Salvation Boulevard: A Novel

A critically acclaimed thriller by one of America’s best mystery writers about death, faith, religion, God, and the real mysteries of life

Publishers Weekly

Best known for American Hero(1994), the jaunty political novel that became the film Wag the Dog, Beinhart offers something less jaunty but definitely more ambitious in this splendid religious legal thriller. When Ahmad Nazami, a Muslim scholarship student at the University of the Southwest, confesses under duress to the murder of Nathaniel MacLeod, an atheist philosophy professor, PI Carl Van Wagener, a born-again Christian, agrees to help Manny Goldfarb, a celebrated Jewish defense lawyer, prove Nazami's innocence. Van Wagener, a member of charismatic pastor Paul Plowright's Cathedral of the Third Millennium, is soon on the trail of a missing manuscript MacLeod wrote disproving God's existence. In a beautifully understated author's note, Beinhart lays out the factual basis for his provocative morality tale and invites readers to visit his Web site, which includes "a forum for an ongoing dialogue about religion, irreligion, faith, belief, and their intersections with politics, war, money, life, and death." (Sept.)

Larry Beinhart is the author of Wag the Dog (originally published as American Hero) on which the film starring Robert De Niro was based, and The Librarian. His No One Rides for Free (1986) received the 1987 Edgar Award for Best First Novel. He currently resides in Woodstock, New York, with his wife and two children.