Download or read book Crime Novels Four Classic Thrillers 1964 1969 LOA 371 written by Margaret Millar and published by Library of America. This book was released on 2023-09-12 with total page 847 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the 1960s the masters of crime fiction expanded the genre’s literary and psychological possibilities with audacious new themes, forms, and subject matter—here are four of their finest works This is the second of two volumes gathering the best American crime fiction of the 1960s, nine novels of astonishing variety and inventiveness that pulse with the energies of that turbulent, transformative decade. In Margaret Millar’s The Fiend (1964) a nine-year-old girl disappears and a local sex offender comes under suspicion. So begins a suspenseful investigation of an apparently tranquil California suburb which will expose a hidden tangle of fear and animosity, jealousy and desperation. Ed McBain (a pen name of Evan Hunter) pioneered the multi-protagonist police procedural in his long-running series of 87th Precinct novels, set in a parallel Manhattan called Isola. Doll (1965) opens at a pitch of extreme violence and careens with breakneck speed through a tale that mixes murder, drugs, the modeling business, and psychotherapy with the everyday professionalism of McBain’s harried cops. The racial paranoia of a drunken police detective in Run Man Run (1966) leads to a double murder and the relentless pursuit of the young Black college student who witnessed it. In Chester Himes’s breathless narrative, New York City is a place with no safe havens for a fugitive whom no one wants to believe. In Patricia Highsmith’s The Tremor of Forgery (1969) a man whose personality is disintegrating is writing a book called The Tremor of Forgery about a man whose personality is disintegrating, “like a mountain collapsing from within.” Stranded unexpectedly in Tunisia, Howard Ingham struggles to hold on to himself in a strange locale, while a slightly damaged typewriter may be the only trace of a killing committed almost by accident. Volume features include an introduction by editor Geoffrey O'Brien (Hardboiled America), newly researched biographies of the writers and helpful notes, and an essay on textual selection.
Download or read book Crime Novels of the 1960s Crime novels four classic thrillers 1964 1969 written by Geoffrey O'Brien and published by . This book was released on 2023 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The masters of 1960s crime fiction expanded the genre's literary and psychological possibilities with audacious new themes, forms, and subject matter. [Volume 1]: Fredric Brown's The murderers, a darkly comic look at a murderous plot hatched on the hip fringes of Hollywood; Dan J. Marlowe's terrifying The name of the game is death, about a nihilistic career criminal on the run; Charles Williams's Dead calm, a masterful novel of natural peril and human evil on the high seas; Dorothy B. Hughes's The expendable man, an unsettling tale of racism and wrongful accusation in the American Southwest; and Richard Stark's taut The score, in which the master thief Parker plans the looting of an entire city with the cool precision of an expert mechanic; [Volume 2]: The fiend, in which Margaret Millar maps the interlocking anxieties of a seemingly tranquil California suburb through the rippling effects of a child's disappearance; Ed McBain's classic police procedural Doll, a story that mixes murder, drugs, fashion models, and psychotherapy with the everyday professionalism of the 87th Precinct; Run man run, Chester Himes's nightmarish tale of racism and police violence that follows a desperate young man seeking safe haven in New York City while being hunted by the law; and Patricia Highsmith's ultimate meta-thriller, The tremor of forgery, a novel in which a displaced traveler finds his own personality collapsing as he attempts to write a novel about a man coming undone." -- From back covers.
Download or read book Crime Novels Four Classic Thrillers 1964 1969 LOA 371 written by Margaret Millar and published by Library of America. This book was released on 2023-09-12 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the 1960s the masters of crime fiction expanded the genre’s literary and psychological possibilities with audacious new themes, forms, and subject matter. Here are five of their finest works. This is the first of two volumes gathering the best American crime fiction of the 1960s, nine novels of astonishing variety and inventiveness that pulse with the energies of that turbulent, transformative decade. In Margaret Millar’s The Fiend (1964) a nine-year-old girl disappears and a local sex offender comes under suspicion. So begins a suspenseful investigation of an apparently tranquil California suburb which will expose a hidden tangle of fear and animosity, jealousy and desperation. Ed McBain (a pen name of Evan Hunter) pioneered the multi-protagonist police procedural in his long-running series of 87th Precinct novels, set in a parallel Manhattan called Isola. Doll (1965) opens at a pitch of extreme violence and careens with breakneck speed through a tale that mixes murder, drugs, the modeling business, and psychotherapy with the everyday professionalism of McBain’s harried cops. The racial paranoia of a drunken police detective in Run Man Run (1966) leads to a double murder and the relentless pursuit of the young Black college student who witnessed it. In Chester Himes’s breathless narrative, New York City is a place with no safe havens for a fugitive whom no one wants to believe. In Patricia Highsmith’s The Tremor of Forgery (1969) a man whose personality is disintegrating is writing a book called The Tremor of Forgery about a man whose personality is disintegrating, “like a mountain collapsing from within.” Stranded unexpectedly in Tunisia, Howard Ingham struggles to hold on to himself in a strange locale, while a slightly damaged typewriter may be the only trace of a killing committed almost by accident.
Download or read book Crime Novels Five Classic Thrillers 1961 1964 LOA 370 written by Fredric Brown and published by Library of America. This book was released on 2023-09-12 with total page 867 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the 1960s the masters of crime fiction expanded the genre’s literary and psychological possibilities with audacious new themes, forms, and subject matter—here are five of their finest works This is the first of two volumes gathering the best American crime fiction of the 1960s, nine novels of astonishing variety and inventiveness that pulse with the energies of that turbulent, transformative decade. In The Murderers (1961) by Fredric Brown, an out-of-work actor, hanging out with Beat drifters on the fringes of Hollywood, concocts a murder scheme that devolves into nightmare. This late work by a master in many genres is one of his darkest and most ingenious. Dan J. Marlowe’s The Name of the Game Is Death (1962) channels the inner life of a violent criminal who freely acknowledges the truth of a prison psychiatrist’s diagnosis: “Your values are not civilized values.” Written with unnerving emotional authenticity, the story hurtles toward an annihilating climax. Charles Williams drew on his experience in the merchant marine for his thriller Dead Calm (1963). A newlywed couple alone on a small yacht find themselves at the mercy of the mysterious survivor they have rescued from a sinking ship, in a suspenseful story that chillingly evokes the perils of the open ocean. In the beautifully told and sharply observant The Expendable Man (1963), Dorothy B. Hughes’s final masterpiece of suspense, a young man in the American Southwest runs afoul of racial assumptions after he picks up a hitchhiker who soon turns up dead. In twenty-four brilliantly constructed novels, Richard Stark (a pen name of Donald Westlake) charted the career of Parker, a hard-nosed professional thief, with rigorous clarity. The Score (1964), a stand-out in the series, finds Parker and his criminal associates hatching a plot to rob simultaneously all the jewelry stores, payroll offices, and banks in a remote Western mining town, only to come up against the human limits of even the most intricate planning. Volume features include an introduction by editor Geoffrey O'Brien (Hardboiled America), newly researched biographies of the writers and helpful notes, and an essay on textual selection.
Download or read book The Snail watcher and Other Stories written by Patricia Highsmith and published by . This book was released on 1970 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Cop Hater written by Ed McBain and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 1999-12 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The murder of three detectives in quick succession in the 87th Precinct leads Detective Steve Carella on a search through the city's underside and ultimately into the murderer's sights"--NoveList.
Download or read book The Deep Blue Good by written by John D. MacDonald and published by Random House Trade Paperbacks. This book was released on 2013-01-08 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From a beloved master of crime fiction, The Deep Blue Good-by is one of many classic novels featuring Travis McGee, the hard-boiled detective who lives on a houseboat. Travis McGee is a self-described beach bum who won his houseboat in a card game. He’s also a knight-errant who’s wary of credit cards, retirement benefits, political parties, mortgages, and television. He only works when his cash runs out, and his rule is simple: He’ll help you find whatever was taken from you, as long as he can keep half. “John D. MacDonald was the great entertainer of our age, and a mesmerizing storyteller.”—Stephen King McGee isn’t particularly strapped for cash, but how can anyone say no to Cathy, a sweet backwoods girl who’s been tortured repeatedly by her manipulative ex-boyfriend Junior Allen? What Travis isn’t anticipating is just how many women Junior has torn apart and left in his wake. Enter Junior’s latest victim, Lois Atkinson. Frail and broken, Lois can barely get out of bed when Travis finds her, let alone keep herself alive. But Travis turns into Mother McGee, giving Lois new life as he looks for the ruthless man who steals women’s spirits and livelihoods. But he can’t guess how violent his quest is soon to become. He’ll learn the hard way that there must be casualties in this game of cat and mouse. Features a new Introduction by Lee Child
Download or read book True Crime An American Anthology written by Harold Schechter and published by . This book was released on 2008-09-18 with total page 824 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "True Crime: An American Anthology" offers a comprehensive look at the many ways in which American writers have explored crime in a multitude of aspects: the dark motives that spur it, the shock of its impact on society, and the effort to make sense of the violent extremes of human behavior.
Download or read book Cotton Comes to Harlem written by Chester Himes and published by Vintage Crime/Black Lizard. This book was released on 2011-08-03 with total page 207 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From “the best writer of mayhem yarns since Raymond Chandler” (San Francisco Chronicle) comes a hard-hitting, entertaining entry in the trailblazing Harlem Detectives series about two NYPD detectives who must piece together the clues of the scam of a lifetime. Flim-flam man Deke O’Hara is no sooner out of Atlanta’s state penitentiary than he’s back on the streets working a big scam. As sponsor of the Back-to-Africa movement, he’s counting on a big Harlem rally to produce a massive collection—for his own private charity. But the take is hijacked by white gunmen and hidden in a bale of cotton that suddenly everyone wants to get his hands on. As NYPD detectives “Coffin Ed” Johnson and “Grave Digger” Jones face the complexity of the scheme, we are treated to Himes’s brand of hard-boiled crime fiction at its very best.
Download or read book The Two Faces of January written by Patricia Highsmith and published by Open Road + Grove/Atlantic. This book was released on 2014-06-10 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The award-winning “classic psychological thriller” by the author of Strangers on a Train and The Talented Mr. Ripley (USA Today). In a grubby Athens hotel, Rydal Keener is bored and killing time with petty scams. But when he runs into another American, Chester MacFarland, dragging a man’s body down the hotel hall, Rydal impulsively agrees to help, perhaps because Chester looks like his father. Then Rydal meets Collete, Chester’s younger wife, and captivated, becomes entangled in their sordid lives, as the drama marches to a shocking climax at the ruins of the labyrinth at Knossos. A winner of a Crime Writers of America award, The Two Faces of January was the basis of a film starring Viggo Mortensen, Kirsten Dunst, and Oscar Isaac. “An offbeat, provocative and absorbing suspense novel.” —The New York Times “Patricia Highsmith is one of the few suspense writers whose work transcends genre.” —The Austin American-Statesman
Download or read book A Stranger in My Grave written by Margaret Millar and published by Soho Press. This book was released on 2016-02-09 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Young housewife Daisy Harker’s world is upended when a blank spot in her memory and a reoccurring nightmare link her to an unsolved murder and a decades-old conspiracy Jim and Daisy Harker are a young, well-to-do couple in San Felice, California, and though childless they maintain the sort of domestic happiness that others can only aspire to. But a darkness exists at the outer edges of Daisy’s mind and she has no idea why it’s there. In a series of reoccurring nightmares she wanders a cemetery, eventually finding her own gravestone. According to the dream, December 2nd, 1955 is the day she died. Street smart but honorable, Stevens Pinata is a man with his own mysteries. An orphan left on a church doorstep as a child, he isn’t even certain of his ethnicity, let alone his goals in life. As a private investigator he works with bail bonds and quick shakedowns. But when a pretty young woman like Daisy Harker comes into his office with a crazy request to “find her lost day” he is intrigued. He is too decent to take advantage of a crazy woman, but Mr. Harker is a wealthy man and who is Pinata to turn down money? What unfolds is a masterpiece of suspense and one of the books that forever changed the domestic thriller. Millar’s razor sharp prose cuts a masterful plot and slashes at the racism, sexism, and entitlement endemic to an era otherwise celebrated for its prosperity.
Download or read book The Franchise Affair written by Josephine Tey and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-12-25 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Robert Blair was about to knock off from a slow day at his law firm when the phone rang. It was Marion Sharpe on the line, a local woman of quiet disposition who lived with her mother at their decrepit country house, The Franchise. It appeared that she was in some serious trouble: Miss Sharpe and her mother were accused of brutally kidnapping a demure young woman named Betty Kane. Miss Kane's claims seemed highly unlikely, even to Inspector Alan Grant of Scotland Yard, until she described her prison -- the attic room with its cracked window, the kitchen, and the old trunks -- which sounded remarkably like The Franchise. Yet Marion Sharpe claimed the Kane girl had never been there, let alone been held captive for an entire month! Not believing Betty Kane's story, Solicitor Blair takes up the case and, in a dazzling feat of amateur detective work, solves the unbelievable mystery that stumped even Inspector Grant.
Download or read book Deliverance written by James Dickey and published by Delta. This book was released on 2008-11-19 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “You're hooked, you feel every cut, grope up every cliff, swallow water with every spill of the canoe, sweat with every draw of the bowstring. Wholly absorbing [and] dramatic.”—Harper's Magazine The setting is the Georgia wilderness, where the states most remote white-water river awaits. In the thundering froth of that river, in its echoing stone canyons, four men on a canoe trip discover a freedom and exhilaration beyond compare. And then, in a moment of horror, the adventure turns into a struggle for survival as one man becomes a human hunter who is offered his own harrowing deliverance. Praise for Deliverance “Once read, never forgotten.”—Newport News Daily Press “A tour de force . . . How a man acts when shot by an arrow, what it feels like to scale a cliff or to capsize, the ironic psychology of fear: these things are conveyed with remarkable descriptive writing.”—The New Republic “Freshly and intensely alive . . . with questions that haunt modern urban man.”—Southern Review “A fine and honest book that hits the reader's mind with the sting of a baseball just caught in the hand.”—The Nation “[James Dickey's] language has descriptive power not often matched in contemporary American writing.”—Time “A harrowing trip few readers will forget.”—Asheville Citizen-Times "A novel that will curl your toes . . . Dickey's canoe rides to the limits of dramatic tension."—New York Times Book Review "A brilliant and breathtaking adventure."—The New Yorker
Download or read book Cover Her Face written by P.D. James and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-04-17 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first in the series of scintillating mysteries to feature cunning Scotland Yard detective, Adam Dalgliesh from P.D. James, the bestselling author hailed by People magazine as “the greatest living mystery writer.” Sally Jupp was a sly and sensuous young woman who used her body and her brains to make her way up the social ladder. Now she lies across her bed with dark bruises from a strangler’s fingers forever marring her lily-white throat. Someone has decided that the wages of sin should be death...and it is up to Chief Inspector Adam Dalgliesh to find who that someone is. Cover Her Face is P.D. James’ delightful debut novel, an ingeniously plotted mystery that immediately placed her among the masters of suspense.
Download or read book Run Man Run written by Chester Himes and published by Vintage Crime/Black Lizard. This book was released on 2024-10-08 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this knockout standalone crime novel from the acclaimed author of the Harlem Detectives series, a white cop’s murderous outburst leads to a pulse-pounding chase to silence a witness It’s early morning in New York, a few days after Christmas and bitter cold. A white detective named Walker accuses the black workers at a luncheonette on 37th Street and Fifth Avenue of stealing his car. He’s been drinking—a lot. By the time he corners Fat Sam in the refrigeration room, he’s raving mad, and his .32-caliber revolver goes off. But who would believe it was an accident? Two other men work in the luncheonette, and in his fuming, psychotic state, Walker is determined to take out these witnesses. One of them, Luke, he kills in cold blood. But the other, Jimmy, gets away by the skin of his teeth. As Jimmy tries to stay one step ahead and desperately pleads with the authorities that the killer is on the force, Walker closes in until the chase culminates in an explosive conclusion.
Download or read book Ashenden written by W. Somerset Maugham and published by Standard Ebooks. This book was released on 2023-01-01T20:46:22Z with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During World War I W. Somerset Maugham, already by then an established playwright and author, was recruited to be a British intelligence agent. These stories reflect his wartime experiences in intelligence gathering. Though fictionalized, they managed to retain enough authentic elements for Winston Churchill to advise Maugham that their publication might be a violation of the Official Secrets Act, resulting in the author burning an additional 14 stories. Set in various locales across the continent, these remaining Ashenden stories are a precursor to the jet-setting spy novels of the 1950s and 1960s. Maugham is known as a master short story writer and these stories are no exception, combining wit and realism to create memorable characters in a unique and highly critical portrait of wartime espionage. Initially released to a mixed reception—with an early review by D. H. Lawrence being especially scathing—Ashenden has since been credited as an inspiration for numerous authors, including John Le Carré, Graham Greene, and Raymond Chandler. The latter in particular was especially impressed, writing in 1950, “There are no other great spy stories—none at all. I have been searching and I know.” This book is part of the Standard Ebooks project, which produces free public domain ebooks.
Download or read book Polar Star written by Martin Cruz Smith and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-08-15 with total page 592 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Don't miss the latest book in the Arkady Renko series, THE SIBERIAN DILEMMA by Martin Cruz Smith, ‘the master of the international thriller’ (New York Times) – available to order now! AN ARKADY RENKO NOVEL: #2 'One of those writers that anyone who is serious about their craft views with respect bordering on awe' Val McDermid 'Makes tension rise through the page like a shark's fin’ Independent *** Arkady Renko, former Chief Investigator of the Moscow Town Prosecutor's Office, made too many enemies and lost the favour of his party. After a self-imposed exile in Siberia, Renko toils on the 'slime line' of a factory ship in the Bering Sea. But when an adventurous Georgian woman comes up with the day's catch, the signs of murder are undeniable. Up against the Soviet bureaucracy in a complex international web, Renko must again become the obsessed, dedicated cop he once was. And in doing so, he discovers much more than he bargained for . . . Praise for Martin Cruz Smith 'The story drips with atmosphere and authenticity – a literary triumph' David Young, bestselling author of Stasi Child 'One of those writers that anyone who is serious about their craft views with respect bordering on awe' Val McDermid ‘Cleverly and intelligently told, The Girl from Venice is a truly riveting tale of love, mystery and rampant danger. I loved it’ Kate Furnivall, author of The Liberation ‘Smith not only constructs grittily realistic plots, he also has a gift for characterisation of which most thriller writers can only dream' Mail on Sunday 'Smith was among the first of a new generation of writers who made thrillers literary' Guardian 'Brilliantly worked, marvellously written . . . an imaginative triumph' Sunday Times ‘Martin Cruz Smith’s Renko novels are superb’ William Ryan, author of The Constant Soldier
