Missing Woman

Albert Samson #5

by Michael Z. Lewin

Looking for the murderer of Priscilla Pynne, who had previously been missing and was found to have run off with a local art gallery owner, Albert Sansom must penetrate the layers of several complicated relationships

Genres: Mystery

215 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1981

About the author

Michael Zinn Lewin is an American writer of mystery fiction perhaps best known for his series about Albert Samson, a distinctly low-keyed, non-hardboiled private detective who plies his trade in Indianapolis, Indiana. Lewin himself grew up in Indianapolis, but after graduating from Harvard and living for a few years in New York City, has lived in England for the last 40 years. Much of his fiction continues to be set in Indianapolis, including a secondary series about Leroy Powder, a policeman who frequently appears in the Samson novels, generally in a semi-confrontational manner.

Another series, however, is set in Bath, England, where Lewin now lives. This features the Lunghis who run their detective agency as a family business. So far there are three novels and nine short stories about them.

Lewin has also written a number of stand-alone novels. Some have been set in Indianapolis and others elsewhere. His latest novel, Confessions of a Discontented Deity, is even set partly in Heaven. A satire, it breaks from Lewin's history of genre fiction.

Lewin is the son of Leonard C. Lewin, author of the 1967 bestselling satire The Report from Iron Mountain: On the Possibility and Desirability of Peace.

Reviews

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Samson gets involved in a murder investigation while searching for a missing woman in a small town. The usual great wit and style that has made me seek these out.

[Marcy Skala · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoy Albert Samson. These are not heavy books with great meaning, just fun to read when you have some time to spare.