That’s the least of the revelations to greet Faith Zanetti on her return to Moscow, a city she last lived in some fifteen years ago. A lot has changed since then – no more Soviet Union, for one thing – but a lot hasn’t. The dead-eyed thugs who arrest Faith before she’s had time to unpack may no longer call themselves KGB, but they dance to that old familiar music. And while Faith is now a (semi) respectable journalist, rather than the tear-away teen bride of a Russian bootlegger, she’s about to learn a lesson that the Russians themselves have known all along: The past is never so deeply buried that it can’t reach out and bite you in the back.

DATELINE: Jerusalem. Foreign correspondent Faith Zanetti has her dream job: She lives in swanky overseas hotels, on somebody else’s dime, and she’s in nearly constant danger of being blown up. Bliss.

What’s the appeal? With enough sniper-fire, nobody counts your drinks or your inappropriate one-night stands. And with tomorrow’s newspaper deadline always looming, there’s never time to think about the lies you’ve told, the promises you’ve broken, the things you should have done differently. But when Faith’s best friend and favorite drinking pal is murdered, there isn’t enough vokda in Israel to blot out the pain she’s spent a lifetime running from. In fact, there’s only one possible response: Light a cigarette and go after the story.

Smart, damaged, and able to out-drink any man in the joint, Faith Zanetti is very much a heroine for today. Reviewers have likened her to Bridget Jones, but in fact she’s much tougher and grittier than that. A better comparison: Kay Scarpetta, as she appeared in the early novels of Patricia Cornwell, but leavened with a gloriously cynical, pitch-black sense of humor.

“This is a keeper; don’t miss it” — Booklist (starred review)

“Faith Zanetti is a heroine who was waiting to be created: Tough, emotionally damaged, and drenched in alcohol, with a heart as hard as her copy and an attraction towards blood and suffering” —Sunday Herald (UK)

“Like Bridget Jones on high-test vodka, Faith Zanetti is the kind of girl to make your mother shudder and your father drool … sharp and hilarious” —The Guardian (UK)

“Faith Zanetti is the heroine we’d all love to be” —The Mail on Sunday (UK)

“Narrated by the fearless Faith Zanetti, and populated by a collection of nervous wrecks, thrill-junkies, and shameless alcoholics, The Bad News Bible whizzes along at terrific speed” —Sunday Telegraph (UK)

“There is an edge of terrible truth throughout” —South China Morning Post (Hong Kong)

The second book in the Faith Zanetti series, Vodka Neat, is coming out from Felony & Mayhem in July 2009