Book Recommendation: New England White

New England White, by Stephen L. Carter
The author's long-awaited second novel [his first was The Emperor of Ocean Park] is an absorbing, brilliantly written mystery set in a prestigious Ivy League University (not Yale) set in a New England city (not New Haven), insists the author, a Yale Law School professor. The story begins when the body of an Economics professor is found by University President Carlyle and his wife, Julia, who is a deputy Dean at the divinity school, and a one-time lover of the victim. All the richly drawn characters are somehow connected to the murdered man, who was in the process of solving a 30-year-old crime. A wonderful, captivating read depicting the successful African-American upper class living in the "heart of whiteness" and the political intrigue created by the motive behind the murder. --Jetty