Read this post to see what this is all about. For more favorites, see here.
George Pelecanos, author of
The Night Gardener
- Willy Vlautin - Northline (pub. date 2008). The second novel from Richmond Fontaine's bandleader is a stunner.
- Don Carpenter - Hard Rain Falling. Long out of print, a lost American classic. Get it any way you can.
- Richard Lange - Dead Boys. The best short story collection I've read in years. Lange's voice is singular and earned.
- Craig McDonald - Head Games
- Megan Abbot - Queenpin
- Duane Swierczynski - The Blonde
Hallie Ephron, Crime fiction book reviewer for the Boston Globe and author of Writing & Selling Your Mystery Novel
- Leonie Swann - Three Bags Full
- Donald Westlake - What's So Funny?
- William Landay - The Strangler
Keith Kahla, Senior Editor at St. Martin's Press
- Joe R. Lansdale - Lost Echoes. You don't have to have roots in East Texas to love Lansdale's writing, but it sure doesn't hurt.
- Juan Rulfo - Pedro Paramo (trans. by Margaret Sayers Peden). I read the earlier translation twenty five years ago and have been meaning to read this newer one for more than a decade. It's brilliant by the way.
- Colin Cotterill - Anarchy and Old Dogs. Could be any of the books in this series but this is the one I read most recently.
Steve Brewer, author of Cutthroat
- Charlie Huston - The Shotgun Rule. Probably the most memorable book I've read this year
- Olen Steinhauer - Victory Square. Fifth and final book in his incredible Eastern Europe series. I've read them all
- John Ridley - The Drift. A gritty 2002 novel about a deranged railroad bum who pulls himself together long enough to hunt for a missing girl. Unforgettable.
Completely fascinating, David -- it's as if we all live in alternate universes. I wonder if every year there's so little overlap among the lists.
- Hallie Ephron
Posted by: Hallie Ephron | December 14, 2007 at 09:53 AM
Looking over the responses that have come in so far, there are only a couple of books that have been cited more than once.
Posted by: David J. Montgomery | December 14, 2007 at 11:03 AM