Ken Bruen – My Ten Favourite Crime Novels

Follow on Facebook

Jack Taylor Films

About Ken Bruen:

KEN BRUEN was born in Galway in 1951, where he now lives.  The Guards, Ken‘s first Jack Taylor novel was published to glowing reviews in 2001 and has become an international bestseller. It was followed by The Killing of the Tinkers, The Magdalen Martyrs, The Dramatist, Priest, Cross, and Sanctuary.

He was a finalist for the Edgar, Barry, and Macavity Awards, and the Private Eye Writers of America presented him with the Shamus Award for the Best Novel of 2003 for The Guards, the book that introduced Jack Taylor. Ken received the best series award in February 2007 for the Jack Taylor novels from The Crime Writers Association of America. The Dramatist was nominated in March 2007 for a Gumshoe Award for the Best European Crime Novel of 2006. More recently he has won the German (2010) and French (2009) crime writers’ prizes.

Ken is also the author of the Brant novels, a London-based crime series. The screenplay for London Boulevard was penned by Oscar winning Departed writer William Monahan and stars Colin Farrell and Kiera Knightly. Three further novels Blitz, Once Were Cops and Tower have also been recently adapted for the screen and shot in 2009/2010.

Satan’s Lambs

Author: Lynn Hightower

Description: the best PI novel…………..ever

From Publishers Weekly
Woman’s intuition takes on the power of Satan in this hokey but entertaining thriller set in Tennessee and Kentucky. Lena Padget’s life changed drastically seven years ago, when her brother-in-law, fanatical Satanist Jeff Hayes, brutally murdered her pregnant sister and two-year-old nephew. Determined to protect other vulnerable women, Lena became a private eye, specializing in cases of abuse and endangerment. Jeff, now out on parole, harasses her with menacing phone calls and sinister trinkets left in her home. When his partner, Archie Valetta, is also released, Valetta’s ex-wife Eloise fearfully enlists Lena’s services; nonetheless, Archie manages to brutalize Eloise and kidnap her four-year-old son Charlie. Lena soon learns that the hardcore, Satanic cult to which Jeff and Archie both belong intends to use Charlie as a human sacrifice–unless she can find him first. Hightower ( Alien Blues ) brings off this improbable plot with more panache than one might expect. Her prose is clear and the pacing break-neck. The emphasis on maternal instinct and feminine intuition is unconvincing, as is the formulaic romantic element. Hightower also fails to bring Jeff to life and thus never makes Satan-worship or its evil practitioners a credible threat.

Bury Me Deep

Author: Megan E. Abbott

Description: The new Queen of Noir.

Barbelo’s Blood

Author: Joseph Ferri

Description: for sheer inventiveness and panache, proving that cojones still exist

From the Publisher

Soon to be available with new cover at the Book Depository at link below cover, you can buy from Amazon here

(Amazon is currently displaying original cover but purchased books will be the new cover)

Neil Mount, Galway Print

Edith’s Diary

Author: Patricia Highsmith

Description: Ken Bruen “the ultimate psychological thriller and oh, so damn beautifully written.”

Fake I.D.

Author: Jason Starr

Description: Ken Bruen “proving he is the real true heir to noir.”

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Starr (The Follower) traces the life of a New York bar bouncer down on his luck in this sinister noir tale. Tommy Russo, an aspiring actor, wants in on the deal of a lifetime: purchasing a racehorse with several other backers. Gambling addict Russo barely has enough money to buy a burger, let alone contribute 10 grand, so he hocks a girlfriend’s jewelry and then moves on to stealing from his boss’s safe. Russo’s gradual spiral down into complete degeneration is so expertly crafted that readers will be shocked to compare the hopeful actor with his final incarnation as hardened criminal. Starr expertly combines elements of hard-boiled crime novels with a dark view of human nature to create a one-of-a-kind, mesmerizing read. (June)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Starr revisits the territory of his Nothing Personal (2000), paring the story of a doomed gambler down to its most basic elements for a swift, irresistible plummet through the darkness. Tommy Russo is a struggling actor (is there any other kind?) working as a bouncer and playing the role of his lifetime in his daily portrayal of someone with a soul, in place of which he hosts an unhealthy appetite for long odds and easy money, a fierce temper, and a genius for denial. Pursued by his trusting boss’s boozy wife, more wolverine than cougar. Russo never stops grabbing for the brass ring, and heaven help anyone who gets in his way. Russo embodies addiction’s insatiable sociopathic drive: he is a shark in human form, fated to swim continuously or die, casually devouring lovers, friends, and associates without a second thought. Round and round and round he goes, and where he’ll stop, nobody knows. Pulpy thrills for the Jim Thompson set. –David Wright

The Last Good Kiss

Author: James Crumley

Description: Then and now, the bar to which all mystery should mystery aspire.

Winter’s Bone

Author: Daniel Woodrell

Description: Ken Bruen “astounding, truly awesome”

‘Daniel Woodrell is a genius’ (Time Out)

Stunningly accomplished. (New York Times Book Review)

Daniel Woodrell is one of the most exciting writers I’ve discovered in a long time. (Val McDermid)

‘Woodrell is a marvellous writer’ (Roddy Doyle )

‘Woodrell throws down sentences that will leave you amazed.’ (Charles Frazier )

Print the Legend

Author: Craig McDonald

Description: Ken Bruen “at last, a novel that kicks the crap out of the so called literary ejits.”

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist
Four years after the death of Ernest Hemingway, raffish crime novelist, Hollywood script doctor, ladies’ man, and Hemingway confidant Hector Lassiter is in Sun Valley, Idaho, to address a Hemingway conference. He’s also there to assist Papa’s widow, Mary, in preparing Papa’s unpublished work for publication. Hector is also feeling his years, and, as Hemingway before him, he’s worried about his long game, his own literary legacy. But he quickly realizes that he’s being followed by several different men. One of them is Donovan Creedy, an FBI agent who reports directly to J. Edgar Hoover. Creedy seems to have gone fully around the bend; he’s determined to destroy Papa’s legacy and kill Hector. Legacy be damned! Hector must save his craft. McDonald began his Lassiter series with Head Games (2007), a good-natured romp. Toros & Torsos (2008) was richer and darker. Print the Legend is darker still. Literary criticism and professors repeatedly get jabbed, but McDonald saves his knockout punch for Hoover, whose harassment of writers such as Hemingway and Steinbeck continued for decades. –Thomas Gaughan

The Friends of Eddie Coyle

Author: George V. Higgins

Description: Just maybe the greatest crime novel ever written.

Review
the best crime novel ever written makes The Maltese Falcon read like Nancy Drew –Elmore Leonard

Simultaneously a brilliant thriller and a cold and convincing business prospectus of felony. –The New Yorker

Chilling…the most penetrating glimpse yet into what seems the real world of crime…Positively reeking with authenticity. –The New York Times Book Review Product Description
Eddie Coyle is a small-time punk with a big-time problem who to sell out to avoid being sent up again. Eddie works for Jimmy Scalisi, supplying him with guns for a couple of bank jobs. But a cop named Foley is onto Eddie, and he s leaning on him to finger Scalisi, a gang leader with a lot to hide. These and others make up the bunch of hoods, gunmen, thieves, and executioners who are wheeling, dealing, chasing, and stealing in the underworld of Eddie Coyle.

The Twelve

Author: Stuart Neville

Description: phew, a novel about the North that rightly won just about every major award going.

Review
“a gripping, original thriller”
–Sunday Times

Jeff Abbott
An astonishing debut. Brilliantly conceived, masterfully written, Stuart Neville’s The Twelve is both a heart-pounding thriller and a stunning examination of responsibility and revenge. He is going to be a major new voice in suspense fiction.