Book picks similar to
Long Lost Dog of It by Michael Kazepis
noir
broken-river-books
crime
neo-noir
The Blade Itself
Marcus Sakey - 2007
Danny Carter and his best friend, Evan, earned theirs knocking over pawnshops and liquor stores, living from score to score, never thinking of tomorrow.Then a job went desperately wrong, and in the roar of a gun blast, everything changed. Years later, Danny doesn't think about his past. He's built a new world for himself: a legitimate career, a long-term girlfriend, and a clean conscience. He's just like anyone else. Normal. Successful. Happy. Until he spots his old partner staring him down in a smoky barroom mirror. The prison-hardened Evan is barely recognizable. Having served his time without dropping Danny's name, his old friend believes he's owed major payback---and he's willing to do anything to get it. With all he loves on the line and nowhere to turn, Danny realizes his new life hinges on a terrible choice: How far will he go to protect his future from his past? A debut novel that's drawn comparison to Dennis Lehane, Laura Lippman, and Quentin Tarantino, The Blade Itself is the story of a good man held hostage by circumstance; a riveting exploration of class, identity, and the demons that shape us, where every effort to do the right thing leads to terrifying consequences and one inevitable conclusion: The more you have, the more you have to lose.
Iron House
John Hart - 2011
Time to burn and time to kill, time for two young orphans to learn that life isn’t won without a fight. Julian survives only because his older brother, Michael, is fearless and fiercely protective. When tensions boil over and a boy is brutally killed, there is only one sacrifice left for Michael to make: He flees the orphanage and takes the blame with him.To keep her safe... For two decades, Michael has been an enforcer in New York’s world of organized crime, a prince of the streets so widely feared he rarely has to kill anymore. But the life he’s fought to build unravels when he meets Elena, a beautiful innocent who teaches him the meaning and power of love. He wants a fresh start with her, the chance to start a family like the one he and Julian never had. But someone else is holding the strings. And escape is not that easy. . . . Go to Hell, and come back burning.... The mob boss who gave Michael his blessing to begin anew is dying, and his son is intent on making Michael pay for his betrayal. Determined to protect the ones he loves, Michael spirits Elena—who knows nothing of his past crimes, or the peril he’s laid at her door— back to North Carolina, to the place he was born and the brother he lost so long ago. There, he will encounter a whole new level of danger, a thicket of deceit and violence that leads inexorably to the one place he’s been running from his whole life: Iron House.
Lake Country
Sean Doolittle - 2012
His punishment: two days in jail for every year of his probation. But for one friend of the victim’s family—an ex-marine named Darryl Potter—this punishment isn’t enough. Potter sets out to even the score by kidnapping Benson’s twenty-year-old daughter. It’s a bad, bad plan, and only Mike Barlowe, Potter’s former combat buddy, knows how to stop it. With a beautiful news reporter, the cops, and a bounty hunter on Potter’s tail, Barlowe races to head off his troubled friend before innocent people get hurt. The hunters and the hunted plunge north into Minnesota’s Lake Country, each with their own ambitions and demons, each headed for a violent collision—and for one horrifying moment of life or death.“As long as there are writers like Sean Doolittle out there, American crime fiction has got a sterling future ahead of it.”—Dennis Lehane“With
Lake Country,
Sean Doolittle has out-
Fargo
ed
Fargo
. Already a master of Midwestern noir, he takes a huge, novelistic leap with his newest work, a complex, quirky, and tremendously satisfying story of revenge and redemption. If you haven’t yet read a Doolittle novel, you’ve missed the cutting edge of crime fiction today. Trust me, this guy is the future.”—William Kent Krueger,
New York Times
bestselling author of
Northwest Angle
A Hint of Death
Quintin Jardine - 2014
With Chief Constable Bob Skinner's help, Haddock will soon discover that outward appearances are never as they seem, and that no crime can go unpunished... Also features an exclusive extract from Quintin Jardine's brand-new Bob Skinner mystery, HOUR OF DARKNESS.
On My Life
Angela Clarke - 2019
Imprisoned. Pregnant.Jenna thought she had the perfect life: a loving fiancé, a great job, a beautiful home. Then she finds her stepdaughter murdered; her partner missing.And the police think she did it...Locked up to await trial, surrounded by prisoners who'd hurt her if they knew what she's accused of, certain someone close to her has framed her, Jenna knows what she needs to do:Clear her nameSave her babyFind the killerBut can she do it in time?'An angry, powerful read - one of those rare crime novels with more to deliver than routine thrills.' Mick Herron, author of London Rules'A compelling, vividly realised prison drama with a mystery at its heart. Hugely enjoyed it.' Steve Cavanagh, author of Thirteen'This is an eye-opening, jaw-dropping read that will keep you up to the wee small hours.' Liz Nugent, author of Skin Deep'Intelligent, pacy thriller... Taut, claustrophobic, fast-paced, moving. An incredibly gripping read.'Will Dean, author of Dark Pines
The Execution of Noa P. Singleton
Elizabeth L. Silver - 2013
Singleton never spoke a word in her own defense throughout a brief trial that ended with a jury finding her guilty of first-degree murder. Ten years later, having accepted her fate, she sits on death row in a maximum-security penitentiary, just six months away from her execution date. Seemingly out of the blue, she is visited by Marlene Dixon, a high-powered Philadelphia attorney who is also the mother of the woman Noa was imprisoned for killing. Marlene tells Noa that she has changed her mind about the death penalty and Noa’s sentence, and will do everything in her considerable power to convince the governor to commute the sentence to life in prison, in return for the one thing Noa is unwilling to trade: her story. Marlene desperately wants Noa to reveal the events that led to her daughter’s death—events that Noa has never shared with a soul. With death looming, Marlene believes that Noa may finally give her the answers she needs, though Noa is far from convinced that Marlene deserves the salvation she alone can deliver. Inextricably linked by murder but with very different goals, Noa and Marlene wrestle with the sentences life itself can impose while they confront the best and worst of what makes us human in this haunting tale of love, anguish, and deception.
Strangers
David Moody - 2014
The bodies of the dead – savagely mutilated, unspeakably defiled – are piling up with terrifying speed. There are no apparent motives and no obvious connections between the victims, but the killings only began when Scott Griffiths and his family arrived in Thussock...“In his evocation of fear and unease and the speed with which he grips you, he brings to mind old Brit horror writer James Herbert. And that is some recommendation.” —London Lite“Moody has the power to make the most mundane and ordinary characters interesting and believable, and is reminiscent of Stephen King at his finest.” —Shadowlocked"Moody is as imaginative as Barker, as compulsory as King, and as addictive as Palahniuk." —Scream the Horror Magazine
Jack of Spades
Joyce Carol Oates - 2015
Rush has achieved the kind of critical and commercial success most authors only dream about: He has a top agent and publisher in New York, and his twenty-eight mystery novels have sold millions of copies. Only Stephen King, one of the few mystery writers whose fame exceeds his own, is capable of inspiring a twinge of envy in Rush. But Rush is hiding a dark secret. Under the pseudonym "Jack of Spades," he pens another string of novels—noir thrillers that are violent, lurid, masochistic. These are novels that the upstanding Rush wouldn't be caught reading, let alone writing. When his daughter comes across a Jack of Spades novel he has carelessly left out, she picks it up and begins to ask questions. Meanwhile, Rush receives a court summons in the mail explaining that a local woman has accused him of plagiarizing her own self-published fiction. Before long, Rush's reputation, career, and family life all come under threat—and in his mind he begins to hear the taunting voice of the Jack of Spades.
An American Outlaw
John Stonehouse - 2013
His brothers-in-arms are mere shadows of their former selves—Gil, unmarked—determines to take care of them. But how far should a man go for the people he loves? Stepping across the line between right and wrong, Gil finds himself stranded in the Texan desert—as a bank heist he's planned goes horribly wrong. Pursued into the badlands by US Marshal John Whicher, Gil crosses paths with Tennille Labrea; an outlander, with her own demons to fight. Shielding a secret too precious to share with anyone, she's ready to cross her own line in the sand. What makes an outlaw? Marshal John Whicher, veteran of the First Gulf War thinks he knows. But can natural justice ever outrank the law? For three very different people a moment of reckoning is set in train: violent, defining; inescapable.
Edgar and Lucy
Victor Lodato - 2017
Eight-year-old Edgar Fini remembers nothing of the accident people still whisper about. He only knows that his father is gone, his mother has a limp, and his grandmother believes in ghosts. When Edgar meets a man with his own tragic story, the boy begins a journey into a secret wilderness where nothing is clear—not even the line between the living and the dead. In order to save her son, Lucy has no choice but to confront the demons of her past. Profound, shocking, and beautiful, Edgar and Lucy is a thrilling adventure and the unlikeliest of love stories.
The Other Woman
Hank Phillippi Ryan - 2012
Detective Jake Brogan is investigating a possible serial killer that may be hunting down Boston's young women under the city's bridges. As the body count rises and election looms closer, it becomes clear to Jane and Jake that their cases are connected...and that they may be facing a ruthless killer who will stop at nothing to silence a scandal. Dirty politics, dirty tricks, and a barrage of final twists, The Other Woman is the first in an explosive new series from Hank Phillipi Ryan. Seduction, betrayal, and murder—it'll take a lot more than votes to win this election.
Nightfall
David Goodis - 1947
Is he an innocent artist who just happens to have some very dangerous people interested in him? Or is he a killer on the lam from his last murder—with a satchel worth over $300,000 in tow?Relentlessly focused, Nightfall may be David Goodis’ most accomplished novel. It is a fiendishly constructed maze, filled with unpredictable pitfalls and human predators whose authenticity only makes them more terrifying.David Goodis (1917–1967), a former pulp, radio, and Hollywood script writer, is now recognized as a leading author of crime fiction. Besides sojourns in New York City and Hollywood, he lived primarily in Philadelphia.
All He Saw Was The Girl
Peter Leonard - 2011
Rome:McCabe and Chip, two American exchange students, are about to become embroiled with a violent street gang, a beautiful Italian girl, and a flawed kidnapping plan.Detroit:Sharon Vanelli’s affair with Joey Palermo, a Mafia enforcer, is about to be discovered by her husband, Ray, a secret service agent.Brilliantly plotted and shot through with wry humor, ALL HE SAW WAS THE GIRL sees these two narratives collide in the backstreets of Italy’s oldest city.
Maybe I Should Just Shoot You In The Face
Brian PanowichMark Krajnak - 2014
This collection features new stories from all the Zelmer Pulp regulars as well as stunning noir photography from Mark Krajnak and an introduction by Brit Grit Godfather Paul D. Brazill.Zelmer Pulp arrives with both guns out in this Volume 1 noir collection.
The Rapist
Les Edgerton - 2013
Master storyteller Les Edgerton guides us on a haunting journey inside the criminal mind to show that no matter how depraved a person appears to be, there might still exist a spark of humanity.