Book picks similar to
Happy Hour and Other Philadelphia Cruelties by Tony Knighton


crime
short-stories
psychological-thriller
anthology-collections

Down Among the Jocks (Hardman Book 5)


Ralph Dennis - 1974
    They're back in the fifth adventure in the beloved and acclaimed series that influenced generations of crime writers. Retired pro football star Ed Cross did most of his scoring between bed posts with other player's women, including Hump's ex-girlfriend. That was bad enough. But, just to rub it in, Cross sends Hump an x-rated birthday skin flick of him celebrating in bed with two women. Hump goes looking for blood... and finds it. Cross is murdered and Hump becomes the prime suspect. Hardman works to clear Hump and discovers there's plenty of murderous hate for Cross out there...from the top of the sports world to the pits of Atlanta's illegal gambling scene... and revealing it could get them both killed. This new edition includes an Afterword from Ben Jones, the Dukes of Hazzard actor and former U.S. Congressman from Georgia. PRAISE FOR THE HARDMAN NOVELS "Like Chandler and Hammett before him, Dennis was trying to do something different with what was thought of as throwaway literature.” Joe R. Lansdale, New York Times bestselling author of the Hap & Leonard series “The Hardman books are by far the best of the men’s action-adventure series.” Mother Jones Magazine “Among the best series books around.” Philadelphia Daily News

Keep Her Safe


Sophie Hannah - 2017
    What if she's not dead?Pushed to the breaking point, Cara Burrows flees her home and family and escapes to a five-star spa resort she can't afford. Late at night, exhausted and desperate, she lets herself into her hotel room and is shocked to find it already occupied — by a man and a teenage girl.A simple mistake at the front desk... but soon Cara realizes that the girl she saw alive and well in the hotel room is someone she can't possibly have seen: the most famous murder victim in the country, Melody Chapa, whose parents are serving natural life sentences for her murder.Cara doesn't know what to trust — everything she's read and heard about the case, or the evidence of her own eyes. Did she really see Melody? And is she prepared to ask herself that question and answer it honestly if it means risking her own life?

The Barkeep


William Lashner - 2014
    Six years ago Justin's life was ripped apart when he discovered his mother's bludgeoned corpse. Now Justin's father is serving a life sentence and Justin drowns his emotions in a pool of inner peace. But when Birdie claims he murdered Justin's mother for cash, Justin is hurled back to the emotions, back to the past, and, most frightening of all, back to the father he tried to leave behind. WHO HIRED BIRDIE GRACKLE TO KILL JUSTIN?S MOTHER? As Justin pieces together the truth, a killing machine stalks Justin, leaving a trail of dead in his wake. Someone wants to bury the truth, and maybe Justin, too. Justin had better find some answers quick, because murder is just not Zen.

Turn Her Face to the Wall


William Hussey - 2013
    In this creepy tale, the twist comes with the very last word…

The Girl with a Clock for a Heart


Peter Swanson - 2014
    When George first met her, she was an eighteen-year-old college freshman from Sweetgum, Florida. She and George became inseparable in their first fall semester, so George was devastated when he got the news that she had committed suicide over Christmas break. But, as he stood in the living room of the girl's grieving parents, he realized the girl in the photo on their mantelpiece - the one who had committed suicide - was not his girlfriend. Later, he discovered the true identity of the girl he had loved - and of the things she may have done to escape her past.Now, twenty years later, she's back, and she's telling George that he's the only one who can help her...

Cry to Me


J.A. Schneider - 2021
    No one heard the shots that killed him and wounded Liddy. The band was loud and guests were scattered. When the police declare the crime a failed murder-suicide attempt and Liddy as their suspect, her sister Kim is devastated and insists it's a setup. Wyatt's handsome brother David and Liddy's closest friends try to help Kim investigate...but questions arise. Could Liddy have only pretended to be happy, snapped, and shot her husband? Above all, Kim's worst anguish is wondering if she ever really knew her sister... With a hurricane approaching, the police put their investigation on hold, and those closest find themselves all under one roof. Relationships unravel, and Kim thinks, "This is terrifying. We're all five of us in this house. At night in a hurricane with no power...and a terrible feeling of menace. I can't shake it."

Beautiful Bad


Annie Ward - 2019
    Hospitals and lakes. When Ian drinks vodka in the basement. ISIS. When Ian gets angry... That something is really, really wrong with me.Maddie and Ian's romance began with a chance encounter at a party overseas; he was serving in the British army and she was a travel writer visiting her best friend, Jo. Now almost two decades later, married with a beautiful son, Charlie, they are living the perfect suburban life in Middle America. But when a camping accident leaves Maddie badly scarred, she begins attending writing therapy, where she gradually reveals her fears about Ian's PTSD; her concerns for the safety of their young son, Charlie; and the couple's tangled and tumultuous past with Jo.From the Balkans to England, Iraq to Manhattan, and finally to an ordinary family home in Kansas, sixteen years of love and fear, adventure and suspicion culminate in The Day of the Killing, when a frantic 911 call summons the police to the scene of a shocking crime.

White Bodies


Jane Robins - 2017
    Felix and Tilda seem like the perfect couple: young and in love, a financier and a beautiful up-and-coming starlet. But behind their flawless facade, not everything is as it seems. Callie, Tilda's unassuming twin, has watched her sister visibly shrink under Felix's domineering love. She has looked on silently as Tilda stopped working, nearly stopped eating, and turned into a neat freak, with mugs wrapped in Saran Wrap and suspicious syringes hidden in the bathroom trash. She knows about Felix's uncontrollable rages, and has seen the bruises on the white skin of her sister's arms. Worried about the psychological hold that Felix seems to have over Tilda, Callie joins an Internet support group for victims of abuse and their friends. However, things spiral out of control and she starts to doubt her own judgment when one of her new acquaintances is killed by an abusive man. And then suddenly Felix dies--or was he murdered? A page-turning work of suspense that announces a stunning new voice in fiction, White Bodies will change the way you think about obsession, love, and the violence we inflict on one another--and ourselves.

The Blinds


Adam Sternbergh - 2017
    Welcome to The Blinds, a dusty town in rural Texas populated by misfits who don’t know if they’ve perpetrated a crime, or just witnessed one. What’s clear to them is that if they leave, they will end up dead. For eight years, Sheriff Calvin Cooper has kept an uneasy peace—but after a suicide and a murder in quick succession, the town’s residents revolt. Cooper has his own secrets to protect, so when his new deputy starts digging, he needs to keep one step ahead of her—and the mysterious outsiders who threaten to tear the whole place down. The more he learns, the more the hard truth is revealed: The Blinds is no sleepy hideaway. It’s simmering with violence and deception, aching heartbreak and dark betrayals.

Killing Kate


Alex Lake - 2016
    HE HAS A TYPE: ALL HIS VICTIMS LOOK THE SAME. AND THEY ALL LOOK LIKE YOU.Kate returns from a post break-up holiday with her girlfriends to news of a serial killer in her home town – and his victims all look like her.It could, of course, be a simple coincidence. Or maybe not.She becomes convinced she is being watched, followed even. Is she next? And could her mild-mannered ex-boyfriend really be a deranged murderer?Or is the truth something far more sinister?

The Secretary


Renée Knight - 2019
    Danvers in Daphne Du Maurier’s Rebecca.From her first day as Personal Assistant to the celebrated Mina Appleton, Christine Butcher understands what is expected of her. Absolute loyalty. Absolute discretion. For twenty years, Christine has been a most devoted servant, a silent witness to everything in Mina’s life. So quiet, you would hardly know she is there.Day after day, year after year, Christine has been there, invisible—watching, listening, absorbing all the secrets floating around her. Keeping them safe.Christine is trusted. But those years of loyalty and discretion come with a high price. And eventually Christina will pay.Yet, it would be a mistake to underestimate such a steadfast woman. Because as everyone is about to discover, there’s a dangerous line between obedience and obsession.

One Little Mistake


Emma Curtis - 2016
    . . YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE.Vicky Seagrave is blessed: three beautiful children, a successful, doting husband, great friends and a job she loves. She should be perfectly happy.When she makes a split-second decision that risks everything she holds dear, there's only person she trusts enough to turn to.But Vicky is about to learn that one mistake is all it takes; that if you're careless with those you love, you don't deserve to keep them . . .

Try Not to Breathe


Holly Seddon - 2016
    Only fifteen years old, Amy disappeared walking home from school one day and was found in a coma three days later. Her attacker was never identified and her angelic face was plastered across every paper and nightly news segment.Fifteen years later, Amy lies in the hospital, surrounded by 90’s Britpop posters, forgotten by the world until reporter Alex Dale stumbles across her while researching a routine story on vegetative patients.Remembering Amy’s story like it was yesterday, she feels compelled to solve the long-cold case.The only problem is, Alex is just as lost as Amy—her alcoholism has cost her everything including her marriage and her professional reputation.In the hopes that finding Amy’s attacker will be her own salvation as well, Alex embarks on a dangerous investigation, suspecting someone close to Amy.Told in the present by an increasingly fragile Alex and in dream-like flashbacks by Amy as she floats in a fog of memories, dreams, and music from 1995, Try Not to Breathe unfolds layer by layer to a breathtaking conclusion.

Cross Her Heart


Sarah Pinborough - 2018
    Maybe she’s ready now. Maybe she can trust again. Maybe it's time to let her terrifying secret past go. Then her daughter rescues a boy from drowning and their pictures are all over the news for everyone to see. Lisa's world explodes, and she finds everything she has built threatened. Not knowing whom she can trust, it's up to her to face her past to save what she holds dear.

To the Power of Three


Laura Lippman - 2005
    To the Power of Three is just one of those reasons. Lippman’s brilliant and disturbing tale of three inseparable high school girlfriends in an affluent Baltimore suburb who share dark secrets literally until death, To the Power of Three is this “writing powerhouse” (USA Today), who has “exploded the boundaries of the mystery genre to become one of the most significant social realists of our time” (Madison Smartt Bell) operating at the very top of her game. Not merely crime fiction, but fiction that gets to the deep psychological, emotional, and human roots of a terrible crime, Lippman’s novel is one that will not be easily forgotten—a must read for fans of Kate Atkinson, Tana French, Jodi Picoult, and Harlan Coben