When New York bookseller and part time burglar Bernie Rhodenbarr is asked to purloin a collection of old letters from an unscrupulous literary agent, Bernie considers that this job will be a labor of love. The letters consist mostly of correspondence from author Gulliver Fairborn to his former agent Anthea Landau. Fairborn, an extremely reclusive individual, considers these letters to be private property, their contents not for public consumption. But Anthea Landau has announced that she has every intention of auctioning them off to the highest bidder. Every collector, so-called expert and would-be biographer of Fairborn descends upon New York on hearing this news.

Years earlier, Fairborn had written a novel entitled Nobody's Baby, which Bernie Rhodenbarr read while in his teens, and which he credits with having changed his life. Bernie figures he owes Fairborn a debt of gratitude for having written that book. So when Fairborn's one-time paramour, Alice Cottrell, walks into Barnegat Books on East Eleventh Street and lays out the details for Bernie, and how grateful Fairborn would be for the return and/or destruction of the letters, Bernie jumps at the chance to be of service.

Unfortunately, things are seldom as simple as they might first appear. Anthea Landau turns up dead, murdered, with Bernie in her apartment and the police knocking at the door. With the letters now missing and an unwanted corpse on his hands, to say nothing of a mysterious ruby necklace that seems to be in some way connected to the case, Bernie realizes he will have to work quickly if he is to keep himself out of jail, and Fairborn's letters from falling into the wrong hands.

This book is peopled with an assortment of quirky characters typical of a Lawrence Block story. To name just a few, there is the smarmy hotel desk clerk who colors his hair with shoe polish, the streetwise cop who has learned years ago that it is easier (and more profitable) to work with Bernie the Burglar than against him, and an Amazonian toothpick fish called a candiru which... well, you'll just have to read that part for yourself.

Lawrence Block is among the most respected writers of crime fiction working at this time, and with good reason. His stories are always expertly crafted, with plots that are interesting and intelligent, dialogue that is crisp and funny, characters who could have stepped from real life, and pacing that is brisk and engaging. The Burglar in the Rye is no exception to any of this. A fun read from the first page to the last, this is a worthy entry in the Bernie Rhodenbarr series.

Block's unexpected twists of plot and his knack for turning colorful and humorous phrases will keep the reader smiling all the way through the book, and then looking around for more Lawrence Block to read.