Third Place Books presents Jeffrey D. Briggs and James W. Ziskin

Third Place Books presents Jeffrey D. Briggs and James W. Ziskin

Within a Shadowed Forest and Turn to Stone

Wednesday, October 14, 2020 - 6:00pm

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Recovering from the physical and emotional wounds she suffered in Out of the Cold Dark Sea, Martha Whitaker travels to Duluth, Minn., to help her friend James MacAuliffe. 

Someone blew up his truck and a charred body is discovered in the wreckage. Together, they pursue a trail of clues that leads them up the North Shore to the scenic village of Grand Marais, into the vast northern forest, and onto the frigid waters of Lake Superior in search of a shadowed killer. 

Before they become the next victims. 

Within a Shadowed Forest is the thrilling sequel in the Waterfront Mystery series that began with Out of the Cold Dark Sea.


Florence, Italy, August 1963. In Italy to accept a posthumous award for her late father's academic work, "girl reporter" Ellie Stone is invited to spend a weekend outside Florence with some of the scholars attending the symposium. 

A suspected rubella outbreak leaves the ten friends quarantined in the bucolic setting with little to do but tell stories to entertain themselves. Deciding to make the best of their confinement, the men and women spin tales, gorge themselves on fine Tuscan food and wine, and enjoy the delicious fruit of transient love. 

But the summer bacchanalia takes a menacing turn when the man who organized the symposium is fished out of the Arno. "Morto." As long-buried secrets rise to the surface, Ellie must figure out if one or more of her newfound friends is capable of murder.

Jeffrey D. Briggs, a writer and journalist, has been writing about the waterfront since he moved onto his over sailboat thirty years ago. He now lives on land in Shoreline with his wife and dog and can often be found on the shores of Puget Sound, wondering what secrets lie hidden beneath those cold waters.

Jeffrey has published over 350 articles in regional and national magazines. A long-time resident of Seattle, he took a detour in life and moved to Rochester, Minn., where he became a biomedical science writer for Mayo Clinic, and got to preview all his future diseases. He also got to spend many happy times exploring the North Shore of Lake Superior. When he could no longer see out his office window because of snow drifts, he returned home to the Pacific Northwest, dropping anchor in Richmond Beach, on the shores of Puget Sound.

James W. Ziskin, Jim to his friends, is the Anthony and Macavity award-winning author fo the Ellie Stone mysteries. His books have also been finalists for the Edgar, Barry, and Lefty awards. He worked in New York as a photo-news producer and writer, and then as director of NYU’s Casa Italiana. 

He spent fifteen years in the Hollywood post-production industry, running large international operations in the subtitling/localization and visual effects fields. His international experience includes two years working and studying in France, extensive time in Italy, and more than three years in India. He speaks Italian and French.