Böcker utgivna av Down & Out Books

<i>Can Moonlight and his Elvis impersonator sidekick survive a murderous gang of Hollywood obsessed Russian mobsters? </i> <br><br>Dick Moonlight can''t help himself. Moonlight, the private detective known as Captain Head-Case due to the piece of bullet lodged in his brain, should be grateful for his current job. But when it becomes clear the cash-starved brain surgeon he''s been hired to drive around is protecting his son from a rape conviction, Moonlight becomes disgusted. <br><br>Worse, when the charges turn into a case of "reckless murder," Moonlight''s the only one trying to keep the kid from the electric chair, though the young lady-a state senator''s daughter-clearly committed suicide. Then Moonlight and his unwilling assistant, a fat Elvis impersonator who owes him money, stumble into a much bigger plot and are soon dodging Hollywood obsessed drug-running Russian thugs, corrupt government officials, and the specter of Moonlight''s recently deceased girlfriend. <br><br><i>New York Times</i> bestselling author Vincent Zandri delivers another fast-paced thriller in the ITW Thriller and PWA Shamus Award-winning Dick Moonlight PI series, offering readers plenty of wry humor, bullets, car chases, and Scarface references. For fans of Michael Connelly, Don Winslow, Joe Lansdale, Eric Beetner, Frank Zafiro and more. <br><br>Praise for the Books by Vincent Zandri: <br><br>"A riveting story...oh, what a story it is: grisly, surprising, and page-turningly suspenseful. A terrific old-school thriller." -<i>Booklist</i> (starred review) <br><br>"Zandri writes strong prose that rarely strains for effect, and some of his scenes...achieve a powerful hallucinatory horror." -<i>Publishers Weekly</i> <br><br>"Captures readers'' attention from the opening scene...creates a story that...is hard to tear away from once a reader is hooked." -<i>BookPage</i> <br><br>"Sensational...Masterful...Brilliant." -<i>New York Post</i> <br><br>"The action never wanes." -<i>Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel</i> <br><br>"Gritty, fast-paced, lyrical and haunting." -Harlan Coben, <i>New York Times</i> bestselling author <br><br>"A satisfying yarn." -<i>Chicago Tribune</i> <br><br>"Vincent Zandri nails reader''s attention." -<i>Boston Herald</i> <br><br>"(Zandri) demonstrates an uncanny knack for exposition, introducing new characters and narrative possibilities with the confidence of an old pro...Zandri does a superb job interlocking puzzle pieces." -<i>The San Diego Union-Tribune</i> <br><br>"Tough, stylish, heartbreaking." -Don Winslow, bestselling author of <i>Savages</i> <br><br>"A thriller that has depth and substance, wickedness and compassion." -<i>The Times-Union (Albany) </i>

<b>Old-Time Mountain Song</b> <br><br>There''s a place in Tennessee, just across the line, <br>No one ever goes up there, it''s too rough a climb, <br>You won''t find the name or place wrote on any map, <br>Folks down here ''round Shelton''s Trace calls it White Oak Flats. <br><br>Hazel Taylor was my wife, and I loved her so, <br>We was married on Shelton''s Trace, fifteen years ago, <br>Now I lie here all alone, wonderin'' on the past, <br>Wonderin'' why she left our home to go to White Oak Flats. <br><br>I don''t know how he looked at her, I don''t know what he said, <br>I don''t know what he could have done, to turn poor Hazel''s head, <br>Never in her darkest hour, could she imagine that, <br>She''d agree to go with him, up to White Oak Flats. <br><br>I can see the rocky trail up the mountain side, <br>I can see poor Hazel, now, lying by his side, <br>Folks down here still talks about how it come to pass, <br>Nothing but the silence now, up on White Oak Flats <br><hr><br>Hazel Tighrow is a woman born far back in the Appalachian Mountains, in the early decades of the Twentieth Century. who explodes all the stereotypes. Where she "should" be an unlettered drudge, ready to marry young, and produce ten children, she is, instead, a reflective, self-taught, well-read, and sensitive young woman, who desperately wants the freedom to grow into herself. <br><br>Still, because she is so aware, she knows whence she comes, and tries to fit-in as best she can. She eventually marries a caring young man, George Taylor, and does what she can to settle-in to the life of the mountains. <br><br>Listen to the author''s recording of the White Oak Flats song played on a fretless gourd-banjo, in the old two-finger style on <a target="_blank" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=no-jwX_yw1Y">YouTube</a>. <br><br>

"All's great for sixteen-year-old actor Dalton Black as he portrays a teen killer on a crime reenactment show. That is, until he realizes someone is stalking him. When that someone turns out to be Homer Lee Varney, the man convicted of the murder, things take a dark turn, and Dalton is afraid for his life. What does Varney want? Some sort of twisted revenge? Or something even worse? Can Dalton and his drama friends discover the truth, before they become the killer's next victims? Stay tuned to find out!"--

Sometimes a man who goes missing should stay missing! When a savvy and sexy literary agent by the name of Suzanne Bonchance lures Dick Moonlight into searching for her missing star client-the boozing, poet laureate, Roger Walls-the PI with the piece of bullet in his brain finds himself waist-deep in a whole lot of trouble. But when a hot MFA in Writing student who claims to know Walls personally comes to his rescue, Moonlight not only becomes smitten with her charm, he falls head over heels with a young woman he barely knows. As the trail for Walls narrows, and the truths about everyone who has ever been involved with the world-famous writer are revealed, Moonlight wants only to run away as fast as his legs will take him. One thing he can't outrun, however, are bullets. For fans of action-packed mystery series-especially those of Robert Parker, Don Winslow, and Charlie Huston-comes the next installment in the 2015 ITW Thriller Award and PWA Shamus Award-winning Dick Moonlight, Private Investigator series.

Badge 112 is the story of a restless boy orphaned in high school, and his unlikely passage from juvenile delinquent to decorated police officer. When Peter Stipe finds his mother after her suicide, it leaves him scarred and isolated. After a couple of brushes with the law, his dad sends him off to Culver Military Academy to provide structure and discipline. In a whirlwind final summer, he found himself paired with the most beautiful girl on campus and clashing with the commandant. This pattern of behavior would define his years in high school. At 17, his father's sudden death from cancer cast him adrift. After beginning work in a warehouse, Stipe is soon befriended by a firefighter who'd lost his only son to combat in Vietnam. The father figure took the aimless youth under his wing, instilling a tireless work ethic while suggesting a career in civil service. Though his spell of misdirection continued, Stipe heeded the advice and found himself working for the Building Department, enforcing city codes and inspecting houses. Trained in every aspect of code enforcement, his laid-back style was effective with business owners, landlords and residents. But he saw the grim effects of poverty first hand, exposed to wretched living conditions. The homes and apartments he inspected were so filthy, he had to strip his clothes off outside when he got home. However, assignments all over town enabled him to learn Ann Arbor like the back of his hand. His skill in code-enforcement led to a personal recruitment by Ann Arbor's Police Chief to become an officer. A 29-year-old rookie, Stipe left his mark, combining instinct, orientation and superb fitness to catch criminals and save lives. He confronts the memory of his own mother's death by handling the suicides of several more victims, many to gunfire. His negotiation skills spare the lives of many more. While on the force, Stipe embarked on a series of high-profile arrests, high-speed pursuits, foot chases, bank robberies, hostage situations, homicides, life and death struggles and harrowing rescues. In 1994, a serial killer investigation exposed the strained racial tensions between the police and the public they serve. Stipe and the killer confront one another in court. Stipe's tactical training results in his assignment as the point man on the SWAT Team. He engages in a sequence of armed encounters, some at point blank range. The peak in his career is toppled by a turbulent marriage to an unfaithful wife, an ill-fated affair with an attractive partner, and the tragic drowning of two teenage girls, trapped in a submerged car. When the veteran officer bottomed out and became immune to hope and humor, he was rescued from the brink by a succession of intuitive patrol partners and the girl that sold him coffee. Badge 112 is about survival in the darkest corners of society, and about a cop turning tragedy and adversity into hope and redemption in the dim light of life on his patrol beat.

<i>If you can dream it, you can kill it.</i> <br><br>Mac Sexton is a good-looking teenager and up-and-coming force of nature who harbors a secret ambition: to become the Number One Serial Killer in America, if not the world. Born into a wealthy, robustly dysfunctional family in the Northeast, and choosing (It/It/Its) as preferred pronouns, Mac chronicles its grisly journey from abused child to apex predator in humor darker than a lump of anthracite. <br><br>Mac''s family is a veritable smorgasbord of warped souls. Its father, referred to by Mac sarcastically as "Dear Old Dad," is a powerful and well-thought-of figure in the community, a Yale alumnus whose achievements and privilege camouflage a secret life of gut-wrenching perversity. Mac''s mother is a gin-swilling socialite and all-around enabler who routinely turns a blind eye to her husband''s cruelty. Mac''s younger adoptive sister Morgan is a conniving 10-year-old, a pint-sized problem child from China with more issues than <i>Hustler</i>. Mac''s older brother Wally is an awkward loner bullied by their father and on a path of self-destruction, especially when he decides to follow in his father''s footsteps and use Mac for his personal enjoyment, not realizing that his younger sibling is morphing everyday into one of the most vicious creatures the Devil on a bad day has ever created-a twisted child with a high IQ, a streak of mean wider than the Mississippi and Styx combined, and an insatiable appetite for violence-a psychopath who considers Charles Manson and John Wayne Gacy as heroes and stellar role models. <br><br>From its days in an elite prep school wreaking havoc on wayward teachers, to its time spent in a hardcore "troubled teen" therapy program in the Utah desert where it finds itself eventually captured by a cult group of renegade Mormons, to its embittering enrollment as a student at Vassar and Amherst, Mac proves unflinching in its desire to rack up the body count of victims to stratospheric levels. <br><br>Dropping out of college, Mac heads to Maryland where it witnesses the murder of a bearded cross-dressing Good Samaritan before travelling to Richmond, Virginia, where an 85-year-old billionaire, smitten by lust and with a taste for wives and catamites, proposes marriage, much to the horror of the doddering old sugar daddy''s family. It is while travelling to Tennessee, under the guise of visiting Graceland to pay respects to Elvis instead of searching for fresh victims, that Mac''s BMW hits a deer, and a kindly old couple stops to render aid-an event that will prove pivotal for Mac, and definitely not for the better, thrusting the teen into a nightmarish world that will demand the utmost in survival skills and resolve, forcing it to use its unique skill set and bloodlust and can-do attitude to prove once and for all that it, and it only, deserves the title of Number One Serial Killer in America. A title for which no consolation prize is given for second place.

Homecoming queen. Cheerleader. Heroin addict. Meadow Charles had all the promise in the world-and secrets to hide. Someone else tried to hide Meadow's secrets when they murdered her and left her body at the Parker County landfill. Five years later, the murder still reverberates through the Appalachian community. But now the man who confessed to the murder says he didn't do it, and he wants Henry Malone to prove it. Henry and his well-armed A.A. sponsor Woody quickly find themselves drawn into a world of money and drugs, prostitutes and corruptions, and at the center, one family's dark past-full of secrets someone's killing to keep hidden. Praise for SHE TALKS TO ANGELS: "James D.F. Hannah is the real deal... (He) shows with this book he has no trouble holding his own against Robert B. Parker and Lawrence Block." -Dave Zeltserman, author of Small Crimes and Pariah "A wicked slice of pulpy, country noir!" -Joe Clifford, author of The One That Got Away and the Jay Porter series "Atmospheric and genuine, James Hannah's She Talks to Angels packs a powerful punch." -J. Carson Black, bestselling author of The Shop and Spectre Black "The dry dark wit, the terrible secrets that need to be unlocked, the action... One of the best traditional PI series out there for fans of guys like Elvis Cole, Spenser, and even Dave Robicheaux." -Jochem van Der Steen, Sons of Spade

The desert spares no souls. Set in the scorched and unforgiving deserts of the American Southwest, A Place for Snakes to Breed follows Weldon Holt's desperate search for his daughter Tammy, who is lost in the vicious landscape of interstate truck stop prostitution and its nightworlds "where the fruit of human trade is harvested by razor blades and cheap pistols." Weldon Holt knows these brutal roadways all too well. As an over-the-road truck driver he was once ruined by liquor and methedrine, and he vanished from his daughter's life. After a brief reconnection some fifteen years later, his daughter vanishes from his. Now, returning to the same roads that nearly killed him, Weldon must protect the sobriety he's maintained for over a decade as Tammy does her best to lay her own life to ruin. The violence of temptation does battle with Weldon's urgency to find and save Tammy at every mile marker he passes. The character of time is devoured as Tammy descends into her journey of hellish self-destruction and agony, where the threat of death thrums in every motel room she visits and in every hitchhiked ride she takes. Her body and spirit deteriorate in the pollution of alcohol and cheap stimulants as she escapes into a vaporous version of herself where no real self remains. Told with taut, vivid, and hallucinatory prose, A Place for Snakes to Breed explores the darkest expanses of human despair peopled by unforgettable characters who live and breathe on the page with complexity and emotional depth as they struggle to liberate themselves from the interstate's pythonic grasp. Praise for A PLACE FOR SNAKES TO BREED: "Finn writes with the precision and eloquence of Cormac McCarthy, an understanding of what Jack London called 'the submerged tenth, ' and the brutality of Nelson Algren and David Goodis. A Place for Snakes to Breed is a novel that will be studied by students and scholars, and serve as a model of how a book should be written for writers." -Eric Miles Williamson, author of East Bay Grease and Welcome to Oakland "Finn's sinewy sentences whose movements you will not predict (and which you will read several times to savor and to try to piece out how he got there) turns A Place for Snakes to Breed into much more than a story about a troubled youth on a journey through the underworld. This is the world of a gifted writer who knows that the impoverished, the defective, and the hopeless is as complex as that of the upper-class characters that populate so much best-selling drivel." -Ron Cooper, author of Purple Jesus and All My Sins Remembered

In Roughhouse, Jeffery Hess returns to the unforgettable world of good-natured badass Scotland Ross-hero of his critically acclaimed Beachhead and Tushhog-to tell the powerful story of people stretched to extremes. It's August 1986. The Cold War rages and Yuppies make all the money. Fresh off a three-year stretch at Starke for keeping Pearce family secrets, Scotland has a new place to call home on Fort Myers Beach. All should be perfect except Scotland's wife is going to die unless he comes up with $100,000. He enlists a trusted friend to help him rob a Tampa casino to pay for her unconventional treatment. While freely risking life in prison if he's caught, he never thought his trusted accomplice could go rogue and turn against him. On top of that, his long-lost nieces come to him in need of help only he can provide, while a mysterious female former Marine has her own surprise plan for him. Scotland hurtles through his new-found freedom right back into a storm of violence and pain with strong women and treacherous men gusting in all directions. Without him, the women would be doomed; without them, he would be. Yet, success and failure are put to the biggest challenge by an unsettled score from the past that threatens to bury them all in the surf. Praise for ROUGHHOUSE: "Rounding out a trilogy is never easy, especially one with as memorable an anti-hero as Scotland Ross, the on-again/off-again criminal-with-a-heart-of-gold who managed to shoot his way out of Jeffery Hess's Beachhead and Tushhog. Yet Hess's finale to cap the series not only delivers, it firmly sets Hess up with the masters of Florida rough-and-tumble crime fiction. Roughhouse pummels Scotland Ross as he fights his way through heartache, betrayal, shifting family loyalties and unbreakable family bonds, all set against a backdrop of bullets and cash, salt and sun, the best that Florida has to offer." -Steph Post, author of Miraculum, Lightwood, Walk in the Fire, Holding Smoke, and A Tree Born Crooked "A bruised and bloodied hero punching destiny's jaw one last time. Tense, gritty, emotional. Roughhouse carves a fitting end for the unbreakable Scotland, who, like the 80s itself, ain't accepting fate easy." -James R. Duncan, author of Blood Republic "What a wild ride! I really dig that this book is noir through and through yet has this emotional beating heart at its center. I could read about these characters and their wacky Floridian lives all day. Well done, sir!" -Chris Rhatigan, author of Squeeze and Race to the Bottom "Scotland Ross is a good man running in a merciless world. It's a good thing he's built for the battle. This book reminded me of early Elmore Leonard books. I'm embarrassed to say this is my first Scotland Ross novel. But I'm fired up that I can devour the other two." -Jonathan Brown, author of the Lou Crasher Mysteries "Edgy, rich and excessively smart, Roughhouse might be that rare third element of the trilogy, even better than its predecessors. Regardless, it is constantly entertaining and, even better, always artful." - Fred G. Leebron, author of Six Figures, Out West, and Welcome to Christiania

Mail carrier and aspiring writer Ezra Lockert is reclusive author Glen Dower's "biggest fan." Ezra realizes that the best way to become like his idol, he must become part of Glen's life. Using his amateur sleuth skills, and his connections at the United States Post Office, Ezra tracks Glen down to the small town of Purgatory, Maine. Through a series of clever tactics, Ezra gets himself assigned to Glen's mail route. He not only joins the Purgatory community, he also becomes their most accomplished stalker. For weeks, Ezra watches Glen from the woods outside Glen's house and studies his patterns and writing habits. After learning all he can, Ezra takes the next step and befriends Glen. As the friendship grows, Ezra believes he can now take the next step toward becoming a writer. But he is about to get closer to Glen than he had even dreamed. Praise for WANNABE: "If Martin Scorcese's King of Comedy and Stephen King's Misery had a kid, it might look and read like M. Wallace Herron's Wannabe. This funny, breezy, satiric take on idol worship, the publishing business, and the craft of writing will have you quickly turning the pages till you get to the surprising end, worthy of the best of Alfred Hitchcock." -Charles Salzberg, Two-time Shamus Award nominee for Devil in the Hole and Second Story Man "Herron's Wannabe is a delightfully twisty and fascinating read. Watch out what you wish for indeed." -Reed Farrel Coleman, New York Times bestselling author

Jay Brodsky is an enigma. To his fellow agents at the FBI's cybercrimes division. To his new partner. Even to himself. For someone whose skills are beyond question, he often seems just on the edge of losing control. He seldom speaks about his family and his personal life, but he seems to be hiding something. And he has an unusual obsession with even the most obscure punk rock. So when a mysterious cyber-terrorist organization begins erasing Americans' medical debt, Jay must put his personal issues aside to focus on an attack that threatens to destabilize the US economy. But when the trail leads to his own family, Jay will be forced to confront everything he never knew about his parents and his long-missing sister and decide where his true loyalties lie. With his country and his mind racing toward a breaking point, can Jay find the answers before everything descends into chaos?

Can Dick Moonlight save himself from crashing and burning? PI Dick Moonlight wakes up to find himself on a plummeting plane and handcuffed to an FBI agent. As if his life wasn't already turbulent enough-his bar burned down; his ex, Lola, left him for another man; and Jack Daniels is his new best friend-the FBI informs him that he's got unfinished business. His last case, the one with Russian mobsters after a top secret flash drive, isn't exactly closed. The cop who took the hardware from Moonlight went rogue, bringing along a crooked FBI agent and Moonlight's ex, and now he's looking to sell to the highest bidder. The FBI needs Moonlight to track them down-in Florence, Italy. Outwitting, outrunning, and out shooting the Russian thugs who are also after the flash drive will be a piece of cake. Wooing back Lola, however, is going to take everything he's got. The stakes couldn't be higher in Vincent Zandri's latest Dick Moonlight PI thriller. Blue Moonlight is a fast-paced, whip-smart tale of a guy who can't always remember getting into trouble-and can't seem to stay out of it. For fans of Robert B. Parker, Michael Connelly, Ace Atkins, Brett Battles, Don Winslow, and more comes an unputdownable mystery that's sure to keep you up all night...in a good way.

In the city of Carcasa, gunshots devastate the night as a patrol officer makes a traffic stop. The occupants-three dealers caught in the act of muling-set into motion a course of actions that can only end badly. Now, one is dead, another fleeing on foot and the third tearing through neighborhoods in a bumper car-style chase. Furious, grief-stricken officers on their heels with their brother fighting for his life on the side of a road. <br><br>The shooter escapes, and the PD begins their hunt to find the shooter before he lucks out, fades into memory. With what information they have, they dig; the dirt that is the shooter''s life getting thrown over their shoulders by the shovel-full. Family, friends, employment, any avenue of refuge for him begins to burn. Things get complicated along the way. The kind of complicated that goes into a body bag. The art of flushing out the enemy is a sacred practice, best done with smoldering rage. <br><br>But, after a man has nowhere to hide, having him out in the open might be worse. <br><br>Praise for IT''S UGLY BECAUSE IT''S PERSONAL: <br><br>"<i>It''s Ugly Because It''s Personal</i> is a book unlike any other I''ve read and more than what it first appears to be. All told, it''s Ryan Sayles putting it out there and showcasing a side of the life most of us rarely see. More than an important story, it''s a grand design, and a book I believe the world needs to read." -Beau Johnson, author of <i>All of Them to Burn</i> <br><br>"In his no-holds-barred style, Sayles is gritty and real...like a punch to the head. Life as it is in the hard, dark places where cops work. This is a timely tale that will make you think, and maybe even make you thankful." -Joel W. Barrows, author of the Deep Cover Thrillers <br><br>"Tough as nails. Real as hell." -Colin Campbell, author of the Jim Grant Thrillers <br><br>"This story erupts in gunfire on page one and spends the rest of the book dragging us through the tension and profound pain that results from those first pages. While adhering to the procedural, Sayles still manages to make this tale sing with tension." -Frank Zafiro, author of the SpoCompton novels

Dick Moonlight is dead for real this time. Thanks to a trio of masked thugs in a dark downtown Albany alley, he''s purchased a one-way ticket to the Pearly Gates-that is, until he feels his floating spirit painfully pulled back into his bruised but breathing body. And that''s when the real trouble starts. <br><br>A private detective with a short-term memory problem due to a wayward self-inflicted slug, Moonlight knows he''s still in danger. Now he just needs to know why. And he''s got plenty of enemies to keep him guessing-the Albany police, the local mob, even the latest love of his life, Lola, can''t be trusted. Only his Vietnam-vet best friend, Georgie, is on the level. But it seems the goons who tried to take him out have bigger fish to fry-chiefly Moonlight''s latest client, Peter Czech, a handicapped nuclear engineer with a mysterious Russian heritage. Czech had something-a box-the gang believes is now in Moonlight''s possession, and they''re willing to get it any deadly way they can. Problem is, Moonlight doesn''t recall Czech giving him any box-of course, that doesn''t mean he doesn''t have it. He just better figure out where it is before he winds up dead for the last time. <br><br>The Cold War is heating up once again in Vincent Zandri''s latest thriller. <i>Moonlight Rises</i> is a fast-paced, whip-smart tale of a guy who can''t always remember getting into trouble-and can''t seem to stay out of it. For fans of Robert B. Parker, Michael Connelly, Ace Atkins, Brett Battles, Don Winslow, and more comes an unputdownable mystery that''s sure to keep you up all night...in a good way.