Beinhart feels that Salvation Boulevard is a "more distinctly fictional" book than others he's done in the past. "I would guess the reason is that there is no public place where the drama of what faith really is has been played out. We have plenty of people acting on faith. Plenty of people moving in and out of it and some opposing it, but nowhere where the investigation of what it really is has been played out."

In Salvation Boulevard, then, the author corrects this cosmic oversight. If you ask, for instance, why Beinhart wrote this book at this time, you can expect to get an earful. There is no easy answer, it would seem, but it's all deeply interesting.

"Religion has returned as the number one excuse for violence and war," the author says. "The 21st Century has started out as a bad acid flashback of the 12th. We should be asking why. People who believe speak out in defense of faith, how good, how wonderful it is. The New Atheists look at their truth claims and find them ridiculous, look at their actions and find them hideous, and can't figure out why anyone would believe or even accept belief in others. It would seem, on the face of it, that figuring out why people believe would be our number one academic industry and our number one national security priority, but there is no meaningful dialogue about it. That's why I wrote the book and even though it's a thriller and a murder mystery and a detective story with chases and shoot outs and some sexy stuff, that's what it's really about."

Beinhart has written six previous novels, as well as three with his wife, Gillian Farrell. He is also the author of two highly acclaimed works of non-fiction: Fog Facts: Searching for Truth in the Land of Spin (Nation Books, 2005) and How to Write A Mystery (Ballantine, 1996). He has been awarded the Edgar, the Gold Dagger, the Grand Prix de Literature Policier, New York Times notable book of the year, and was a Raymond Chandler/Fulbright Fellow. He lives in Woodstock, New York with Farrell and their children.

Contributing editor Linda L. Richards is also the editor of January Magazine and a contributor to The Rap Sheet.  Her fifth novel, DEATH WAS IN THE PICTURE, will be published St. Martin's Minotaur/Thomas Dunne January 2009.