The Whisper of Leaves A Novel by Craig Smith September 2002 paper, 0-8093-2480-6, $14.00t 336 pages,  6 x 9 Mystery / Fiction / Illinois Interest   Bronze Medal Winner for the 2002 ForeWord Mystery Book of the Year     In a southern Illinois college town where horror is carved in flesh and corruption knows no bounds, a young English professor with a shrouded past is about to learn higher education can be murder.   sooon, JosIe, i promiss No one remembers how the body of Josie Fortune was found deep inside Lues Creek Canyon twenty years ago. No one remembers how corrupt police officials framed an innocent man and handed the victim’s daughter into the state’s welfare system. No one remembers, no one but a killer left to carve out a brutal legacy of torture and murder with absolute impunity in this rural southern Illinois college town.   WilcuM HoM Josie When Josie Darling returns to Lues State to assume a teaching position and come to terms with her mother’s murder, she takes every precaution to hide her tainted past from her colleagues. But someone close remembers, and the shadows of history close in. Threats come, intimate promises of violence written in a desperately psychotic scrawl, invading every aspect of her life. Confronted by personal and professional jeopardy at every turn, Josie must face her terror and expose the identity of her mother’s killer—a killer who is now stalking her.   u R Heer in mY dReEms “If you think you can sleuth this thing, I’m afraid you’re in over your head,” warns a local investigator, but Josie’s stake in this case is all too personal and all the more immediate as she uncovers other murders. Her list of potential suspects includes her deranged ex-husband, her outlaw stepfather and any of his rogue clan, several manipulative English professors, and a host of corrupt local lawmen.    stil tHinkING Of u, hoR Struggling against an unseen but ever-present enemy and with few allies to counsel her, Josie embarks on an odyssey of self-discovery. Using her well-honed research skills, the academic becomes the detective and sets out to recover her birthright. Josie transforms herself from tormented victim to relentless avenger as she takes on the intense willfulness of her namesake. But even her renewed strength of character may not help Fortune’s Darling save herself and find the elusive killer’s true identity in time, an identity heard only in the whisper of leaves.     Praise for The Whisper of Leaves . . .   “Craig Smith proves he can hold the reader in tight suspense. . . . The Whisper of Leaves is an expertly crafted tale. The characters, Josie especially, come to life—and briefly become parts of our lives. And Smith’s plot is shatterproof, with all the elements lining up sensibly and logically.” —The Mystery Review (Rating: Three Daggers, out of four )   “Smith delineates his large cast concisely and writes with verve and style about campus life.” —Kirkus Reviews   “[A] serial killer stalks a southern Illinois college town. When Professor Josie Darling returns to teach at Lues State twenty years after her mother's murder, she must contend with a lot more than the usual academic battles in this dark, cat-and-mouse thriller.” —Publishers Weekly     Praise for the previous novels of Craig Smith . . . “compelling and tightly written”—Americana Annual “brilliant scene setting”—London Publishing News “taut and compelling psycho-thriller”—London Bookseller “not for the faint-hearted”—Hamburg Abendblatter     Read the SIUC Media and Communications Resources news release   Born in Terre Haute, Indiana, Craig Smith presently lives in Lucerne, Switzerland. He received a Ph.D. in English from Southern Illinois University Carbondale in 1988 and has been a professor at Arkansas State University and the University of Northern Colorado. Smith has published two novels in Europe. The Whisper of Leaves is his American debut.       From The Whisper of Leaves . . . “Josie fought the tears of impotence and ignorance and rage. She cursed the man in the hot silence. Then she shivered at the end he had planned for her. She would never find him in time. How was she ever going to know who was doing this until it was too late? How could she see him coming? He was nothing more than a ghost! The truth was, there was no answer to this riddle. She would not find him among the shadows of history. That was only the delusion of an angry young woman. There were no answers in obscure texts for this puzzle. There was no help from the police. How long she would live was his decision and his alone. The more she struggled to find out something, the more he laughed at her. He would laugh as long as he was enjoying himself, at any rate. When he grew tired of the game, he would come for her. From the dark? In the daylight? Smiling in her face? Hiding in a shadow?”