Box Nine by Jack O'Connell

The drug is called Lingo, and it’s the most powerful narcotic Lenore has ever seen. This cheaply manufactured pill races straight for the brain’s language center, supercharging it so that even a dimwitted person can speak and read at 1,500 words per minute. It induces giddiness, confidence, and sexual euphoria—with a side effect of murderous rage. The drug has come to Quinsigamond, a fading industrial center in the heart of Massachusetts, and it’s going to tear this town apart.

 

Lenore believes she can stop that from happening. A narcotics detective with a few addictions of her own—amphetamines and heavy metal, to name a couple—she loves nothing more than her gun, until she meets Dr. Frederick Woo, the linguist assisting her on the case. Together they can stop the drug—if it doesn’t take hold of them first.

Author Bio: Jack O'Connell's first novel, Box Nine, won the Mysterious Press Discovery Award. His second novel, Wireless, was chosen by the Los Angeles Times as one of the top ten crime novels of 1993. O'Connell is also the author of The Skin Palace and Word Made Flesh. His latest novel, The Resurrectionist, was chosen by Amazon.com as one of the top-10 SF novels of 2008. The winner of Le prix Mystère de la critique and Le Grand Prix de l'Imaginaire in France, the novel was also nominated for the Shirley Jackson Award. O'Connell lives in Worcester, Massachusetts, with his wife and two children.

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