Wise-cracking, staunchly independent, and chronically curious, Grafton's gritty gumshoe Kinsey Millhone is back. This time, the alphabet series star will take on the toughest case to date: her past. What begins as a random phone call from a "storage space scavenger" (someone who buys the contents of defaulted storage units) leads Kinsey to a box of old papers and personal effects that her ex-husband, Mickey Magruder, left behind. Inside, she finds a 15-year-old unsent letter from a bartender that, among other things, reveals her former hubby was having an affair. The letter also contains details about the murder of a transient--a crime for which Mickey was blamed. Although never convicted, Mickey was ruined--losing his job, wife, and friends. But 15 years later, Kinsey realizes that foul play may have been involved in the murder, a deadly temptation for her.

Die-hard fans will especially enjoy Kinsey's self-disclosure--something she's infamous for not doing--about her childhood, the fate of her parents, and the randy details of her first marriage. A very vulnerable and interesting side to Kinsey's character is also revealed when her obsessive-compulsive fact-finding bent is mixed up with matters of the heart.

A fast, fun read, O Is for Outlaw is packed with Grafton's clear, colorful imagery and signature metaphors: "Our recollection of the past is not simply distorted by our faulty perception of events remembered, but skewed by those forgotten. The memory is like orbiting twin stars, one visible, one dark, the trajectory of what's evident forever affected by the gravity of what's concealed." --Rebekah Warren


From Publishers Weekly
Grafton's fans will be thrilled with this knockout 15th Kinsey Millhone mystery, which deals with Kinsey's first marriage. In a complex story that zigzags between past and present, the California PI gets involved again with her first ex-husband, former cop Michael "Mickey" Magruder, who initially reappears in her life by chance when she comes across memorabilia he kept after their separation 14 years earlier. The mementos include an undelivered letter addressed to Kinsey, providing Mickey with an alibi for the beating death of Vietnam vet Benny Quintero, the unproven charge against Mickey that prompted Kinsey to leave him. Conscience-stricken, Kinsey looks up acquaintances from her early marriage, questioning her judgment and values at the time. Then two Los Angeles police detectives inform her that Mickey has been shot and is in a coma, and Kinsey decides to investigate. As usual in Grafton's novels, the PI encounters a string of offbeat characters who lead or mislead her in a gyre of confusion; here, many of them had motive and opportunity to shoot Mickey. In time, Kinsey stumbles on a clueAat first bewilderingAthat leads back to the Vietnam War and, eventually, points the way to Benny's killer and Mickey's assailant. In addition to her distinctive humor, sharp sense of place and crisp dialogue defining character, Grafton adds depth to this outing through unexpected details of Kinsey's past. Meanwhile, Kinsey's examination of her youthful self-righteousness and na?vet? initiates a provocative contemplation of guilt, morals and loyalty that graces one of the very best entries in a long-lived and much-loved series. Agent, Molly Friedrich at Aaron Priest. $500,000 ad/promo; Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club main selection; author tour. (Oct.) Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From School Library Journal
YA-The alphabet series that features Kinsey Millhone, a former cop turned private investigator, continues in this fine mystery with lots of suspense. The story begins with a phone call from Teddy Rich, who offers to sell Kinsey a box of personal items that he bought at a repossession auction. The contents of the box had been stored for years by Kinsey's ex-husband, Mickey Magruder. While searching through it, she discovers an unopened letter addressed to her. This letter establishes an alibi that he needed 14 years earlier when a murder case ruined his career as a policeman and prompted the demise of their marriage. Kinsey hopes to find him but, as fate would have it, two L.A. police investigators enter the story at this point to inform her of Mickey's "accident." A fast-paced, intriguing set of circumstances and dangerous turns make this tale a page-turner. The story is well crafted and the characters are believable. Grafton's fans will love it.Linda A. Vretos, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, Alexandria, VA Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Kinsey Millhone is overcome with curiosity when a guy who buys up salvage from self-storage units calls to say he has a cardboard box of her personal possessions. Among the childhood report cards, she finds an undelivered letter written to her years before. Her first husband was implicated in a murder at the time, and the letter scolds her for not standing by her man by lying to give him an alibi. Kinsey is compelled to find out what happened. In the course of the investigation, she meets again with many of the gang she knew then, during the Vietnam War era. As the old murder investigation and Kinsey's past unfold, listeners will be glued to their cassette players to find out how the threads will come together. Reader Judy Kaye does a great job with Kinsey's voice, using just the right mixture of self-assuredness and a little nostalgia for the young woman she was those many years before. All public libraries with mystery fans will want to buy several copies.-Barbara Valle, El Paso P.L., TX Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
Kinsey Millhone, a legend in the overcrowded world of female detectives, returns in her most gripping adventure to date. Until now, Grafton has allowed readers only meager glimpses into Kinsey's past, but this time the curtain is drawn, and the story of her impetuous, long-ago marriage to vice cop Mickey Magruder is told. Only months after the ill-fated marriage took place, Kinsey's infatuation with the hard-living, hard-drinking, philandering Magruder took a nose dive when he was accused of murder and asked Kinsey to fabricate an alibi for him. Now Mickey, whose life has taken a long downhill slide into joblessness, alcoholism, and bankruptcy, is in a coma after being shot by an unknown assailant. The usually unsentimental Kinsey is consumed by guilt, wondering if her uncompromising refusal to believe in Mickey's innocence years earlier contributed to his downfall. Maybe she owes him something . . . like finding out who tried to kill him. She learns Magruder was hot on the trail of a decades-old case of murder, deceit, and betrayal--a case that could ultimately endanger Kinsey's life, too. For the most part, Grafton's 15 Millhone novels have remained fresh and endearing, although many longtime fans detected a leveling off, if not an outright decline, in the last few episodes. That trend is abruptly reversed here, with a novel of depth and substance that is, in every way, the class of the series. Emily Melton


From Kirkus Reviews
Fans hungry for details of Kinsey Millhone's well-guarded past will give thanks for Teddy Rich, the storage-locker scavenger who's come up with a box of old documents about herself that he's willing to sell for $30 (Kinsey gets him to take $20). Most of the stuffharvested, as it turns it, from a locker rented by Kinsey's first husband, ex-cop Mickey Magruderis no more interesting than your own grade-school photos and report cards. But a letter to Kinsey implicitly confessing an affair between Mickey and the letter-writer, Honky-Tonk bartender Dixie Hightower, a letter Kinsey never received because she'd left Mickey the day before, reminds her why she left Mickeybecause he'd asked her to back up his phony alibi for the killing of Benny Quintero, a drifter he'd been in a shoving match with the night beforeand convinces her that Mickey's in trouble. Wrong. Mickey's already out of trouble, deep in a coma after getting shot himself days before Kinsey started digging into the past she shared with him. So Kinsey dusts off her p.i's license and digs deeper herself, dredging up a trail of deception that goes back to the jungles of Vietnam, all the while trying to convince the LAPD that, no, she didn't get a half-hour call from Mickey before he died, no matter what the phone company's records say. Lying, snooping, rifling drawers, following oblivious suspects, rarely taking time to sit and think, Kinsey keeps you blissfully in the dark about what's happened and what's coming up till the magician tips her hand at the denouement and shows you how simple it all wasin Grafton's best since 1992, when I was for Innocent.(Literary Guild/Mystery Guild main selection; $500,000 ad/promo; author tour) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.


Review
"EVERYTHING THAT HAS ALWAYS WORKED FOR THIS FIRST-CLASS SERIES WORKS BETTER HERE. . . . O Is for Outlaw comes across with a freshness that suggests [Sue Grafton] has been taking stock of her skills, sharpening them up for the long haul."
--The New York Times Book Review

"EXTREMELY GOOD--OUTSTANDING, IN FACT. . . . As always Millhone is an engaging detective--a bit lighthearted, a bit sarcastic, always resourceful, and frequently funny."
--San Francisco Chronicle


Review
"EVERYTHING THAT HAS ALWAYS WORKED FOR THIS FIRST-CLASS SERIES WORKS BETTER HERE. . . . O Is for Outlaw comes across with a freshness that suggests [Sue Grafton] has been taking stock of her skills, sharpening them up for the long haul."
--The New York Times Book Review

"EXTREMELY GOOD--OUTSTANDING, IN FACT. . . . As always Millhone is an engaging detective--a bit lighthearted, a bit sarcastic, always resourceful, and frequently funny."
--San Francisco Chronicle

FROM OUR EDITORS

Our Review
"O" Yeah, Kinsey's Back!
There are two ways to judge a mystery series: 1.) How good the books are individually and 2.) How fresh the author can keep the primary characters and the situations.

Too many series grow tiresome quickly. At least for me. Some exceptions come to mind. Ed McBain. Bill Pronzini. The late E. X. Ferrars. And of course Sue Grafton.

"O" Is for Outlaw is not only one of the best in the Kinsey Millhone series, it's also the freshest. One senses Grafton getting a second wind. Or maybe starting to see Kinsey in a slightly different way.

The set-up is beautifully simple: Kinsey comes into possession of the contents of an abandoned store garage. One of the things she finds in there is material that makes her wonder if she was right about her first husband after all. His being accused of murder broke up their marriage. She pretty much bought into the cops' story that their fellow cop, and her husband, was the killer. Now she's not so sure.

This is a wonderful device for taking us on a journey into Kinsey's past. A lot of questions readers have had over the years are answered here in Grafton's usual fetching voice. The novel investigates two mysteries -- the one surrounding her husband Mickey; and the mystery that is Kinsey herself, the forces that shaped her into what she is today.

There's comedy, melancholy, a clever puzzle, her usual cast of kooks and criminals, and lots of middle-aged angst redeemed by Kinsey's winsomeness. In other words, the perfect Sue Grafton novel.

--Ed Gorman

FROM THE PUBLISHER

The call comes on a Monday morning from a guy who scavenges defaulted storage units at auction. The weekend before, he'd bought a stack of cardboard boxes. In one, there was a collection of childhood memorabilia with Kinsey's name all over it.

Though she's never been one for personal possessions, curiousity is a power force. What she finds among the items is an old undelivered letter to her that will force her to reexamine her beliefs about the breakup of her first marriage...about the honor of her first husband...and about an unsolved murder. It will put her life in the gravest peril.

Through fourteen books, listeners have been fed short rations when it comes to Kinsey Millhone's past: a morsel here, a dollop there. We know about the aunt who raised her, the second husband who left her, the long-lost family up the California coast. But husband number one has remained a blip on the screen. Until now. "O" Is for Outlaw: a revealing excursion into Kindey's past.

FROM THE CRITICS

Entertainment Weekly

Grafton keeps pulling out surprises- and pulling us in.

Publishers Weekly

Grafton's fans will be thrilled with this knockout 15th Kinsey Millhone mystery, which deals with Kinsey's first marriage. In a complex story that zigzags between past and present, the California PI gets involved again with her first ex-husband, former cop Michael "Mickey" Magruder, who initially reappears in her life by chance when she comes across memorabilia he kept after their separation 14 years earlier. The mementos include an undelivered letter addressed to Kinsey, providing Mickey with an alibi for the beating death of Vietnam vet Benny Quintero, the unproven charge against Mickey that prompted Kinsey to leave him. Conscience-stricken, Kinsey looks up acquaintances from her early marriage, questioning her judgment and values at the time. Then two Los Angeles police detectives inform her that Mickey has been shot and is in a coma, and Kinsey decides to investigate. As usual in Grafton's novels, the PI encounters a string of offbeat characters who lead or mislead her in a gyre of confusion; here, many of them had motive and opportunity to shoot Mickey. In time, Kinsey stumbles on a clue--at first bewildering--that leads back to the Vietnam War and, eventually, points the way to Benny's killer and Mickey's assailant. In addition to her distinctive humor, sharp sense of place and crisp dialogue defining character, Grafton adds depth to this outing through unexpected details of Kinsey's past. Meanwhile, Kinsey's examination of her youthful self-righteousness and na vet initiates a provocative contemplation of guilt, morals and loyalty that graces one of the very best entries in a long-lived and much-loved series. Agent, Molly Friedrich at Aaron Priest. $500,000 ad/promo; Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club main selection; author tour. (Oct.) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

Kinsey Millhone is overcome with curiosity when a guy who buys up salvage from self-storage units calls to say he has a cardboard box of her personal possessions. Among the childhood report cards, she finds an undelivered letter written to her years before. Her first husband was implicated in a murder at the time, and the letter scolds her for not standing by her man by lying to give him an alibi. Kinsey is compelled to find out what happened. In the course of the investigation, she meets again with many of the gang she knew then, during the Vietnam War era. As the old murder investigation and Kinsey's past unfold, listeners will be glued to their cassette players to find out how the threads will come together. Reader Judy Kaye does a great job with Kinsey's voice, using just the right mixture of self-assuredness and a little nostalgia for the young woman she was those many years before. All public libraries with mystery fans will want to buy several copies.--Barbara Valle, El Paso P.L., TX Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.\

School Library Journal

YA-The alphabet series that features Kinsey Millhone, a former cop turned private investigator, continues in this fine mystery with lots of suspense. The story begins with a phone call from Teddy Rich, who offers to sell Kinsey a box of personal items that he bought at a repossession auction. The contents of the box had been stored for years by Kinsey's ex-husband, Mickey Magruder. While searching through it, she discovers an unopened letter addressed to her. This letter establishes an alibi that he needed 14 years earlier when a murder case ruined his career as a policeman and prompted the demise of their marriage. Kinsey hopes to find him but, as fate would have it, two L.A. police investigators enter the story at this point to inform her of Mickey's "accident." A fast-paced, intriguing set of circumstances and dangerous turns make this tale a page-turner. The story is well crafted and the characters are believable. Grafton's fans will love it.-Linda A. Vretos, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, Alexandria, VA Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.|

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