Mississippi Blue 42

Compson, Mississippi, 2014: Newly-minted FBI Special Agent Rae Johnson knows a thing or two about the gridiron. She practically grew up on the football field, alongside her father, a legendary national-championship-winning college coach. Which is why she's perfect for her first assignment out of Quantico: to investigate illicit money flows in a booming football town in central Mississippi. White-collar crime.

Rae brings fresh knowledge to the sting, but her mission to bust the so-called bagmen--diehard fans who effect recruiting decisions and game outcomes through under-the-table cash bonuses to players--has been unsuccessful. Things get complicated when the star quarterback of the University of Central Mississippi team is flung off a roof to his death, a money-filled gym bag beside him. Rae isn't there to investigate murder, it's not in her jurisdiction--but try as she may to push it away, something's going on in Compson, Mississippi. Something not quite right.

To get to the bottom of it, Rae must ingratiate herself with the people of Compson--the players, and gridiron girls, and coaches, and politicians, who comprise the complex social machinery of the small-town football empire. A heart-pounding noir thriller, Edgar-winning author Eli Cranor's latest is an ambitious and well-researched dive into the crooked corners, the tenuous alliances, and the power-hungry sideliners of America's most popular game.