The Rosary Murders
  • Published:
    1979
  • Formats:
    Print / eBook
  • Series:
  • Main Genre:
    Amateur Sleuth
  • Time Period:
    Contemporary
  • Pages:
    296
  • Rating:
  • Purchase:
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"A sophisticated and baffling thriller . . . a real bone-freezer." -- Publishers Weekly

"Ingenious, witty, literate -- at once irreverent and compassionate -- an impressive tour indeed for a first-time novelist." -- Los Angeles Times

"Well-paced, tightly written, exciting as hell, and, quite possibly, the best mystery I've read in years." -- Dallas Times-Herald

The Rosary Murders
was William X. Kienzle's first Father Koesler mystery, published in 1978. Twenty-three more books followed, creating a best-selling mystery series mostly set in Detroit and reflecting the personality of its hero, Father Robert Koesler, a diocesan priest with a penchant for sleuthing. The Rosary Murders was named one of the top twenty-five mysteries of the twentieth century in spring 2000 by the Chicago Sun-Times. It was also made into a movie, with Donald Sutherland in the role of Father Koesler.

In The Rosary Murders, Detroit priests and nuns are being methodically murdered; all are found with a plain black rosary entwined between their fingers as a calling card. From Ash Wednesday, when the murderer first struck, the police seem helpless to solve the string of senseless murders. The weeks that follow become a nightmare for the crack homicide team headed by Lieutenant Walter Koznicki, until Father Koesler breaks the madmen's code.

Here is a story with tension, excitement, intelligence, and a rare wit and humor. Kienzle painstakingly leads you through every step in an intensive police investigation of heinous series of murders. Police procedure  and Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper reporting are as much a part of the action as the crimes themselves.

With superb control of the novel's movement, Kienzle can tantalize at a tortoise's pace and torment with a breakneck hare's pace.
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EDITIONS
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    • First Edition
    • Mar-1978
    • HarperCollins
    • Paperback
    • ISBN: 0061317063
    • ISBN13: 9780061317064
    •  
    • Feb-1980
    • Bantam
    • Mass Market Paperback
    • ISBN: 0553264060
    • ISBN13: 9780553264067
    •  
    • Mar-1980
    • Bantam
    • Mass Market Paperback
    • ISBN: 0553232738
    • ISBN13: 9780553232738
    •  
    • 1981
    • Bantam
    • Mass Market Paperback
    • ISBN: 055314930X
    • ISBN13: 9780553149302
    •  
    • Dec-1984
    • Bantam
    • Mass Market Paperback
    • ISBN: 0553250841
    • ISBN13: 9780553250848
    •  
    • Sep-1989
    • Ballantine
    • Mass Market Paperback
    • ISBN: 0345356683
    • ISBN13: 9780345356680
    •  
    • Jan-1979
    • Andrews McMeel Publishing
    • Hardcover
    • ISBN: 0836261011
    • ISBN13: 9780836261011
    •  
    • Jan-1990
    • MacMillan
    • Hardcover
    • ISBN: 0896211738
    • ISBN13: 9780896211735
    •  
    • May-2012
    • Andrews McMeel Publishing, LLC
    • eBook
    • ISBN: 1449424767
    • ISBN13: 9781449424763
    •  
    • May-2012
    • Andrews McMeel Publishing, LLC
    • eBook (Kindle)
    •  
    • Oct-1988
    • Thorndike Press
    • Trade Paperback
    • ISBN: 089621205X
    • ISBN13: 9780896212053
    • Large Print



View the Complete William X. Kienzle Book List