A Crime Novel
Publication Date: October 2015
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About Wrong Crowd …
A sultry novel in which an art thief finds himself out of his depth in a criminal maelstrom when he meets a beautiful woman with no past …
When Claude meets Maxine in the Caribbean he falls for her. He does not expect he will start an affair with her back in London, then again he does not expect to have to call on the help of his old mate Spike, nor that will they become embroiled with Russian gangsters Vladimir and Grigory.
But then Claude will do anything to hold onto Maxine.
Peopled with thieves, hustlers, gangsters, gun runners and pimps, Wrong Crowd is a slick and action-packed ride into London’s low-life. East End villains and the Russian Mafia collide in a fast-paced novel of deceit and criminal obsession that sparkles as it speeds towards its astonishing conclusion.
Praise for Wrong Crowd …
“Wrong Crowd by Richard Godwin is a tense slice of international noir that oozes atmosphere.”
— Paul D Brazill, author of Guns of Brixton and A Case of Noir
“An extended meditation on sexual obsession, deception, and violence.”
— T. Jefferson Parker, author of Full Measure and The Famous and the Dead
“If you get into The Wrong Crowd then you’re into the ‘right book.’ Richard Godwin is an author’s author who never fails to deliver a cracking read, and this one is no exception.”
— Matt Hilton, author of the best-selling Joe Hunter thriller series
“When you pick up a Richard Godwin book, you can be sure you’re holding the work of one of the most daring and distinctive crime writers working today. He’s also one of the most versatile … Godwin can also always be relied upon to introduce a single moment of violence that permanently sears itself into the mind, and Wrong Crowd is no different … Careful you don’t miss it — tonally this is a Fulham Wolf of Wall Street, exposing the emptiness at the heart of excess. Another gem from Godwin”
— Mike Stafford, nudgemenow.com
“Once more Richard Godwin proves he is the only worthy successor to Patricia Highsmith. The Wrong Crowd is a deliciously tantalizing bit of dark psychological thriller that will make you think twice about whom you make friends with while on vacation. You won’t want to put this one down for a second.”
— Vincent Zandri, NY Times and USA Today best-selling author of Everything Burns and Moonlight Weeps
“Richard Godwin does it again! With the adroit skill of a seasoned writer that knows that human decency is just a fragile scab on a wound that harbors a violent world seething in sex, drugs, lust and death, Godwin introduces us to the Wrong Crowd.”
— Lou Boxer, Founder of NoirCon
“Only Godwin. It’s a phrase you’ll use often when you get acquainted with the sensual and sultry atmosphere of this master storyteller. Wrong Crowd is some of his most accessible work, but it’s one of his most textured and refined as well. Only Godwin can pull it off every time like that.”
— Benoît Lelièvre, deadendfollies.com
“Claude meets Maxine knee-deep in the Caribbean and knows he’d do anything to make her his: anything. But keeping her means raising the stakes: cash, guns, gangsters and a return to his bad old habits. Will there be enough of him left to keep her by the time he’s through? Godwin makes The Wrong Crowd lethally sexy — which makes this story just right.”
— K.A. Laity, author of White Rabbit
“Don Juan meets the Marquis de Sade meets Kafka meets Jim Thompson meets Richard Godwin who gets them all together in one room and they collaborate on Wrong Crowd. It’s a brilliant success.”
— Les Edgerton, author of The Genuine, Imitation, Plastic Kidnapping,The Bitch, The Rapist and others
“With extraordinary writing, characterization, and storytelling, Godwin is truly one of our great writers.”
— Luca Veste, author of Dead Gone
A Richard Dean Buckner Mystery
Publication Date: October 2015
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About Warpath …
The real estate mogul is lying about something, but his wife really was raped twenty-years ago in an unsolved assault. Now she’s long dead by her own hand, the case has gone cold, and the mogul starts dropping cash into former Saint Ansgar homicide detective turned private eye Richard Dean Buckner’s wallet to find some answers.
Just hours later Buckner’s old homicide partner calls up. His grandmother was just killed in a drive-by that hit the wrong address. People that stupid need to be taught harsh lessons, and vengeance just so happens to be one of Buckner’s finer skills.
Everything circles the drain as Buckner finds himself at war with the worst gang the city has to offer as well as the slithering rapist who has resurfaced just to tie the loose ends from the twenty year-old crime. Buckner doesn’t back down, and if that means getting himself carjacked so he can interrogate the gang bangers, pose as the mogul’s secret lover and chase the rapist into a women’s shower room so he can beat him mercilessly, so be it. Just another day.
Praise for Warpath …
“When so many PI novels are all about pretty form, damned few writers get the gritty function of real PI novels. Chandler, Hammett, Crais, Crumley. Those guys are the shit. So is Sayles. Warpath immerses you in his world, shows you what you’d rather not see, makes you hear his music his way. When Bruckner bleeds, we do, too. But it’s not just pretty red, it means something, we learn from it. Read him … period. Incidentally, Sayles tells us that music sounds like a drillbit up someone’s ass. Come on … how can you not read that?”
— Trey R. Barker, author of Death is Forever and Slow Bleed
“Buckner’s back. More bloody, more bawdy, more biting … and more brutal. Sayles’ wise-cracking, sardonic detective takes you along in the front seat for a ride on noir’s wild side. Funny, dark and twisted. Warpath chafes against the cookie-cutter mysteries of yesteryear and serves up crime like no other. Not since Philip K. Dick has a writer created a narcotic so insidious as the Big Fry.”
— Tom Pitts, author of Knuckball and Hustle
“William James first defined the literary technique of stream-of-consciousness and then William Faulkner and James Jones employed it for powerful and uber-original effects, becoming the best-known practitioners of the technique until Gordon Lish came along and edged it further along in its evolution. Now, Ryan Sayles has taken hold of it and pushed it along even further on its evolutionary journey with one of the wildest noir rides I’ve ever been privileged to read, his raw and elemental Warpath. Buckner isn’t nuts or a psychopath; he’s just tired of all the bullshit that goes on in the game between criminals and cops and intelligently, he simply takes the most logical course of action in eradicating the animals who dare to breathe in his world. That he’s the baddest bad ass in the neighborhood doesn’t hurt. This is a ground-breaking book in just about every sense of the word. Sayles is a mighty talent and we’re lucky to have him.”
— Les Edgerton, author of The Bitch, The Rapist, The Genuine, Imitation, Plastic Kidnapping and others
“Richard Dean Buckner is a tough ex-police detective turned tougher private eye with at least .44 reasons not to call him Dick. Ryan Sayles pulls out all the stops as he races his protagonist along a frantic and treacherous Warpath.”
— J.L. Abramo, award-winning author of Gravesend
A Jack LeClere Thriller
Publication Date: October 2015
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About Welcome Back, Jack …
When Jack was six years old, his parents were brutally slain by a serial killer. The police later found drifter Clyde Colsen driving a stolen car, his clothes soaked in blood. He was tried, convicted and executed. Jack grew up knowing the police got their man.
Now a decorated homicide detective in New Rhodes, Jack arrives at the third crime scene of the “South End Killer” murders and finds his name. He will soon find out something else: thirty years ago, they got the wrong guy. And now the right guy’s come back to pay Jack and New Rhodes his bloody respects.
As Jack struggles to stay on the case, his cat-and-mouse game with the killer makes him wonder if he’s the cat or the mouse. His family and everyone in his life is fair game. As the killer escalates and threatens the entire city, Jack has a question he must answer in his desperation: can he stop the monster without becoming one?
Praise for Welcome Back, Jack …
“I’ve been following Liam Sweeny’s writing career for several years. He started out pretty good and now — with WELCOME BACK, JACK — he’s become smokin’ good! I predict this novel will propel him to the highest ranks of novelists writing police procedurals. That may look like I’m climbing out on a limb and if so, it’s an extremely stout and solid limb. This ranks with the best of the genre and Sweeny is poised to become a writer of the highest rank. Remember his name — you’re going to be seeing it a lot.”
— Les Edgerton, The Genuine, Imitation, Plastic Kidnapping,
The Rapist, The Bitch and others
“A new dark, very dark star has appeared in the noir spectrum and what a star it is WELCOME BACK, JACK is the real deal, as down and deliciously dirty as it gets but with a wonderful fresh style and artistry that is as compelling as it is addictive. This is one hell of a start to what promises to be an unique series.”
— Ken Bruen, author of the Jack Taylor series
“When a triple homicide in New Rhodes bears worrisome similarities to one from police officer, Jack LeClere’s, childhood, nothing can stop him from following the sinewy clues to their horrific conclusion. As long as writers like Liam Sweeny can work the police procedural to such great affect, readers will follow Jack back to the gritty streets of New Rhodes gladly. Sweeny’s writes beautifully and WELCOME BACK, JACK is full of memorable characters. Claustrophobics beware!”
— Patricia Abbot, author of Concrete Angel
“Equal parts police procedural and psycho-thriller, Liam Sweeny reinvents a genre WELCOME BACK, JACK. When serial killing gets personal, Jack LeClere is dragged underground into the past. Literally. With crisp, taut dialogue, fast-paced action, and more plot twists than the subterranean tunnels Jack must navigate to earn redemption, Sweeny taps into modern-day, urban paranoia, mining the best of Ellroy, Cain, and Westlake. Sweeny pays homage while tearing up some serious new ground.”
— Joe Clifford, author of Lamentation and December Boys
“Do yourself a favor: Before you start reading WELCOME BACK, JACK, clear your schedule. You’re not going to be able to stop until you’ve seen it through to the explosive finale.”
— Rob Hart, author of New Yorked
Part Two of the Shill Trilogy
Publication Date: October 2015
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About Kill the Shill …
Her role in the con game was to be the shill before the scam exploded in bloody violence. Discarded, sacrificed like a pawn, Jane’s left holding the bag.
The swindlers left a murderous trail and millions of dollars are missing. The problem; Jane knows too much. She’s a liability they can’t afford to keep around.
But the con artists underestimated Jane. They miscalculated her tenacity and will-to-survive. Not one to be crossed, her plan is to use their own weapon, the “art of deception,” against them.
Facing insurmountable odds Jane sets out to settle the score with fierce determination, and a few tricks up her sleeve.
Praise for Kill the Shill …
“Hell hath no fury like an actress duped. Revenge is the motivation, deception the means to get even in this exciting crime thriller.”
— Scott Adlerberg, author of Spiders and Flies and Jungle Horses
An Anthology of Crime Stories
Publication Date: October 2015
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About Coast To Coast: From Sea To Shining Sea …
Crime in high places. Crime in low places. Crime from Coast to Coast.
Crime in the Faneuil Hall Marketplace of Boston to the Vincent Thomas Bridge in the Port of Los Angeles. From the wind-swept sails of the New England shoreline to the transitioning Italian-American neighborhood of North Beach in San Francisco and the Disney Concert Hall in L.A.
Crime is everywhere, from the murky depths of Echo Park Lake and the body dump of the Angeles National Forest, to the clear waters of Oyster Bay and the beaches of Cape Cod — even Mexico City — in this collection of stories that range from hardboiled to suspense-thrillers. And while these stories differ in locale, climate, mood and the tone and voices of the various writers, they all resonate with the dark underbelly of crime.
A killer cast of authors including: Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Bill Pronzini, Four-time Edgar Winner William Link, Shamus Winner Paul D. Marks, Sherlock Holmes Bowl Winner Andrew McAleer, Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine Readers Award Winner Robert S. Levinson, Scribner Crime Novel Winner William G. Tapply, Al Blanchard Award winner James T. Shannon … and other poisoned pen professionals.
Praise for Coast To Coast: From Sea To Shining Sea …
“Envelope-pushers! A truly WOW collection by the best mystery writers out there — full of surprises only they can pull off.”
— Thomas B. Sawyer, best-selling author of Cross Purposes and No Place to Run, and head-writer of Murder, She Wrote