Book picks similar to
The Marceau Case by Harry Stephen Keeler
noir
somewhere-out-there
mĂos
keeler
The Jones: The Full Story: His & Her Side
B.M. Hardin - 2015
Between the two of them, there's lies, secrets and betrayal that neither of them signed up for. Just who's to blame for their problems?Is it Niveah's fault because she just can't seem to keep her "goodies" to herself?"...I couldn’t help but wonder if anyone else noticed that I was reciting my part of the wedding vows, before the preacher had fully stopped talking.After all, this was my third time around..."Or is it Santana's fault because he couldn't tell the truth to save his own life; let alone someone else's?🌟"...Everything, every single detail of my life for the past few years had been planned out; in preparation for this very moment. It had all been for this day; well maybe not this exact day, but I knew that at some point this day would come..."Keeping up with the Jones has never been easy to do, and Niveah and Santana are about to show you why!
The Parrot's Theorem
Denis Guedj - 1998
He turns out to be a bird who discusses maths with anyone who will listen. So when Mr Ruche learns of his friend's mysterious death in the rainforests of Brazil he decides that with the parrot's help he will use these books to teach Max and his twin brother and sister the mysteries and wonders of numbers and shapes.But soon it becomes clear that Mr Ruche has inherited the library for reasons other than pure enlightenment, and before he knows it the household are caught up in a race to prevent the vital theorems falling into the wrong hands.Charming, fresh, with a narrative which races along, the novel takes the reader on a delightful journey through the history of mathematics.
Juice!
Ishmael Reed - 2011
finally obtained the suit O. J. Simpson wore in court the day he was acquitted, and it now stands as both an artifactin their “Trial of the Century” exhibit and a symbol of the American media’s endless hunger for the criminal and the celebrity. This event serves as a launching point for Ishmael Reed’s Juice!, a novelistic commentary on the post-Simpson American media frenzy from one of the most controversial figures in American literature today. Through Paul Blessings—a censored cartoonist suffering from diabetes—and his cohorts—serving as stand-ins for the various mediums of art—Ishmael Reed argues that since 1994, “O. J. has become a metaphor for things wrong with culture and politics.” A lament for the death of print media, the growth of the corporation, and the process of growing old, Juice! serves as a comi-tragedy, chronicling the increased anxieties of “post-race” America.
Private Heat
Robert E. Bailey - 2002
So when the senior partner of one of the premier legal firms in Grand Rapids approaches Hardin about a job protecting his niece from her soon-to-be ex-husband for a couple of days, Hardin isn't exactly eager to take on the job. However, Hardin finds that the fee offered to too great to pass up. After a hatchet attack, a house burnt down, and a few violent encounters with some crooked cops, Hardin can hardly wait for the case to be over. But when the husband is found murdered, the niece attempts suicide, and Hardin is brought in on a trumped-up warrant for the crime, it is no longer a case that he is willing to walk away from -- even if he could.
Memoirs of a Midget
Walter de la Mare - 1921
tells of her early life as a dreamy orphan and, in particular, of her tempestuous twentieth year—in which she falls in love with a beautiful and ambitious full-sized woman and is courted by a male dwarf. Concluding that she must choose either to simply tolerate her difference or grow callous to it, Miss M. resolves to become independent by offering herself up as a spectacle in a circus.[Walter de la Mare (1873–1956) wrote numerous novels, short stories, essays, and poems. He was awarded the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Memoirs of a Midget. Other major works include the children’s novel, The Three Royal Monkeys, Henry Brocken, The Return, and Desert Islands.][Alison Lurie is the author of many highly praised novels as well as two collections of essays on children’s literature, Don’t Tell the Grown-Ups and Boys and Girls Forever. She has taught children’s literature and folklore at Cornell University.]
Damn Near Dead: An Anthology of Geezer Noir
Duane SwierczynskiAllan Guthrie - 2006
Megan Abbott’s “Policy” was nominated for the Anthony Award and became the basis for her novel Queenpin, which won the 2008 Edgar Award.
That Awful Mess on the Via Merulana
Carlo Emilio Gadda - 1957
Called in to investigate, melancholy Detective Ciccio, a secret admirer of the murdered woman and a friend of her husband’s, discovers that almost everyone in the apartment building is somehow involved in the case, and with each new development the mystery only deepens and broadens. Gadda’s sublimely different detective story presents a scathing picture of fascist Italy while tracking the elusiveness of the truth, the impossibility of proof, and the infinite complexity of the workings of fate, showing how they come into conflict with the demands of justice and love. Italo Calvino, Pier Paolo Pasolini, and Alberto Moravia all considered That Awful Mess on the Via Merulana to be the great modern Italian novel. Unquestionably, it is a work of universal significance and protean genius: a rich social novel, a comic opera, an act of political resistance, a blazing feat of baroque wordplay, and a haunting story of life and death in the Eternal City.
The Manuscript Found in Saragossa
Jan Potocki - 1810
But he soon finds himself mysteriously detained at a highway inn in the strange and varied company of thieves, brigands, cabbalists, noblemen, coquettes and gypsies, whose stories he records over sixty-six days. The resulting manuscript is discovered some forty years later in a sealed casket, from which tales of characters transformed through disguise, magic and illusion, of honour and cowardice, of hauntings and seductions, leap forth to create a vibrant polyphony of human voices. Jan Potocki (1761-1812) used a range of literary styles - gothic, picaresque, adventure, pastoral, erotica - in his novel of stories-within-stories, which, like the Decameron and Tales from the Thousand and One Nights, provides entertainment on an epic scale.
Detour
Martin M. Goldsmith - 1939
and the woman of his dreams. Things hit a snag when a bookmaking driver Alex flags down suddenly ends up dead. With its tight, crisp writing comparable to James M. Cain and Chandler, the work translated perfectly on screen into the legendary noir "Detour," perhaps the greatest low-budget film ever made.
Maeve Binchy: Circle of Friends / The Copper Beech (Two Complete Novels)
Maeve Binchy - 2003
Now two of her top-selling works have been brought together for the first time in an outstanding volume that shines with moving storytelling that celebrates Ireland, its people, and the journey of life itself. Circle of Friends is the heartwarming tale of two girls: Benny Hogan and Eve Malone, friends from the time they're in school together. Off to the university in Dublin to begin a new life and face new challenges, they help and support each other in a world that can bring them great new riches, expanded friendships, and also betrayal of the worst kind. In the Copper Beech, the children of the village of Shancarrig grow up without much obvious excitement, but there's far more there than meets the eye. The mysteries and adventures behind closed doors in a small town shape the children's futures and the life of the town in this moving novel of a country town in Ireland.
I Wake Up Screaming
Steve Fisher - 1941
The classic novel of sexual obsession and murder amid the star-making machinery of Hollywood in the 1950s."She was as white as marble, but she looked lovely.  Her hair was splayed out in fine strands of gold, and her lips were bright, rich red, and there was a green eyeshadow on her eyelids.  You could see that because her eyes were closed and she was lying very still.  She was lying still and she wasn't breathing."With its portraits of washed-up directors, jaded leading men, and a ruthless cop whose one-track mind leads straight to a cyanide pellet, I Wake Up Screaming is a magnificent thriller by a Hollywood insider whose screenplays included Lady in the Lake and I, Mobster.
Death in August
Marco Vichi - 2002
Inspector Bordelli is one of the few policemen left in the deserted city. He spends his days on routine work, and his nights tormented by the heat and mosquitoes. Suddenly one night, a telephone call gives him a new sense of purpose: the suspected death of a wealthy Signora. Bordelli rushes to her hilltop villa, and picks the locks. The old woman is lying on her bed - apparently killed by an asthma attack, though her medicine has been left untouched.With the help of his young protégé, the victim's eccentric brother, and a semi-retired petty thief, the inspector begins a murder investigation. Each suspect has a solid alibi, but there is something that doesn't quite add up . . .
City of Fallen Angels
Paul Buchanan - 2020
A scorching heatwave is suffocating L.A. PI John Keegan is offered a small fortune to find a beautiful woman from a set of photographs. He refuses; the job seems suspicious.But the next day the same woman, Eve, turns up, unbidden, on his doorstep. Eve fears for her safety. She is being watched. Before Keegan knows it, someone has been killed with Keegan s own gun, and he gets sucked into a world of suspicion and betrayal where he s never quite sure where the truth lies. Before long he s the prime suspect in a murder he didn't commit, and all the evidence seems to point in his direction.It s almost like someone planned it that way.