Walter Satterthwait: Wilde West (USA 2014)

From the Publisher:
A savage killer haunts the lecture tour of a vaunted Irish playwright
Though a world-renowned dandy, Oscar Wilde is not too refined for Colorado. As he travels across America on the lecture circuit, the famously witty playwright has found much to love about the western states. Whiskey, saloons, and friendly conversation with notables like John "Doc" Holliday -- Wilde loves it all. There is even, in every town his entourage visits, a sensational murder.

In the nights after Wilde gives his talks, a man with a knife goes lurking in the back alleys and red-light districts of these dusty western towns. Each morning, the police find the remains of a savagely murdered prostitute. Booze-addled detective Earl Grigsby is tracking the killer, and suspects Wilde may be the one with blood on his hands. If he ever wants to leave America, Wilde will have to use his wit to unmask the savage killer.

Walter Satterthwait: Wilde West. mysteriouspress.com, ISBN: 9781453251232 (June, 2014), 1407 KB, ca. 376 p., $.9.99.

Walter Satterthwait: Wilde West (UK 1992)

From the Publisher:
Midway through his triumphant lecture tour of the American West, the young Oscar Wilde discovers that someone in his entourage has been savagely murdering prostitutes. US Marshal Robert Grigsby - gruff, resolute, and occasionally sober - suspects Oscar. And so the flamboyant aesthete, determined to clear his name, sets out to reveal the madman's identity by what he calls 'a systematic application of the poetic imagination.'

Before he finally confronts the killer, Wilde conducts a passionate affair with the fiancée of the most powerful man in Colorado; samples the pleasures of opium; finds himself stalked by a brutal, bearlike buffalo hunter; and shares an occasional drink with the mysterious Doc Holliday, gunman and gambler. A tense mystery, a perverse comedy, Wilde West is a brilliant novel that includes, as all books should, murder, sex, insanity, cannibalism, and a herd of goats.

Advance praise for WILDE WEST by Walter Satterthwait
'This perfect blend of mystery, satire and travelogue...' -- US Publishers Weekly
'The hunt for the killer is almost as riveting and as gruesome as the one in The Silence of the Lambs' -- Denver Post
'Wilde sparkles, and Satterthwait's way with historical figures (as in Miss Lizzie) is easy to take' -- US Kirkus Review
'Satterthwait, who also brought Lizzie Borden to life in Miss Lizzie, more than does justice to his inspired choice of Wilde as a protagonist. Sharp writing; lively fiction.' -- US Library Journal

Jacket photo: Colin Thomas

Walter Satterthwait: Wilde West. Collins Crime Club, ISBN: 0002323761 (February, 1992), 374 p., £14.99.

Walter Satterthwait: Wilde West (USA 1991)

From the Publisher:
Midway through his triumphant lecture tour of the American West, English writer Oscar Wilde discovers that someone in his entourage has been savagely murdering prostitutes. U.S. Marshal Robert Grigsby -- gruff, resolute, and occasionally sober -- suspects Oscar. And so the flamboyant esthete, determined to clear his name, sets out to reveal the madman's identity by what he calls a "systematic application of the poetic imagination."

Before he finally confronts the killer, Wilde conducts a passionate affair with the fiancée of the most powerful man in Colorado; samples the pleasures of opium; finds himself stalked by a brutal, bearlike buffalo hunter; and shares an occasional drink with the mysterious Doc Holliday, gunman and gambler. A tense mystery, a perverse comedy, Wilde West is a brilliant novel that includes, as all books should, murder, sex, insanity, cannibalism, and a herd of goats.

WALTER SATTERTHWAIT is the author of Wall of Glass (SMP, 1988), Miss Lizzie (SMP, 1989), and At Ease with the Dead (SMP, 1990). He lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Jacket art by John Nickle

Walter Satterthwait: Wilde West. St. Martin's Press / A Thomas Dunne Book, ISBN: 0312059973 (August, 1991), 374 p., $.19.95.