You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
You can never really escape your past… Michael Hoffman has come a long way from his deprived childhood in Chicago’s South Side. Now he’s a young, successful partner in a major New York law firm, handling some of its clients’ most prestigious M&A deals. With a beautiful wife, and two young daughters who look up to him, he has built the perfect life. But Michael has a secret: one that goes back to his childhood; a secret so dark it would destroy his family and brilliant career. Discovered by the wrong people, it would certainly get him killed. There is only one person who knows about his past, and he is a career criminal who manages a low profile hedge fund, bankrolled by Eastern European mafia money. Michael is safe, but only for as long as he agrees to feed details of his firm’s deals to the fund so it can make millions from insider trading.
This third issue of Down & Out: The Magazine features a new Jim Brodie story by Barry Lancet, whose novel Japantown has been optioned by J.J. Abrams and Warner Brothers for the Hollywood treatment. Here we have Brodie on a trip to his home in Japan and a quest to find out what’s going on with the yakuza and a perplexing kidnapping. But first up is a story by Canadian favorite Peter Sellers; he delivers a nasty little crime story of love and loyalty in the workplace in his own unique style. Patti Abbott gives us a searing story proving once again how nothing torches the human soul like that of another person’s expectations. Art Taylor, one of the best and most prolific short story artists...
An arson in New Rhodes reveals the body of Julia Mae Jefferson, an eight-year-old African American girl in the city’s North Central District. Jack LeClere, the top homicide detective in the New Rhodes Police Department, is paired with a new partner for the case, Clyde Burris, a former New York City homicide-turned-New Rhodes PD Internal Affairs detective. Jack and Burris have a mutual distrust of each other, but that’s the least of their worries. In the heat of the ashes of that row-house, the search for a brutal killer awaits. New Rhodes is a city on the edge. An influx of new police recruits aren’t adjusting to the community they serve. A fight during a protest at a defunded communit...
Malefactors is defined as “those who commit an offense against the law”, or more simply put, “one who does ill toward another”. This collection of short stories from Jim Wilsky is chock full of them. Tales that are all different, yet all the same. The locales and characters range from rural to urban. Office buildings, swamps, wealthy estates and corn fields are some of the places. The people range from folks with money to flat broke, from those who have a lot on the line to those who have nothing to lose, old and young alike. There are stone cold killers to good guys and those in between. Those walking on that shaky bridge, that thin tightrope that connects good and evil. The stories all share the same common ingredients though. Plots that are brutal, chaotic, desperate, vengeful and violent. These pages paint the rage and burning fire that dwells within almost everyone but only surface and re-erupt in some. From guns, to knives, to swords and bare hands, this collection will push all the right buttons for crime fiction readers. These specially selected stories touch every base. So, buckle up and read on.
The “black car” has appeared both conspicuously and inconspicuously throughout the annals of fiction—its presence both mysterious and menacing, its appearance enough to pause your heart. It’s the sedan just within sight that seems to be mimicking your speed and movements as you walk down the dark deserted street late at night. As the hairs rise on the back of your neck you wonder, Who is behind the wheel and what is the driver’s intent? It’s The Black Car Business and its presence means your life is about to abruptly change. You try to assure yourself there’s nothing wrong, but your pace quickens nonetheless, and soon you’re running, desperate for that narrow sliver between t...
An innocent math professor runs for his life as teams of hitmen try to prevent publication of their government’s dark history… College professor Sam Teagarden stumbles upon a decades-old government cover-up when an encoded document mysteriously lands in his in-box, followed by a cluster of mini-drones programmed to kill him. That begins a terrifying flight from upstate New York, to Washington, to Key West as Teagarden must outfox teams of hitmen equipped with highly sophisticated technology. While a fugitive, he races to decode the journal, only to realize the dreadful truth—it’s the reason he’s being hunted because it details criminal secrets committed by the U.S. in the 20th Cent...
Matthew Flanagan is living the American dream. A plum job at an ad agency. A hot wife. A beautiful home in Southern California. But something is eating him up inside and a nasty drinking habit is about to cost him everything. After his life finally collapses around him, Matthew disappears to Vegas with a girl he barely knows. When word reaches the Flanagan clan back in Connecticut, Matthew’s brothers Mark and Luke are sent on a mission to find their brother and bring him home. It’s a longer and darker journey than either of them planned on. At turns funny and moving, Prodigal Sons is a hard-boiled American odyssey. A family saga with the heart of a crime novel. Praise for PRODIGAL SONS: “The work of an extravagantly talented writer, Prodigal Sons is one of the best debut novels I have ever read.” —Sterling Watson, author of Suitcase City, Fighting in the Shade, and Sweet Dream Baby “Miner’s wicked electric chair humor calls to mind the best of Elmore Leonard and Charles Willeford.” —Patrick Michael Finn, author of From the Darkness Right Under Our Feet and A Martyr for Suzy Kosasovich
An estranged family member! A score to end all scores! Continued gastrointestinal issues! Five years after surviving the most harrowing heist of her life, Fantine Park is lured back to the United States by her aunt. The bait: a lead on the identity of her mother’s killer and a score known as the ‘pension plan’, a piece of software that can literally pay out in perpetuity if they can get their hands on it in time. Working with a team of actual professionals with their own motivations; Fan’s loyalties and beliefs will be tested as nothing is as it seems; especially when one of the members of this crew may have been the last person to see her mother alive. It’s going to be lies, murde...
Dustin loves to rob banks. Dustin loves to drink. Dustin loves his women. Dustin loves loyalty. He might even love his adopted nephew Jeremy. And, he sometimes gets a little too enthusiastic in his job doing collections for local bookies—so, sometimes, he loves to hurt people. Told in the first person, Uncle Dust is a fascinating noir look inside the mind of a hard, yet very complicated criminal. Rob Pierce has been nominated for a Derringer Award for short crime fiction, and has had his stories published in Flash Fiction Offensive, Pulp Modern, Plots With Guns, Revolt Daily, Near to the Knuckle, and Shotgun Honey. The editor of Swill Magazine, he lives in Oakland, California, with his wif...
After helping a frightened girl who flagged down their Kenworth in Austin and delivering her to safety, trucker Jojo Boudreaux and co-driver Gator Natoli believe that’s the end of it. Until they find her again in Oklahoma City, and this time she doesn’t want to be saved. They soon find themselves pulled into dangerous territory. Somali Mafia territory. A place where powerful people manipulate a hundred-billion-dollar industry of prostitution, drugs and international sex trafficking. A place where innocence dies at a cost no one should have to pay. It’s not long before Jojo is drawn in deeper, fighting for her own life in this violent world of corruption, abuse, and addiction. Armed with her wits and will, the only way to survive is to trust others, accept help from unexpected places, and never, ever give up hope.