grace, whose role is limited to screaming. When the island's sole law-enforcement officer is beaten nearly to death and her replacement locked in a cell in his own jail, it's obvious that the winds have blown in quite another screenplay, this one fromKey Largo,and that only Sam has the stuff to play the Bogart role.

Reliable, predictable thrills that don't shame Knopf's growing reputation but won't advance it either.

More Reviews (2) Fewer Reviews

Marilyn Stasio

Knopf has mastered the verbal drill for tough guys in tight situations, and like Sam's nautical know-how, his banter with imperfect strangers is a cut above the norm…This unexpected sail into danger makes for a stimulating story…
—The New York Times

Staff Reviewer

If you like reading about boats and boating, complete with dodgers, foulies, and coamings, the latest entry in Knopf’s award-winning Sam Acquillo series is tailor-made for you. Off the water, the novel, with its batty rich folks, gorgeous hotties lusting for the hero, and a grotesque murder, is a bit less compelling. The setup, though, is beguiling. Sam, his girl, and his dog survive a storm at sea that washes them up on an island off the East Coast. The natives are nasty, with secrets wa

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781579622169
Publisher: Permanent Press, The
Publication date: 5/1/2011
Pages: 256
Sales rank: 590,187
Product dimensions: 5.80 (w) x 8.80 (h) x 1.10 (d)

Meet the Author

CHRIS KNOPF's four Sam Acquillo mysteries have received exceptional accolades, with critics likening Sam to Dashiell Hammett's Sam Spade, Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe, and Robert Parker's Spenser, while repeatedly comparing Knopf to Elmore Leonard, and both John D. and Ross MacDonald. All these mysteries had subrights sales in the UK, Canada, Japan, Spain, Turkey, Italy, and China. The Last Refuge (2005), Two Ti m e (2007), and Hard Stop (2009) were finalists for the Connecticut Book Award. Two Time was one of thirteen mysteries listed as "Recommended Summer Reading" in The New York Times Book Review and was listed in Entertainment Weekly as one of the 50 "Hot Picks" of that summer. Publishers Weekly chose it as one of the "Best 100 Books for 2006." Head Wounds (2008) won the 2008 Ben Franklin Award for Best Mystery.

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Kataman1

Posted July 26, 2011

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A Big Disappointment!

I picked this book up based on it having nothing but good reviews on Amazon and was greatly disappointed. Sam Acquillo and girlfriend Amanda Anselma are forced to dock their boat in a "snobbish" island peopled by folks with a lot of "old money." The locals don't like outsiders and the only hotel (the Black Swan) is run by outsiders who seem ready to close its doors from lack of business.

While Sam waits for parts to repair his boat, he and Amanda seemed to be intrigued by the folks at the Black Swan. When one of the guests is found hanged in the shower, everyone assumes suicide by Sam suspects murder. He has to tell everyone not to touch anything to allow a forensics team to properly collect evidence, however with weather conditions it will be a long time before a forensics team will arrive.

Sam then puts his detective hat on and decides to solve what had happened. I had a hard time getting into this book and felt no connection with anyone at the hotel or Sam and Amanda for that matter. Some of the reviewers said that Sam is a wise cracking individual (I was picturing David Rosenfelt's Andy Carpenter) but I found Sam to be quite dull. As he and Amanda have appeared in other books maybe you need to read those first to get an appreciation for their characters. I know that this book did very little for me. The only thing I found interesting that there could actually be an Island of snobs like the one described in the book.
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SheilaDeeth

Posted April 25, 2011

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Wind, waves, computers and mystery

Black Swan is the fifth of author Chris Knopf's Sam Acquillo Hamptons mystery series and the first where the action doesn't actually take place in the Hamptons. As a stand-alone novel it's a character-driven mystery filled with excitement, sailing, scenery and intrigue, and a great introduction to a really great character and series. Sam is piloting his friend Burton Lewis's new sailboat home from Maine and takes refuge from a dramatic storm on Fishers Island, NY-a private island whose inhabitants have no great love of intruders. Gale force winds and waves the size of houses are so convincingly portrayed I feel I might really have been on such a boat; I haven't and never will, since the ocean terrifies me, but the author brings the drama powerfully to life with storytelling as filled with poetry as with excitement. Amanda, a woman Sam has come to love in previous books, and the wonderful Eddie (his dog) share the adventure and the trip, while off-boat are "outsiders" Anika and Axel Fey who, together with their father, hope to make a go of the Black Swan hotel and restaurant despite local disapproval.

The author peoples Fishers Island with well-defined three-dimensional characters, just as surely as he's peopled the Hamptons in previous volumes. Police procedure is simple, straightforward and dangerous. Death, murder and relationships are closely observed. Landscape and weather form a backdrop as filled with character as the story itself, and the mystery is nicely low-key, perfectly timed and tuned to the parallel mysteries of Sam's own feelings for his future and past.

Describing computer programs, ship's steering systems, people, weather and place all with the same sure confidence, Chris Knopf has written another masterful mystery with characters who continue to learn and grow, adding breadth to depth and ever moving forwards to the promise of more. There's no need to read the other books before reading this one, but if you haven't you'll find it hard to resist going out to look for them. Sam Acquillo is a complex wounded soul on a journey that's well worth following; knocked down by life's storms, he stands up and finds himself drawn into other people's fights, thereby redeeming his own.

Disclosure: I was sent a bound galley of Black Swan from the publisher, the Permanent Press, in exchange for an honest review.
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Erin_N

Posted March 25, 2011

Action packed!

October storms out on the Atlantic Ocean near the Northern states can be catastrophic to say the least. First, they come out of nowhere, making the last weather report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration about as useful as a bag of mismatched shoes. Second, even the smallest of storms can whip up the wind to 40 knots and the gusts to 60. But, Sam Acquillo, his girlfriend Amanda, and his dog Eddie would say that the meanest hurricane of the Atlantic coast's season is nothing compared to the wrath of God, man, and beast at the Black Swan inn on Fishers Island Sound off the coast of New York!

A former engineer, Sam embraced a life of hard work after a political upheaval cost him his career and everything he ever worked for. Going with the flow, his current profession was to deliver a boat to his deep pocketed benefactor. A sudden storm and a broken rudder sweep Sam and Amanda onto the most xenophobic, blue-blood island in the free world where the are caught up in the intrigue of the oddball inn owners and the off season guests; a team of executives from a software industry giant. When one of these executives turns up dead by hanging in the shower, Sam isn't sure if it's empathy for the innkeeper's daughter, the impending hurricane, or his love of a good mystery that keeps him on the island long after the boat is fixed and his safety is non-existent.

Chris Knopf weaves an intriguing tale of adventure and mystery with a protagonist that is a cross between Steven Seagal, Sam Spade, and side characters so kooky that they would be at home in an Agatha Christie novel. Black Swan is the 5th installment in Knopf's Sam Acquillo Hamptons Mystery series, a series that has become widely popular in the "UK, Canada, Japan, Spain, Turkey, Italy, and China" (excerpt from the inside cover). One of the books in the series was a "Recommended Summer Reading" in the New York Times Book Review while another won the 2008 Ben Franklin Award for Best Mystery.
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Black Swan: A Sam Acquillo Hamptons Mystery

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More About This Book

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Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

Kirkus Reviews

Marilyn Stasio

Staff Reviewer

Product Details

Meet the Author

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A Big Disappointment!

Wind, waves, computers and mystery

Action packed!