A TOUCH OF DEATH by Charles Williams

This is another banger by Charles Williams, where a broke ex-football player gets sucked into a robbery plot by a scheming brunette in a bikini. 

…looking like something the censors cut out of a sailor’s dream.

It really stands out because not only was it constantly surprising but it features one of the coolest femme fatales in the genre, a master manipulator that never once used sex to seduce our lead sucker, because she simply doesn’t need it, she’s that good. Seriously, I constantly kept waiting for the clothes to come off but was always surprised. In fact, the moment that the two meet, they hate each other, and the hate only grows hotter as the story moves forward. 

You’re a business proposition to me, a hundred and twenty thousand dollars’ worth of meat to be delivered on the hoof.

The other thing that grows is the tension, which is the real star of the show here. The moment the plot gets going, the suspense never lets up, and I was right there in the protagonist’s shoes, not sure how much more I could take, and nearly yearning for the police to just catch them already or for the double-crosses to happen, if only to allow me to breathe for a bit. And when the ending comes, it’s not like I didn’t see it coming, but I didn’t expect it to be as satisfying. While this one isn’t as much of a slam-dunk classic as Hell Hath No Fury (The Hot Spot), it’s still a fantastic noir by Charles Williams. 

There were no days now. Time had melted and run together into one endless and unmarked second of waiting for an explosion when the fuse was always burning and forever a quarter of an inch long. 

GRADE: A-

MORE BETTER DEALS by Joe R. Lansdale

Joe Lansdale is one of our best authors and a total genre chameleon. He jumps from genre to genre with no warning and succeeding better than most, whether it’s horror, buddy comedies, westerns, or coming-of-age dramas. And even though he’s a chameleon, he still stands out in each lane because he has a voice all his own. 

Now, he’s back again with a straight noir worthy of the Gold Medal or Black Lizard label. It follows a used car salesman and passing mixed-race, Korean War veteran named Ed Edwards who wants the White American Dream for himself: the dream of owning a business, having a white woman on his arm, and making enough money to send his sister to school. And to get that, he’ll do anything, whether it’s sleep with another man’s bored wife, or plot a murder or three!

This one was extremely enjoyable, and it's Lansdale doing what he does best, plotting a well-paced backwoods noir with enough violence, sex, and betrayal to make Gil Brewer or Charles Williams smile, and doing it with the knack for humor, dialogue, and dramatic irony that we’ve come to love from the author!

GRADE: B+

SLOW DOWN by Lee Matthew Goldberg

This novel is sold as a tense noir in the same vein as a classic James M. Cain novel with a successful filmmaker recounting his cutthroat rise to fame by stealing his mentor’s film and wife. It had some potential but ultimately, there’s not enough there to really live up to its hype and promise. 

The characters aren’t nearly as compelling as they should be and once the lumbering plot gets going about halfway through, it proves to be barely existent beyond a maddeningly basic noir skeleton that can be summarized in a couple of sentences. The entitled asshole protagonist got on my nerves and the femme fatale was completely without nuance. And the ending…goodness, what a timid cop-out that doesn’t at all stand up to the stories that it professes to be influenced by. 

GRADE: D

FUGITIVE RED by Jason Starr

Noir is sometimes defined by the terrible decisions that the loser "heroes" make. In the latest book by crime author Jason Starr, this protagonist stands out, making some of the dumber decisions I've read in a while. But that's not a terrible thing as it was fun reading about this dumbass flounder with every decision he tries to make, digging himself deeper and deeper into the shit after he tries to spice up his love life by cheating on his wife on a dating app and then subsequently getting caught up in a murder plot. 

It's an entertaining, if modest, thriller that takes interesting turns and moves at a great pace. But it doesn't really go far with its drama, chickening out at the end and missing exciting opportunities to take advantage of its cool twists in favor of a disappointingly tidy ending. It was all a little too safe and I wish it was a bit more courageous in its choices. 

GRADE: B-

DETOUR by Martin M. Goldsmith

A violinist named Alexander Roth is hitching rides across the country on his way to Los Angeles to be with his actress girlfriend and gets waylaid along the way by unfortunate circumstances. This essential, classic noir stands out because of its strong writing. Many of the pulp novels back then, because of their quick turn out, felt hastily written, but this one really feels like a little more time was taken to craft the work. Another thing that stands out and that I expect felt different back then was the parallel storytelling, jumping back and forth between Roth's predicament and the story of his girl Sue and her life in Hollywood as a struggling actress. I loved the way the twists in each story revealed themselves and what they meant for the other plotlines. I wish there was a little more substance to Sue's story beyond her pining for love though. But with a cool plot, good writing, a ruthless fatale, and doom-filled atmosphere, this one should definitely be included on any noir bookshelf!

GRADE: B+

NUDE ON THIN ICE by Gil Brewer

Pulpy tagline: “A red-hot hellcat in the frozen night—and murder on the prowl!”

Yep. It’s another potent cocktail of greed and lust by noir master Gil Brewer! This one stars one of his most sleazy protagonists, a womanizer and scam artist who drops the ladies he uses like a bad habit and skips out on the hotel bills. After an old friend dies, Ken McCall concocts a plan to seduce his widow and take her for all the money he left behind for her. But a wrench is thrown in his plans in the form of a pretty young thang named Justine who steals his heart and has plans of her own as well.

"My father. I always called him Daddy. He was the first. He was the only one, other than you."

This is a pretty standard pulp novel for Brewer, but what really makes it memorable is how truly crazy the entire cast of characters is. And if you've read Brewer's other books, that’s really saying a lot! Once you get to Justine's kinky daddy issues and all the ruthless blackmail and double-crosses, you’ll find yourself actually rooting for that poor asshole McCall!

I suddenly wanted to leave this house, fast. I didn't, though. Somehow you never do. It's so damn easy to ignore wisdom when it whispers.

GRADE: B 

STARING INTO THE ABYSS: STORIES by Richard Thomas

Many of these aren't stories in the traditional sense. They are mere portraits, moody snapshots, fragments of broken lives, each one sharp and dirty with rust. They're short, bold, uncompromising pieces that pummel you in various ways, leaving you stunned. Basically, the kind of short fiction that I adore. Even though they're unconventional, they are all still highly engaging and satisfying. This is a collection of some of the most original stories I've read in a while.

I was extremely impressed by the creative talent shown here, whether it's the chronicling of a "Twenty Dollar Bill" as it travels a grimy and depressing journey, the look at fight clubs as a new form of criminal justice in "Victimized," a bizarrely sad take on the author's fate in "Stephen King Ate My Brain," after an encounter with the titular author, a dark, uncomfortable "Interview" for a babysitting job, or a twisted take on the choose-your-own-adventure story in "Splintered."

Every time she looked at me, she saw him, our son, that generous boy, and it was another gut punch bending her over, another parting of her flesh, and I was one of the thousand, and my gift to her now was my echo.

If you like work that focuses on building atmosphere and tone, work that sinks under your skin and lingers way past reading, then buy this and dive in. I can't wait to read more from Richard Thomas. I've been reading many great short story collections in recent years, with very clever and fascinating writing. But I have to say that Thomas's work is definitely some of the most exciting and stands out in the crowd.

GRADE: A

DRY COUNTY by Jake Hinkson

"We all had our chance to do the right thing, and none of us took it."

Any new release by Jake Hinkson is a day one purchase and read for me. I'm a huge fan of his dark noirs that tell tales of complicated losers trying their best to dig themselves out of trouble and making a terrible job of it. While it might lack the manic energy of his earlier books, Dry County might be his most widely accessible book. But he never strays away from his usual tackling of taboo material. In this new novel, he brings together several members of a small Arkansas town, as they collide with each other in the wake of a respected local preacher's decision to pay off his former gay lover in exchange for silence.

There are no good guys or bad guys here as Hinkson passes no judgment on any of the players. Although there's a constant theme in his work critiquing the dangers and hypocrisies of religion, here it's done with a maturity where he just lets the characters loose with all their flaws and without commentary. And I as a reader was riveted as usual watching them desperately dig themselves deeper into their respective holes. Great, constantly entertaining work as usual.

"I'm drowning, and drowning men don't call out for God. They gasp for air."

GRADE: A-

CORROSION by Jon Bassoff

For a few minutes I wished that I were dead but then I worried about hell and what it would bring.

I would describe myself as an avid reader of noir and dark fiction. I feel like I've read lots of great work in these genres. But every now and then I find something that takes me by surprise. Author
Jon Bassoff has been on my radar for a while and I've finally made it to his work with this pitch black, mind-blowing debut noir.

Back up the mountain, shotgun over one shoulder, bride over the other. And now, forever, snow falling, wind howling, boots crunching, breath wheezing, devil laughing.

I don't want to talk too much about the story but it treads familiar waters in regards to content but in an original and creative way that makes it totally addictive and compulsively readable. From its fiery, crackerjack prose, its parallel POV structure, its evolving narrator, and its heavy themes, this is sly, sneaky, and nimbly controlled work that is constantly surprising as the revelations are slowly revealed. And most importantly, it's a brave examination of its troubled protagonists. This one puts Bassoff even more on my radar in a major way.

I used to not believe in God, his father has said, but now, I'm a changed man, a true believer. Only a Supreme Being could create such misery and mayhem.

GRADE: A

HARD COLD WHISPER by Michael Hemmingson

There aren't many contemporary crime noir novels that attempt to recreate the manic intensity of the best classic pulp paperbacks and succeed quite as well as this one. It's about a Southern California process server who falls for a teenager and gets entangled in her plot to fast track her aunt's death and gain her inheritance, and it's written with direct prose that's full of mischief and a sly smirk. It's apparent that Hemmingson was having a ball seeing what dark turns this story would take as he wrote it, pushing our ill-fated protagonist deeper into a cursed nightmare, all for our sadistic entertainment. It's wicked, short, and swift, just like the best novels of the Gold Medal days, recalling the work of people like Gil Brewer and Harry Whittington.

GRADE: A-

SHORT RIDE TO NOWHERE by Tom Piccirilli

High on my list of favorite authors, Tom Piccirilli has been known to have written some dark shit. This novel is no different as it's one of those downer noirs that we wrote in the last half of his career. It's narrated by Jenks, a man who's lost everything in the recession, now homeless on the streets of Manhattan, and now searching for answers in the wake of his old friend Hale's violent death, a man who shared the same economic fate.

The worst thing about having a wife and kids and dog was trying to keep it all. Once it was gone, Jenks had to admit, so was the pressure of fighting for it. You were never so free.

Prepare yourself for a dreary and gut-wrenching odyssey through the grimy streets of New York, from homeless shelters to hooker alleys, as Jenks not only trolls for answers but seems like he's aching for to vent his frustrations through violence. In an interesting look at how destruction can not only be contagious but possibly destined, we watch as Jenks flirts with bloodshed everywhere he goes. No one does true modern noir quite like Piccirilli.

He would listen to the sound of the blade opening and shutting, the way he was listening to it now, and he would discover in that last moment what the next page in the great book of life, written in God's own hand, would have to say about his sins.

GRADE: A-

THE CLEANUP by Sean Doolittle

This was a simple little noir with a familiar story about a disgraced cop on a shit detail working security at a convenience story who gets himself caught up in a murder cover-up involving the checkout girl he’s crushing on. There's some good dialogue and it can get pretty suspenseful. But what made this one really enjoyable was bearing witness to Doolittle’s skillful plotting. Every action and every character turns out to have an important role to play and watching it all come together is like seeing Doolittle set up a complicated array of dominoes, then tipping one over and watching them all fall gloriously!

GRADE: B+

OLD GHOSTS by Nik Korpon

I feel like you can always depend on Nik Korpon for a solid tale of modern noir with dark and evocative language, and Old Ghosts doesn't disappoint. Not totally. This early novella follows Cole, a man trying to make ends meet with his wife Amy, while trying to make a baby with her as well. But things get complicated when old friends come back into his life and bring the old ghosts with them.

I liked the book fine superficially and the writing made it compulsively readable, but I wish that more time was spent on detailing the complicated past relationship that Cole had with Delilah and Chance. It seems like something was compelling him to work with them again even though he knew it would lead to tragedy, but I never fully understood what that something was, so I couldn't get fully invested in his decisions. He seems like he hates them and wants to stab them both in the face all the time, so why does he feel like he has to help them? I'm sure it's something along the lines of feeling some sort of familial loyalty that is hard to break, which I understand on a surface level, but not on an emotional one. We really need to get a sense of their past relationship more. An example of where this is done well in the novella format are in several of Tom Piccirilli's novellas, which deal with similar themes. This one was alright but for a stunning look at what Korpon can do, read By The Nails of the Warpriest.

Also, the editing in this edition left much to be desired too as there were many typos that were pretty dam distracting.

GRADE: B-

THE HOOK by Donald Westlake

The plot master Donald Westlake does it again by weaving a tale of two writers: Bryce Proctorr, a widely popular author with marriage problems and serious writer's block, and Wayne Prentice, a failing mid-level writer with money problems; and in the vein of Strangers on a Train, Bryce allows Wayne to use his name on his next book and split the profits, in exchange for getting rid of Bryce's wife...permanently.

I didn't realize how fun it would be to watch two nerdy writers try to pull off a murder and get away with it, but this is Westlake of course. He makes it all really believable and engaging as the two deal with committing a crime the way writers would: crafting motivations, red herrings, and plot twists in order to not only get away with murder but navigate the publishing industry, all while Westlake is doing the same thing with us. Fun times!

GRADE: B+

KNOW ME FROM SMOKE by Matt Phillips

"Does the past ever stay where it should?"

This started out as an A-book for me, with writing and subject matter that was right up my alley, telling the story of a lounge singer who's got the blues because of her murdered husband and the .45 caliber bullet in her hip, an ex-convict trying to go straight after being in prison for 20 years, and their efforts to pull each other out of the muck they've found themselves in on the streets of San Diego. I love reading about troubled characters like this and these two were particularly compelling. It was bittersweet seeing them fall in love with the knowledge that soon I would have to watch it all fall apart when the kept secrets between them begin to blow things apart in true noir fashion. But the final half of the book dropped a grade once it started to get a bit repetitive and I also couldn't understand why someone that seems as smart as Royal is would allow himself to get so caught up and controlled by someone like Phoenix. But maybe that's the point...maybe Royal not as smart as he should be, and destined to go down the bad path again.

"The fishmonger smells like fish and the bartender smells like sex. And what is it, Stella asked herself, that the devil smells like? 

Like a match struck and shaken back into darkness—that old devil smells like sulfur."

GRADE: B

FATALE: DELUXE EDITION VOLUME 1 by Ed Brubaker

I shouldn't even need to review or recommend this. If you see a book written by Ed Brubaker with art by Sean Phillips, you should just get it and read it because it more than likely is awesome. At this point it's like preaching to the choir. But this is so enjoyable that I want to talk about it so it might as well be with you!

The way he felt about Josephine...it was out of touch with the world. It was unfair to everything and everyone else.

Brubaker focuses on the archetypal "femme fatale": that stock character in so much of noir fiction, the seductive woman that helps to lead the hapless protagonist down a destructive path. But in an original and inspired turn, Brubaker has the awesome idea to focus on the fatale herself and explore the notion that the femme fatale title might be supernatural in origin, a curse on the woman bearing it. In a potent mix of noir and horror, Brubaker tells of the cursed Josephine, the creepy cult that hunts her, and the men that fall in her path, in parallel stories set in 1950's San Francisco, 1970's Los Angeles, and the modern day.

As usual, Phillips's art is moody and expressive, and Brubaker never spoon-feeds the reader, peeling back the layers of his story at just the right pace. I loved seeing the femme fatale trope turned on it's head and into a sympathetic woman who doesn't want the influence that she has on men, but it's also cool to see that the tragic inevitability of noir is still there as she can only watch as these men destroy their lives. Memorable writing, great characters, and atmosphere to burn prove once again why Brubaker and Phillips and colorist Elizabeth Breitweiser are three of the best creators in comic books today. And as usual this Deluxe Edition from Image is simply gorgeous.

Collects the first two story arcs: "Death Chases Me" and "The Devil's Business"

GRADE: A-

GALVESTON by Nic Pizzolatto

This short, moody novel opens with a mob muscle/strongarm guy named Roy Cady finding out that he's diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. While accepting his imminent death, he fatefully crosses paths with a young prostitute named Rocky who ends up on the run with him.  It's a gorgeously written debut novel with sequences that took my breath away. There's a scene where Roy visits an old girlfriend where you can feel his yearning for the past oozing out of the words, even while she remembers that past very differently. There are also tender scenes between Roy and Rocky where they open up to each other and you can truly feel the connection in the pages.

I wanted to shout, but it dawned on me that all my objections involved the future, and I didn’t really have one.

The atmosphere in this one hypnotized me. Pizzolatto's prose shines here; his writing is equal parts lyrical and woeful, at times filled with both beauty and brutality as he tells this story of two broken souls who first find each other at their most hopeless, but end up providing one another with a light in all the darkness.

You’re here because it’s somewhere. Dogs pant in the streets. Beer won’t stay cold. The last new song you liked came out a long, long time ago, and the radio never plays it anymore.

GRADE: A-

SUNBURN by Laura Lippman

I've waited to long to read more books by the popular Laura Lippman, and this one seemed right up my alley. Lippman's set-up is classic pulp noir: a drifter meets a sexy redhead with a mysterious past in a sleepy small town diner and they embark on a relationship that they both know probably won't be the healthiest one. What takes the book down even more fascinating paths is that we get not one, not two, but numerous unreliable narrators. Each character's past starts to be revealed, but not just through their point of view, but the POV of others around them as well. We not only start to learn their history but we learn that they're also harboring secrets as well, and as the reader, we struggle to figure out what is true and what isn't.

He knows everything about her. the hard part has been keeping track of what he's supposed to know and what she has yet to tell him.

It makes for very engaging reading, making this one of the more interesting reading experiences I've had this year. For the first half of the book, I couldn't wait to keep reading to see where the story would take me.

Then, coming up near the end of the novel, I began to suspect that it wasn't really taking me anywhere. The pace slowed down significantly, and by the end, my fears were confirmed. Not much actually happened here, at least not anything that lived up to the promise of the first half. The book was fine but not as amazing as I was hoping, especially with the great character work that Lippman featured here.

GRADE: B

OVERNIGHT by Philip Fracassi

This time around Fracassi takes us on a noir ride through the after-hours of a film set, where a night security guard meets a mysterious stranger and contends with temptation and an offer he can't refuse. I love how simple the story was, and how relatively innocent it all is at first. In the beginning I can see anyone agreeing to what Pete does. But as we all know, that's how it all starts. It's a short novelette with n anxiety-ridden ending and I love how much is left unsaid, but there are enough nuggets and details dropped for the reader to glean character motivations. I actually just got off set myself and said bye to the security guard and thought about this story; wondering what will happen after-hours!

GRADE: B+

SCALPED: BOOK ONE by Jason Aaron

Dashiell Bad Horse resentfully returns to the Prairie Rose Indian Reservation with a pair of nunchucks and a bad attitude, beginning this dark dive into a tough and gritty crime drama and a new world created by Jason Aaron, and I thought this first installment was great.

This inciting plot isn't the newest thing you've probably read, with a guy returning to his hometown sparking a whole lotta drama. We've seen that before. But this is Jason Aaron we're talking about here, and he paints a complex tapestry the same way he does in his Southern Bastards series. He steadily reveals character and relationships and motivations through flashbacks and shifting POV's, and what you originally think you know about certain characters gets challenged constantly.

The art was a little problematic for me though. It was hard to tell certain characters apart and much of the action was messy and difficult to keep track of. Just like in movies, I feel like the rendering of action in comics should be clear and everytime I paused to try and get a sense of what was happening and who was who, it took me out of the story, and that's a problem. With better art I might've given this a better score. But I'm excited about where this story can go.

GRADE: B