Mississippi blue 42

Fierce FBI rookie Rae Johnson explores the criminal underbelly of college football in this captivating thriller from Edgar winner and former collegiate quarterback Cranor (Broiler). Set during the 2013--2014 season, the novel finds Rae, daughter of University of Arkansas coach Chuck Johnson, heading onto familiar turf for her first case. She arrives in Compson, Miss., to join burned-out agent Frank Ranchino on a stalled undercover probe of potential fraud in the University of Central Mississippi's football program. Then star quarterback Matt Talley plunges to his death from the roof of a bar, and the game changes--at least in Rae's mind. Disobeying her pension-minded partner's orders to stay in her lane, Rae goes rogue and poses as a sports journalist to pursue her own, increasingly high stakes investigation into the quarterback's death. Though Cranor calls perhaps a few too many audibles as the plot twists escalate in the novel's final third, his quirky characters, playful humor, and insider's view of the college football landscape ensure that this makes it all way to the end zone. Readers will hope to hear more from Rae soon. Agent: Josh Getzler, HG Literary. (Aug.)

Now that college athletes are finally getting paid, Cranor takes a deep dive into the days when they weren't. The University of Central Mississippi Chiefs quarterback Moses McCloud is a Black freshman who's backing up Matt Talley, a white star thrust to nationwide prominence by his success last season. So it's not very likely that Moses will see much playing time--at least until Matt, fresh from his team's latest victory, takes a header from a rooftop that ends his career, his life, and, thanks to the bag of money scattered around him, maybe his reputation. Mississippi state congressman Harry Christmas, whose years-long scheme to revitalize the region and incidentally enrich himself by paying to recruit and control top talent on the field, is furious that a distracted Matt didn't throw the game, as Harry's bagman, Eddie Pride Junior, had ordered him. But not so furious that he can't turn on a dime and tender a similar deal to Moses. When the kid turns down the money, Harry threatens to call in Eddie's crippling debts unless he persuades his daughter Ella May, who was with Matt on that roof moments before his hard landing, to offer herself to Moses, who'd resigned himself to losing that competition to Matt, too. Meanwhile, computer expert Rae Johnson, a rookie FBI agent whose father was a legendary football coach, is determined to look more closely into the star quarterback's death, even though her much older partner, Frank Ranchino, keeps reminding her that their job description includes financial crimes, not murder. Cranor expertly keeps the pot simmering until a pervasive stench settles over virtually all parties. A powerful case for the proposition that "college football wasn't a game at all; it was a business." Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.