Böcker utgivna av Down & Out Books

Jon Catlett and Paul Frank have turned their once-failing used bookstore into one of the most thriving businesses in the Highlands. But they paid in blood for their success, for Twice Told Books is not just another dusty thrift shop, but a front for the largest heroin distribution network ever based in Louisville. The two eccentric intellectuals-turned-gun thugs enlist the help of an unscrupulous narcotics cop nicknamed Mad Dog and a former marine importing dope through Fort Knox from Afghanistan purer than anything the city has ever seen. In between trading muzzle flashes with a corrupt and psychotic DEA agent and thwarting two crusading homicide detectives, Catlett and Frank plan to corner the market...or at least everything South of Cincinnati. Praise for SOUTH OF CINCINNATI: "If you only read one book this year, make it South of Cincinnati. Hits all the right notes in a narrative to have you renew your faith in the sheer joy of a great book." -Ken Bruen, bestselling author of the Jack Taylor series "Scumbag addicts, dirty cops, savage brutality, and the price of a broken heart. My kind of people. My kind of book. In his latest Jon Catlett novel, author Jonathan Ashley tackles the toughest question facing a junkie: what's harder to kick-the dope or the girl? South of Cincinnati is a thrilling head-first dive into the dirty drug underworld as we watch a hero trying not to drown in pursuit of his humanity." -Joe Clifford, author of Junkie Love and the Jay Porter thriller series "Jonathan Ashley is elbowing his way to the front of the crowd of crime writers with his crisp dialogue, edgy characters and relentlessly gritty action. South of Cincinnati is a razor-sharp slice through the mire of the Midwestern drug underworld, allowing us to peek from a safe distance." -Joe Ricker is the author of Walkin' After Midnight

Standing between Bo and Slick and $642,000 from the bank job: Prison. A hurricane. A horny cop. A naked priest. An angry cab driver. Two wanna-be criminals. A speeding train. A hot soldering iron. A peeping tom. A fed-up girl. A gun dealer. A homeless lady. An empty shotgun. A girlfriend with other plans. One pissed-off mom. Two pissed-off drug dealers. A bitchy landlord. And 48 crazy hours. When this is all over, they'll either be rich, in prison or dead. (Previously published as Run for the Money.) Praise for CRIMINAL ECONOMICS: "Balls out insanity!" -Owen Laukkanen, author of The Professionals and Kill Fee "Proper noir. Definitely my kind of characters. Barely a moral scruple among the lot of them." -Allan Guthrie, author of Hard Man, Savage Night and Two-Way Split "Beetner writes with tension to spare and the story is marinated in his sick sense of humor, making this gleefully nasty noir fly by in just a few sittings." -Nerd of Noir, Spinetingler Magazine

Dark, gritty, disturbing. Those are the types of characters you'll encounter in the award winning stories within this collection. Tough people in a tough world. But also real people, struggling with difficult decisions when faced with unthinkable circumstances. What happens when you discover a dead body but can't go to the police because of your own dark past? Or your father's dark past? What might a woman resort to when her husband doesn't hold up his end of a bargain? What frightening surprises lie buried beneath the beaches of North Carolina? Or in the desolate hills of Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains? Or in the swamps of the New Jersey Pine Barrens? These are stories that are as dark, gritty, and disturbing as the characters who inhabit them, yet there is a pervasive humanness which forces us to empathize. That asks us to understand why people sometimes do what they do. Perhaps that's the reason these stories have been chosen for the Best American Mystery series, honored by The Atlantic Monthly's Student Writing Contest, not to mention various other awards and honors. Perhaps that's why these stories will stick with you well after the reading has commenced. Always gnawing at you, unrelenting, asking, "What would you have done in that situation? Would you have behaved any differently?" Praise for SHOOTING CREEK AND OTHER STORIES: "This excellent collection transcends any genre label. Ultimately, these stories are mysteries of the human heart's darkest regions. Scott Sanders is the real deal and deserves a wide and appreciative readership." -Ron Rash, The New York Times bestselling author and winner of the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award. "Each story is a gem in this dark, atmospheric, treasure box of a collection. Scott Loring Sanders digs deep and peers unflinching into the frail, twisted human heart, revealing its many facets and glittering truths. A stellar collection!" -Lisa Unger, The New York Times bestselling author of The Red Hunter. "In Shooting Creek and Other Stories, you'll find ne'er-do-well husbands, drunken fathers, tough-as-nails women and mothers, and murderously unfaithful wives in a rogue's gallery of dangerous characters in bad situations. These are stories that will keep you up late reading and thinking, stories that mute the concerns of the everyday world while turning up the volume on thrills and excitement. This is a collection that will fire the imagination while raising moral and ethical issues, which is the true heart of Scott Sanders's fiction. If you're looking for something good to read, this is the book you want." -Ed Falco, author of The New York Times bestselling The Family Corleone. "Scott Loring Sanders's stories are always rich in atmosphere, and his characters are often presented with difficult moral dilemmas. He's an author who prefers a degree of ambiguity to an easy resolution, and that makes his work thought-provoking, as well as unpredictable. Readers in search of well-written, complex suspense tales won't go wrong with a Sanders collection!" -Janet Hutchings, Editor-in-Chief, Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine.

Penns River rarely sees two homicides in a year. Two in little over a week is almost too much for the police force to handle. The assigned detectives - Ben Dougherty, a former MP and Penns River native, and retired Pittsburgh cop Willie Grabek - find links to bind the two cases, but their investigation is complicated by the involvement of private investigator Daniel Rollison, a retired spy on a suspect's payroll who is really working for himself. Pittsburgh mob boss Mike Mannarino also lives in Penns River and has more than a passing interest in the case. The two cops' savvy competes with the limitations of their small town's resources and the interference of Rollison and Mannarino in a story that shows identifying a killer and proving it are separate things. Praise for WORST ENEMIES ... "You're going to be surprised and delighted. It's a great book, and I recommend it unreservedly." - Leighton Gage, author of the Inspector Mario Silva series "By the end, WORST ENEMIES was miles from Strangers On a Train ... When a crime novel goes above and beyond a mere interpretation of a classic, the reader is left as satisfied as the author." - Benjamin Sobieck, author of Cleansing Eden and The Writer's Guide to Weapons "I finished reading this book on a gurney in an Emergency Room with crying kids, a car accident victim and a loud drunk keeping me company, and barely noticed them. If that's not a recommendation, I don't know what is!" - New Mystery Reader

The hit-and-run driver took everything-his wife, child and legs. Now a paraplegic, Dean Drayhart unleashes payback on suspected hit-and-runners in Los Angeles with helper-monkey Sid as his deadly assistant. Dean's gentle, doting nurse knows nothing about what he's up to and when Sid tears out the throat of a Mexican Mafia member, Marcie is kidnapped in order to force Dean's surrender. Armed with nothing but his wits, Sid, and a sympathetic streetwalker named Cinda, Dean manipulates drug-cartel carnales and the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department in a David-against-Goliath plot that twists and turns to a heart-pounding finale. HARD BITE is ideal reading for fans of Carl Hiaasen and Tim Dorsey. Praise for HARD BITE "...outlandish in every way-a crazed noir excursion into an unprecedented heart of darkness. Violent and sometimes funny, always entertaining." - T. Jefferson Parker, three-time Edgar Award winner "The best, most fiercely original crime novel I've read in a long time" -Ray Garton, World Horror Grand Master Award recipient "A carnival of nightmarish fun, HARD BITE had me gasping from one outlandishly terrifying act to the next, each scene involving The Grim Reaper in a wheelchair; a sharp-fanged, treacherous monkey; a SWAT-team posse of drugged Mexican killers; and/or more tough-but-lovable women with guns than a Mickey Spillane novel." -Jack Getze, Fiction Editor, Spinetingler Magazine "By the end, your heart aches a little for the narrator. That's the true goal of fiction, or it ought to be-to shift you on your foundations in the reading, leaving you off in a slightly different place from where you started." - Sophie Littlefield, A Bad Day For Sorry, A Bad Day For Pretty "The ride is electric...quality that other writers should aspire to achieve." -Joseph Patchen for Lurid Lit "Nasty, but a beating heart underneath ...very clever; lovely writing." -Patti Abbott, Derringer Award winner "Anonymous-9 is one of my favorite crime writers." -Nick Mamatas, Bram Stoker and International Horror Guild awards nominee

Two young hustlers, caught in an endless cycle of addiction and prostitution, decide to blackmail an elderly client of theirs. Donny and Big Rich want to film Gabriel Thaxton with their cell phones during a sexual act and put the video up on YouTube. Little do they know, the man they've chosen, a high-profile San Francisco defense attorney, is already being blackmailed by someone more sinister: an ex-client of the lawyer's. A murderous speed freak named Dustin has already permeated the attorney's life and Dustin has plans for the old man. The lawyer calls upon an old biker for help and they begin a violent race to suppress his deadly secret. ***Praise for HUSTLE*** "Tom Pitts' HUSTLE is the kind of in-your-face street level noir that American crime fiction hasn't seen in a long, long time. Frankly, not many writers have either the balls or the talent to pull it off. Pitts has both in spades. Bold, honest and daring." -Todd Robinson, The Hard Bounce "Tom Pitts is part of a rare and dying breed, a self-taught, instinctual writer whose tight, pitch-perfect prose was honed the old-fashioned way by reading and walking the seedy alleys of life. HUSTLE is quick-paced and dark, at once sad and funny as hell, with a Jim Thompson-esque cast of characters and echoes of Bukowski in its poetic sensitivity. Pitts' own experiences on the streets of San Francisco make HUSTLE a novel unlike any you've read before. I love this book." -Ro Cuzon, Under the Dixie Moon "What makes HUSTLE such a remarkable book-and Tom Pitts such a formidable writer-is the juxtaposition of literary tradition versus street ethos. HUSTLE pushes boundaries and challenges the peripheral but not at the expense of story, which zips along the dirty streets of San Francisco to tell a terrifying tale, the likes of which, I promise you, you've never heard before. This is in-the-trenches, first-hand, in-your-face reportage, from a who knows what it takes to survive those streets. Unflinching and without apology." -Joe Clifford, Junkie Love and Lamentation "HUSTLE is a smart and deceitful novel that can't wait for you to judge it. It presents itself with a raw, unadorned prose, but it's way more than meets the eye. Tom Pitts is a wicked storyteller. He barely arrived in the publishing game, but expect him to become one of these cult authors with a rabid fanbase." -Benoit Lelievre, DeadEndFollies.com "HUSTLE in an insane mind-fuck." -Liam Sweeny, Welcome Back Jack

In addition to writing seven Evan Horne mysteries and two stand-alone international thrillers, Bill Moody has written eight short stories, which appeared over the years in various anthologies, along with a brand new story. For the first time, Mood Swings collects all nine stories of murder and music."Moody is a fluent writer with a good ear for dialogue, a deft and ingratiating descriptive touch, a talent for characterization and a genuine feel for the jazz world."-New York Times"You don't have to be a huge jazz fan to enjoy the latest of Bill Moody's colorful, cross-genre riffs about piano man and sleuth Evan Horne."-Chicago Tribune"...you're in for a suspenseful read that will rivet you to your seat..."-Gayle Lynds, New York Times best selling author

Struggling actress Jane Innes is seduced by a handsome new arrival in her acting class. He makes a proposition. He admits he's a con man and needs Jane to pose as a rich, carefree heiress to fulfill her part in his intricate scam. Would you agree? Or run the other way? All goes as planned until Jane's true identity threatens to surface and their scheme begins to crack at the seams. It all leads to a tangled maze of deception, depravity and murder. THE SHILL is part one of a trilogy from Shamus Award winning author, John Shepphird.

BAD HABITS is an anthology of Keith Gilman's short stories. "The best fiction has this feeling that someone's just leaned close to whisper in our ear, 'I've something important to tell you.' Keith Gilman's debut novel has and sustains that quality from the first page. You know right away that you're in the hands of a natural and very fine storyteller. Authenticity, voice, the sense of lives beyond the page, all those things we crave as readers and for which we work so hard as writers, tossing the bones, hoping the magic will work--all are solidly, soundly in place." -James Sallis, author of Drive "Dark, gritty, and hauntingly lyrical, Keith Gilman writes Noir with the authenticity of a cop who has actually worked the mean streets." -Robin Burcell, author of Face of a Killer "...Grabbed me by the collar and wouldn't let go. Gilman's voice is a powerful new addition to the crime fiction community." -Reed Farrel Coleman, Shamus, Barry and Anthony Award-winning author of the Moe Prager series

The Coronavirus prediction?Matt Chance, an ex US Army Ranger living in Bangkok, finds himself drafted into the middle of a deadly plot involving right wing Japanese fanatics intent on punishing China for grievances going back to the end of WW II and the loss of Japan's prominent position as a global power.A leading American research scientist, investigating a mysterious viral outbreak in China, is found dead in unusual circumstances in the Northern jungles of Thailand. Matt is recruited by the U.S. Center for Disease Control, fronting for the CIA, to look into the death. The trail points to the involvement of a Japanese yakuza gang who immediately threaten Matt. Though Matt's initial suspicion is that the gang is involved in smuggling drugs, it becomes apparent that the substance they are dealing with is much more deadly. He continues to investigate and what he unravels is not only a threat to China but to the world.

From the Low Riders that nightly cruise the Sunset Strip, to the infamous Dead Man's Curve immortalized in song, Southern Californian's fascination with their cars has long been the fodder of legend and has defined a culture known for its fast-paced and sometimes reckless lifestyle. Now, sixteen tantalizing stories from L.A. authors takes us on a Joyride through the darker streets of Los Angeles. At the signpost, just ahead, your... LAST EXIT TO MURDER. Original stories by: Avril Adams, Lynn Allyson, Julie G. Beers, Laura Brennan, Stephen Buehler, Bonnie J. Cardone, Sally Carpenter, L.H. Dillman, Beverly Graf, Andrew Jetarski, Miko Johnston, Nena Jover Kelty, Paul D. Marks, Donna May, Laurie Stevens, Eric Stone

Lenny Archer had more than a fair share of tough times and hard knocks, but he had finally decided to stay in the game rather than cash in his chips. Then, two late-night intruders at the Private Investigation office of Archer and Pigeon violently take the choice of life over death out of Lenny's hands. Jimmy Pigeon is determined to discover who killed his friend and partner. He may have to learn what became of the actor who portrayed Charlie Chan in the thirties, and who assassinated a charismatic mobster in the late-forties, before he can identify Archer's killers. LAPD Lieutenant Ray Boyle is not anxious to get tied up in the Chinese fire drill that is the Archer murder case, but he is far less inclined to get anywhere near the question of where a former Heisman Trophy winning football player was on an infamous night in June 1994. Pigeon and Boyle become reluctant allies, sharing little in common besides a mutual hope that Major League Baseball can thwart a players' strike and the bad guys learn crime doesn't pay.

Issue four closes our exciting first year with the very talented debut of Arthur Klepchukov. His intelligent "A Damn Fine Town" is followed by film director and writer John Shepphird and a prequel to his award-nominated "Shill" trilogy, a bit of a teaser for those of you who may not have discovered Jane Innes…yet. Brian Silverman is up next with a story set on his fictional Caribbean island of St. Pierre featuring his characters, Leonard and Tubby. The featured story this issue is of the most excellent Inspector Kubu by the writing team of Michael Stanley. If "Shoot to Kill" is your first Kubu tale, believe me, he's only better when he's in a novel. Our featured historical story is by the very prolific, very good Frederick C. Davis, who became one of Harry Whittington's "St. Pete Boys," the group of writers like Gil Brewer, Day Keene, and occasionally John D. MacDonald, that met on Sunday afternoons at Harry's house. Davis's story is the first Secrets, Inc. installment, "Blood on the Block." We close out the issue with an offbeat heist story by Robb T. White called "Inside Man," and a short piece by the always terrific Lissa Marie Redmond, who first appeared in issue two, called "We Don't Talk About Lester Anymore." There's a good reason for that.

We know a healthy appetite for well-written short stories exists and we want to help make things better. Our goal with Down & Out: The Magazine is to be a little different than other magazines by standing on the shoulders of the giants that have come before us, or at least tiptoe along the arrows in the backs of the pioneers of modern magazine publishing. Each issue will feature a story based on a series character like this issue's brand-new Moe Prager story by Reed Farrel Coleman. If you're a fan of Moe, who is now retired, you'll want to read this fantastic story. We also have new tales by established and well-known writers. This debut issue includes series stories by Eric Beetner, Michael A. Black, Jen Conley, Terrence McCauley, Rick Ollerman, and Thomas Pluck. J. Kingston Pierce, fresh off his former beat from Kirkus Reviews, introduces "Placed in Evidence," his non-fiction column only to be found here. Finally, we'll take a bit of the long road as we answer the question of what happened to crime fiction after Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler moved on from the pulps in "A Few Cents a Word." This issue we re-introduce Frederick Nebel with the first of his Donahue series, "Rough Justice." This is a fun one. For fans of good writing, good literature, and good crime...welcome.

"With his finger firmly placed on sailors' wartime experiences, Hess delivers a potent, thrilling collection of sharply drawn tales." -Kirkus Reviews The stories in Cold War Canoe Club are like vertical launch missiles that explode to reveal a darker side of the US Navy in a time when most of the action took place away from the headlines. Welcome to the period between World War II and the Desert Storm, when enemies were just as likely to be seen on radar as aboard the same ship. The characters who populate the stories Hess has written face their own doom through dangers-foreign and domestic, including shipmates, spouses, secrets, lies, greed, lust, and bad decisions. As Cold War Canoe Club unfolds, we witness the darkest recesses of war ships and the men who sail aboard them as well as the women who wait for them in port and at home. There's a submarine sinking in frigid waters, a pregnant Navy wife distraught over the Cuban Missile Crisis, a race riot aboard an air craft carrier, fist fights, loose women, bad luck, and bad decisions. Hess's sailors and veterans haunt deeply with the authentic sense of people being on ships at sea or at the ends of their ropes as civilians. These stories bristle with noir intrigue and energy, while transporting readers to worlds few have ever seen. A dark exploration of service men, officers, gentlemen, lowlifes, and those trying to navigate troubled waters across oceans and on land. Praise for Cold War Canoe Club... "Jeffery Hess combines a flair for gripping storytelling with a powerful lyrical sensibility to produce that rarest of birds: a book full of page-turners that read like literary fiction. Like Tim O'Brien and Kevin Powers, Hess writes with absolute authority about the military men whose lives he sees with utter clarity and intimacy." -Pinckney Benedict, author of Miracle Boy, The Wrecking Yard and Town Smokes. "Eerily timely and rendered with gritty realism, Cold War Canoe Club beckons us to recall a time when actions and attitudes appeared motivated by an entire world perpetually hovering along the brink of utter destruction. Each tightly woven gem of a short story represents a microcosm of the Cold War macrocosm, and dares to expose Hess as a genius for his artful juxtaposition of humanity's brash boldness with humanity's amnesic naiveté." -Tracy Crow, author of Eyes Right: Confessions from a Woman Marine and editor of Red, White, & True: Stories from Veterans and Families, WWII to Present. "Hess is one of those rare talents who tells a great story with compelling characters, pacing and action." -Terrence McCauley, author of Sympathy for the Devil and The Devil Dogs of Belleau Wood. "Cold War Canoe Club presents an eclectic array of situations and stories all tied together by Hess's hard-edged prose style and deeply-developed characters. In the smart, snappy tradition of Elmore Leonard and James Lee Burke, Hess is a writer who pulls no punches and delivers authenticity in rapid-fire doses." -Steph Post, author of Lightwood and A Tree Born Crooked. "Smart, poignant, often slyly funny, these are stories that will both take your breath away and take you places you've never been before. A true and honest salute to much more than those who serve in the Navy, rich with history real and imagined." -Fred Leebron, author of Welcome to Christiania and Out West. "Jeffery Hess reminds of the glory days or noir: wayward women, brawling sailors, and shadow-lurking heroes who were too hung over when redemption dawned. If you want a quick literary jab to your heart, any of Hess's short fiction will do. Just finish burying that body, pal, and read." -James R. Duncan, author of Blood Republic.

When a top-secret weapon goes missing on Colonel Maggie Black's watch, her honor and her career are on the line. There were airmen who said the Air Force's best female combat pilot would never be the same after losing her arm in Iraq, but state-of-the-art prosthetics have made Maggie better than new, and she's not about to lose what she battled so hard to regain. But finding her experimental missile won't be easy-thanks to the revenge-fueled ambitions of Asdrubal Torres, whose hallucinatory encounter with the Great Spirit challenges him to refill Lake Cahuilla, the ancient inland sea that once covered much of southern California. To fulfill his blessed mission, Torres needs wizardry and weaponry, and the Great Spirit provides both: Magic, in the form of a celebrated shaman's basket returned to the tribal museum by San Diego reporter Jordan Scott; Might, in the form of Maggie Black's top-secret weapon that falls from the sky. From that moment, it's a race against time for Maggie and Jordan, who together must stop Torres from destroying Hoover Dam-and turning the Colorado River into a tsunami that would kill hundreds of thousands and wipe out the Southwest's water supply. In the final showdown, it's Maggie who must disarm the stolen missile's trigger-one-handed or not-and save the day. Praise for THE BLACK KACHINA: "Jack Getze's newest novel, The Black Kachina, marks the arrival of a new star in the international thriller pantheon. Move over, Jack Reacher and make a place at the table for Colonel Maggie Black and her Robin, journalist Jordan Scott. Getze has just hit it out of the park, a gargantuan tape-measure of a clout with this, his best novel to date. My hope is that he's hard at work writing the second of what is sure to be a hugely-successful series. Movie people should be all over this one." -Les Edgerton, author of The Bitch, The Rapist, The Genuine, Imitation, Plastic Kidnapping, Lagniappe and others "With an intriguing mix of Native American folklore and the latest in leading edge weapons technology, Jack Getze takes you on a journey that has possible written hard across the storyline. A thriller that chills. He asks what if a lethal weapon fell into the hands of someone who was obsessed with fulfilling the wildest wishes of his ancestors? Then he throws together a local reporter and a rebellious ace flyer and sets them both against a clock that is racing towards one of the worst disasters in the history of America." -Gordon Brown, author of four crime thriller novels set in Scotland and the US and a co-founder and director of the crime writing festival Bloody Scotland "The Black Kachina shows Jack Getze is not a one-trick pony. A major departure from his Austin Carr series-which is also excellent-with all the elements required to be a mainstream bestseller." -Dana King, Shamus-award nominated author of Resurrection Mall "Getze has that uncommon ability of being able to tell a hell of a story with just the right amount of dark humor. Always a winner!" -Terrence McCauley, award-winning author of The James Hicks Series "It's a daunting task to keep a story complex and suspenseful while making the key players come across so colorful and convincing. Jack Getze makes it seem effortless." -Erin Williams, The Paperback Stash

Need an escape for a few minutes? Don't care if that escape smells like spent gunpowder or could fit into a chalk outline? Then look no further. In this new collection of short fiction, Ryan Sayles continues his streak of no holds-barred grit. An old hit man sharing a last drink with the ghost of one of his first victims. A grieving mother who knows exactly to whom she wants to give all her love. A college student more dangerous than the active shooter event in which he's trapped. A couple's last resort against terminal cancer that might be worse than the disease. Be glad these folks are the ones making-and paying for-the mistakes and you're only getting to read about them. If you've got a few minutes to kill, come on over. Killing is a guaranteed thing around here.

Stray Dogs: Interviews with Working-Class Writers delivers a portrait of contemporary working class authors in America. Editor Daniel M. Mendoza engages with "some of the best in contemporary literary fiction." These one-on-one interviews seek to uncover how each writer has developed their working-class aesthetic. A young writer himself, Mendoza encourages the author's to discuss their craft, their upbringing, their socio-political beliefs, as well as the state of contemporary literature. Stray Dogs: Interviews with Working-Class Writers, is an insightful study of an often overlooked literary genre.Rolando Hinojosa-Smith on the novel in America:"...to show a world as seen by the writer, as experienced (with certain changes) by the writer and to hold whatever it is that the writer holds as his truths..."Richard Burgin on the self and society:"In terms of real metaphysical truth, however, there's been a shift since Dickens and more people are less sure than ever about the origins and purpose of the universe."Eric Miles Williamson on style:"I believe that there is no personal style; writers don't come out original like Athena from Zeus's head. Everybody steals or learns a writer's style and does the opposite. The best writers are the best anthologists..."Stephen Gutierrez on the reader:"I hope that they experience being alive as another person in another time and place and learn (again) that we're all pretty much the same facing the same shit, sometimes nobly, sometimes ignobly..."Ron Cooper on what writer's read:"I have sought out work by authors who write about real people, people who know what true struggles are, people who often do not know how they are going to pay their bills."

Hardboiled. Softboiled. Noir. East Coast. West Coast. And all points in between. Whatever you call them, gumshoe, shamus, Pinkerton, detective, private eye, P.I., shadow, tail, investigator, and wherever you need them, from East to West, North to South. They're all here. From the hard pavement of Brooklyn, New York, to the mean dusty streets of Carson City. Down to sultry New Orleans and the freak show that's Venice, CA. From the flim-flammers of Waco, Texas to DC, Las Vegas to San Berdoo and LA. And from Iowa City to San Diego and small town North Carolina-not to mention the low-life drug dealers in a little place called King's Quarter, Maine. No one is safe in this impressive collection featuring fourteen original private eye stories plus one previously published bonus story. Crime fiction connoisseurs will visit one major crime scene after another with some of today's best-of-the-best crime writers serving as tour guides. Poisoned-pen masters like: J.L. Abramo, Eric Beetner, Michael Bracken, Meredith Cole, Matt Coyle, Thomas Donahue, John Floyd, Gay Toltl Kinman, Terrill Lee Lankford, Janice Law, Paul D. Marks, Andrew McAleer, O'Neil De Noux, Robert J. Randisi, Art Taylor. COAST TO COAST: PRIVATE EYES FROM SEA TO SHINING SEA features suspense stories ranging from hardboiled to psychological to thrillers. And while these stories differ in locale, climate, mood and tone, they all resonate with the dark underbelly of crime. Praise for COAST TO COAST 2 ... "Tough, taut and terrific. This cross-country collection of sleuthing stories-from the best writers in the private eye biz-is wonderfully written, always surprising, and completely entertaining." -Hank Phillippi Ryan, Anthony, Agatha and Mary Higgins Clark award-winning author of Say No More "A tantalizing array of stories guaranteed to please fans of PI fiction. High fives all around!" -MWA Grand Master Bill Pronzini on Coast to Coast: Private Eyes from Sea to Shining Sea "A bang-up read of PI fiction from a gallery of impressive authors. Coast to Coast: Private Eyes from Sea to Shining Sea is compelling, fun, and full of surprises. A treat." -Shamus Award-winning author John Shepphird Praise for the COAST TO COAST crime fiction series ... "Envelope-pushers! A truly WOW collection by the best mystery writers out there-full of surprises only they can pull off." -Thomas B. Sawyer, bestselling author of Cross Purposes, head writer of Murder, She Wrote "A sterling collection of coast-to-coast crime stories dripping with local color-all of it blood red." -Chuck Hogan, author of The Town and Devils In Exile "An engaging collection from a stellar cast of award-winning mystery authors guaranteed to keep you awake all night." -Hannah Dennison, author of the IMBA bestselling Vicky Hill Mysteries "This intriguing collection of stories from these masters of suspense will keep you guessing from cover to cover and coast to coast." -Raffi Yessayan, author of 8 in the Box and 2 in the Hat

Nominated for the 2017 Anthony Award for Best Anthology/Collection Bestselling novelists David Morrell, Alison Gaylin and Elaine Viets headline a new anthology of 22 tales exploring the unique an aura of mystery of New Orleans and the surrounding bayou country. Blood on the Bayou is published in conjunction with Bouchercon, the World Mystery Convention, which is being held in New Orleans. As with the convention itself, the anthology spreads a broad canopy across a wide variety of crime writers from across the country and around the world-including both veteran writers and the brightest up-and-coming talents in the field. These stories range from the light-hearted and fun to the darker side of crime; just as New Orleans and the bayou country can show both to the unsuspecting. All participants contributed their efforts to support our charity-the New Orleans Public Libraries-and by extension readers and writers everywhere. ALL PROFITS GO TO THE LIBRARY. Edited by Greg Herren. Introduction by Heather Graham. Stories by: Kaye Wilkinson Barley, Eric Beetner, G. J. Brown, Sheila Connolly, O'Neil De Noux, Barbara Ferrer, John Floyd, Alison Gaylin, Greg Herren, BV Lawson, R. T. Lawton, Deborah Lacy, Edith Maxwell, Liz Milliron, Terrie Farley Moran, David Morrell, Dino Parenti, Michael Penn, Gary Phillips, Thomas Pluck, Paula Pumphrey, Elaine Viets.

BROOKLYN JUSTICE is a wild ride through the streets of the Borough of Churches. Private investigator Nick Ventura knows trouble-but not how to keep his nose out of it. A pool of blood spreading across a casino poker table, a Buick plowing through a storefront with a dead detective aboard, a fatal rendezvous in the shadow of a Coney Island landmark, a childhood friend gunned down walking his dog in the wrong place at the wrong time, a film distributor who thinks he can get away with murder through intimidation and violence, a mob boss assassinated leaving a neighborhood restaurant, and the particular brand of retribution necessary to level the playing field in the fourth largest city in America-J.L. Abramo serves it all up with a vengeance. "In BROOKLYN JUSTICE, award winning author J.L. Abramo again demonstrates his firm grasp on the language and morality of his native streets, with as many surprises as there are casualties. An ideal follow-up to his acclaimed novel GRAVESEND." -The Denver Review "If grit, hard guys, and the rhythm of the mean streets is your thing, BROOKLYN JUSTICE has got them in spades and J.L. Abramo is your man." -Reed Farrel Coleman, New York Times Bestselling author of WHERE IT HURTS "J.L. Abramo writes noir the way God and Hammett intended-tough, terse, and smart. BROOKLYN JUSTICE is a great read with razor-sharp prose and a compelling cast. Nick Ventura is my kind of PI." -Michael Koryta, New York Times Bestselling author of THOSE WHO WISH ME DEAD "J. L. Abramo's 'Walking the Dog' weaves a seemingly loose collection of conversations, reflections, and memories into a suddenly tight narrative-no stray threads, no unnecessary details, nothing wasted." -Art Taylor, author of ON THE ROAD WITH DEL & LOUISE

Tales from the Blue Line by Rob Riley is a compilation of twenty-nine separate police investigations conducted by Rob Riley and his partners, while they were Milwaukee Police officers. Riley was sworn in as a police officer in 1971 and retired as a detective in 2001. His career was unique even from the beginning, when with only a few months on the job he was recruited to be an undercover narcotics officer. After seven extremely intense years undercover and one year in uniform, Riley was promoted to the rank of detective where he spent the rest of his career. From purchasing illegal drugs from people on the streets to executing nearly a hundred search warrants, his time in the Narcotics Squad seemed like more than a lifetime of police experiences. Twenty-two years as a major crimes detective, Riley connected with high ranking officials in the District Attorney's office, as well as some of the most highly regarded defense attorney's in the country. He was a private investigator for two years after his retirement.

Carolina Crimes: 21 Tales of Need, Greed and Dirty Deeds is a collection of short stories by crime writers living in North and South Carolina, members of Sisters in Crime. The Triangle (Chapel Hill, Durham, Raleigh, NC) Chapter of SinC issued the challenge to members to write stories about addiction or obsession and crime. Who knew that the responses would be so varied or that ice cream, a game of Solitaire, or silk fabric could provide motives to commit murder? Or that golf clubs, stiletto-heeled shoes, and microwave ovens could provide the means? These stories remind us why we love crime fiction, and why it matters. They provide us with the cold revenge of imagination, the hot passion someone could kill for, and the sense of justice a community demands. They remind us we never know exactly what our next-door neighbor may be capable of, or for that matter, what we ourselves harbor in the deepest corners of our hearts and minds. The humor is dark. The suspense is shudder-producing. The horror delivers goosebumps. And by the time we turn the last satisfying page, we know more about what it means to be human. "The Carolinas boast some of the finest crime writers ever to set ink to paper and pixels to disk, as this Sisters in Crime anthology attests. Just like a Carolina Sunday supper, these stories dish up a variety of styles, tones and tastes, from procedurals to cozies to dark psychological thrillers. Pour yourself a tall sweet tea or a couple of fingers of bourbon, sit back and dig in." -Jeffery Deaver.

Shadow towns, smugglers and secret notes-this trio of New York authors are a TRIPLE SHOT of twists and turns in three novellas Payback leads to an unmarked grave in Ross Klavan's Thump Gun Hitched. A freak accident forces two L.A. cops to play out a deadly obsession that takes them from back alley payoffs to hard time in prison, then deep into the tunnel networks south of the border to a murderous town that's only rumored to exist. Before the last shot is fired, everything they thought was certain proves to be a shadow and everything they trusted opens into a trap. Life was so much simpler for Tim O'Mara's marijuana-selling narrator in Smoked when all he had to worry about was keeping his customers, now ex-wife, and daughter satisfied. When he forges a reluctant alliance with his ex-wife's new lover, he realizes there's lots of money to be made from the world's number one smuggled legal product-cigarettes. Unfortunately, his latest shipment contained some illegal automatic weapons. Now he's playing with the big boys and finds the price of the game way over his head. Murder was never part of his business model. And finally in Twist of Fate, Charles Salzberg follows Trish Sullivan, an ambitious TV reporter working in a small, upstate New York market. She receives a note from Meg Montgomery, a beautiful young woman convicted of murdering her husband and two children. Montgomery claims she's innocent and Sullivan, smelling a big story that may garner some national attention, investigates and turns up evidence that the woman has, indeed, been framed. What happens next changes the life of both women in unexpected ways.

MWA Grand Master Margaret Maron, Edgar Award winner Tom Franklin, and New York Times bestselling novelist Ron Rash headline a new anthology of 21 tales spanning from traditional detective stories to comic capers to darkest noir and more-something for all tastes. Murder Under the Oaks is published in conjunction with Bouchercon, the World Mystery Convention, held in 2015 in Raleigh, North Carolina-the City of Oaks. As with the convention itself, the anthology spreads a broad canopy across a wide range of crime writers from across the country and around the world-including both veteran writers and the brightest up-and-coming talents in the field. Several of the stories in Murder Under the Oaks draw on the region's history and culture-including the birth of a secret society at the University of Virginia, a mystery from Edgar Allan Poe's childhood days, and a series of less-than-welcome visits by everyone's favorite hometown sheriff. All participants contributed their efforts to support our charity-the Wake County Public Libraries-and by extension readers and writers everywhere. All profits go to the library. Edited by Art Taylor Including Stories By J.L. Abramo J.D. Allen Lori Armstrong Rob Brunet P.A. De Voe Sean Doolittle Tom Franklin Toni Goodyear Kristin Kisska Robert Lopresti Robert Mangeot Margaret Maron Kathleen Mix Britni Patterson Karen Pullen Ron Rash Karen E. Salyer Sarah Shaber Zoë Sharp B.K. Stevens Graham Wynd