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The author of Blitz and the author of the Jesse Stone novels collaborate on a "rough and profane read" about two childhood friends who become criminals (Daniel Woodrell). Nick's Irish-American father, a Brooklyn rent-a-cop working security in the World Trade Center's North Tower, named him after a Hemingway hero. The old man must have been expecting a different kind of kid. Because, like the R&B song says, Nick was born under a bad sign. As aimless as a stray bullet, his only constants are 'Nam movies, pulp novels, and an unquestioning devotion to his childhood friend, Todd, a Jewish New York con artist with connections to the Boston mob. When Todd inducts Nick into his world of petty crime, it starts with reckless fun—scoring weed, low-level stings, and burglary. But the deeper they sink into the world of the syndicate, the more they realize how unknowable a friend can be, and how unprepared they are to rescue themselves, and their souls, from the gutter. Alternately telling this "brutally poetic" story from the perspectives of Nick and Todd, award-winning "noir masters" Ken Bruen and Reed Farrel Colemen "shine, dropping in-jokes, experimenting and displaying all the literary chops that have made their novels such cult favorites among mystery fans" (Publishers Weekly).
Ken Bruen
Ken Bruen has been a finalist for the Edgar and Anthony Awards, and has won a Macavity Award, a Barry Award, and two Shamus Awards for the Jack Taylor series. He is also the author of the Inspector Brant series. Several of Bruen's novels have been adapted for the screen: The first six Jack Taylor novels were adapted into a television series starring Iain Glen; Blitz was adapted into a movie starring Jason Statham; and London Boulevard was adapted into a film starring Colin Farrell and Keira Knightley. Bruen lives in Galway, Ireland.
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Reed Farrel Coleman
Reed Farrel Coleman (b. 1956) is a mystery author best known for creating the Moe Prager series. Under his own name and the pen name Tony Spinosa, he has published fourteen novels, beginning with Life Goes Sleeping (1991), which introduced the three-volume Dylan Klein series. In 2001, Coleman published Walking the Perfect Square, a gritty story about Moe Prager, a retired New York cop who becomes embroiled in the hunt for a missing college student. Since then, he has written six more novels starring Prager, most recently Hurt Machine (2011). Coleman has won three Shamus awards in the best detective novel category, and has been nominated twice for Edgar awards. His short fiction has been published widely, most recently in the collection Long Island Noir (2012). Coleman lives with his family on Long Island, where he teaches writing classes at Hofstra University.
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