Crime Writer Andrew Welsh-Huggins in conversation with author Julia Keller!

Join award-winning writer for the launch of his new thriller, , when a former postal inspection agent tracks a violent crew through the Midwest to rescue a kidnapped woman. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and crime novelist will be in conversation with Andrew.

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Mercury Carter is a delivery man and he takes his job very seriously. When a parcel is under his care, he will stop at nothing to deliver it directly to its intended recipient. Not even, as in the current case, when he finds a crew of violent men at the indicated address that threaten his life and take the woman who lives there hostage. That’s because Carter has special skills from his former life as a federal agent with the postal inspection service, skills that make him particularly useful for delivering items in circumstances as dangerous as these.

After Carter dispatches the goons sent to K*ll him, he enters a home besieged by criminals—but the leader of the gang escapes with attorney Rachel Stanfield before the mailman can complete his assignment. With Rachel’s husband Glenn in tow, Carter takes off in pursuit of the kidnapper and his quarry, hunting them across Indiana, up to Chicago, and into small-town Illinois. Along the way, he slowly picks off members of the crew and uncovers a far-reaching conspiracy and a powerful crime syndicate, all in service of his main objective: to hand the package over to Rachel. Carter has never missed a delivery and isn’t about to start now.

Introducing a new lone-wolf protagonist to rival Lee Child’s Jack Reacher, Steve Hamilton’s Nick Mason, and Gregg Hurwitz’s Evan Smoak, The Mailman is a pulse-pounding series opener with captivating action and enough thrills to leave readers anxiously awaiting the next installment.

Andrew Welsh-Huggins is the author of Shamus, Derringer, and ITW-award-nominated author of the Andy Hayes Private Eye series, author of the Shamus Award-nominated An Empty Grave, and editor of Columbus Noir, the 101st title in Akashic Books' award-winning series of short mystery fiction anthologies. Andrew's short mystery fiction has appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, Mystery Magazine, Mystery Tribune, the anthology The Best Mystery Stories of the Year 2021, and other magazines and anthologies. Andrew's nonfiction book, No Winners Here Tonight, is the definitive history of the death penalty in Ohio.

Julia Keller won a Pulitzer Prize for her work at the Chicago Tribune, but her journalism career began at the Columbus Dispatch, where she was a staff writer and television critic. Like Andrew, she writes a mystery series under the umbrella, Bell Elkins Novels. Her most recent book is Quitting: A Life Strategy: The Myth of Perseverance—and How the New Science of Giving Up Can Set You Free. She is a visiting professor at the University of Notre Dame.

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