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Tags: hard-boiled detective

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  Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro: Book 1

  A Drink Before the War

  by Dennis Lehane

  Kenzie and Gennaro are private investigators in the blue-collar neighborhoods and ghettos of South Boston-they know it as only natives can. Working out of an old church belfry, Kenzie and Gennaro take on a seemingly simple assignment for a prominent politician: to uncover the whereabouts of Jenna Angeline, a black cleaning woman who has allegedly stolen confidential state documents. Finding Jenna, however, is... (more)
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  Harry Bosch: Book 12

  Echo Park

  by Michael Connelly

  Detective Harry Bosch reopens one of his own unsolved cases and comes face to face with a psychotic killer he has been seeking for years. A thrilling new novel by the author of the #1 bestseller The Lincoln Lawyer. In 1995 Marie Gesto disappeared after walking out of a supermarket. Harry Bosch worked the case but couldn't crack it, and the 22-year-old woman was never found. Now Bosch is in the... (more)
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  Complete Novels

  Red Harvest / The Dain Curse / The Maltese Falcon / The Glass Key / The Thin Man

  by Dashiell Hammett

  Complete in one volume, the five books that created the modern American crime novel In a few years of extraordinary creative energy, Dashiell Hammett invented the modern American crime novel. In the words of Raymond Chandler, "Hammett gave murder back to the kind of people that commit it for reasons, not just to provide a corpse.... He put these people down on paper as they were, and he made them talk and think... (more)
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  Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro: Book 3

  Sacred

  by Dennis Lehane

  The master of the new noir , Dennis Lehane brilliantly interweaves beauty and violence, integrity and evil in this thrilling, powerfully resonant novel. A beautiful, grief-stricken woman has vanished without a trace. So has the detective hired to find her. And a lot of money. Enter saavy, tough-nosed private investigators Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro. Rooted in the no-nonsense streets of Boston's... (more)
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 2

  God Save the Child

  by Robert B. Parker

  Appie Knoll is the kind of suburb where kids grow up right. But something is wrong. Fourteen-year-old Kevin Bartlett disappears. Everyone thinks he's run away -- until the comic strip ransom note arrives. It doesn't take Spenser long to get the picture -- an affluent family seething with rage, a desperate boy making strange friends...friends like Vic Harroway, body builder. Mr. Muscle is Spenser's only lead... (more)
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 1

  The Godwulf Manuscript

  by Robert B. Parker

  For Spenser, that most unorthodox of private detectives, no case is ever straightforward and the theft of a 14th-century illuminated manuscript proves no exception. His investigation soon leads him into organized crime, dope-pushing, theft, radical politics, adultery and murder.
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 35

  Now and Then

  by Robert B. Parker

  When a simple case turns into a treacherous and politically charged investigation, Spenser faces his most difficult challenge yet-keeping his cool while his beloved Susan Silverman is in danger. Spenser knows something's amiss the moment Dennis Doherty walks into his office. The guy's aggressive yet wary, in the way men frightened for their marriages always are. So when Doherty asks Spenser to investigate his... (more)
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 9

  Ceremony

  by Robert B. Parker

  From the bestselling author of Crimson Joy. Spenser's out to make war, not love, as he goes after Boston's entire X-rated industry. Pretty teenager April Kyle has disappeared into the city's darkest underworld, and to rescue her, Spencer pits muscle and wit against bullets and bullies. Part of Dell's ongoing Robert B. Parker reissue program.
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 10

  The Widening Gyre

  by Robert B. Parker

  The adoring wife of a senatorial candidate has a smile as sweet as candy and dots her "i's" with little hearts. A blond beauty, she is the perfect mate for an ambitious politician, but she has a little problem with sex and drugs--a problem someone has managed to put on videotape. The big boys figure a little blackmail will put her husband out of the race. Until Spenser hops on the candidate's bandwagon. ... (more)
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  Harry Bosch: Book 1

  The Black Echo

  by Michael Connelly

  For LAPD homicide cop Harry Bosch -- hero, maverick, nighthawk -- the body in the drainpipe at Mulholland Dam is more than another anonymous statistic. This one is personal. The dead man, Billy Meadows, was a fellow Vietnam "tunnel rat" who fought side by side with him in a nightmare underground war that brought them to the depths of hell. Now, Bosch is about to relive the horror of Nam. From a dangerous maze of... (more)
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  Harry Bosch: Book 8

  City of Bones

  by Michael Connelly

  Since his first appearance in 1992's Edgar-winning The Black Echo, Detective Hieronymous "Harry" Bosch has joined Dennis Lehane's Patrick and Angie, George Pelecanos's Derek Strange, and Greg Rucka's Atticus Kodiak in the pantheon of new-school hard-boiled detectives. Rather than giving Bosch a clever gimmick (like Jeffery Deaver's Lincoln Rhyme, who is a quadriplegic), Michael Connelly embraces the noir... (more)
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 34

  Hundred-Dollar Baby

  by Robert B. Parker

  A client from a decades-old case reaches out to Boston PI Spenser-but can he rescue troubled April Kyle once more? Longtime Spenser fans will remember that once upon a time, though not so long ago, there was a girl named April Kyle-a beautiful teenage runaway who turned to prostitution to escape her terrible family life. The book was 1982's Ceremony , and, thanks to Spenser, April escaped Boston's "Combat... (more)
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 8

  A Savage Place

  by Robert B. Parker

  TV reporter Candy Sloan has eyes the color of cornflowers and legs that stretch all the way to heaven. She also has somebody threatening to rearrange her lovely face if she keeps on snooping into charges of Hollywood racketeering.Spenser's job is to keep Candy healthy until she breaks the biggest story of her career. But her star witness has just bowed out with three bullets in his chest, two tough guys... (more)
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  Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro: Book 2

  Darkness, Take My Hand

  by Dennis Lehane

  The master of the new noir , Dennis Lehane magnificently evokes the dignity and savagery of working-class Boston in this terrifying tale of darkness and redemption. Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro's latest client is a prominent Boston psychiatrist running scared from a vengeful Irish mob. The private investigators know something about cold-blooded retribution. Born and bred on the mean streets of blue-collar... (more)
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 28

  Potshot

  by Robert B. Parker

  The town of Potshot, Arizona, is under siege by a band of murderous marauders, and the law is helpless to stop them. But now there's a new gun in town-Boston P.I. Spenser-and he's gathered a posse of the best and baddest to back him up. "Parker still finds clever ways to invigorate his Spenser series." ( Entertainment Weekly )
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 19

  Double Deuce

  by Robert B. Parker

  When two people are shot outside of a housing project, Spenser and Hawk must battle street gangs and lethal drug dealers in order to track the killer. By the author of Playmates. Reprint. PW. K.
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 5

  The Judas Goat

  by Robert B. Parker

  Spenser has gone to London -- and not to see the Queen. He's gone to track down a bunch of bombers who've blown away his client's wife and kids. His job is to catch them. Or kill them. His client isn't choosy. But there are nine killers to one Spenser -- long odds. Hawk helps balance the equation. The rest depends on a wild plan. Spenser will get one of the terrorists to play Judas Goat -- to lead him to... (more)
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 12

  A Catskill Eagle

  by Robert B. Parker

  Spenser's girlfriend Susan goes away with another man, Russell Costigan, the son of a very rich and dangerous criminal. Spenser and his friend, Hawk, go to find Susan. Soon they are in the world of the CIA, guns and murder.
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  Frank Johnson: Book 2

  The Blue Cheer

  by Ed Lynskey

  Set in the remote mountains of West Virginia, this gritty contemporary detective novel, Lynskey's second to feature former PI Frank Johnson (after 2006's The Dirt-Brown Derby ), will remind many of such masters of hard-boiled prose as Loren Estleman. Johnson has sought to still the memories of a deadly encounter with the Ku Klux Klan by retreating to the Appalachian town of Scarab, where people—and friends—are... (more)
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  The Spenser Novels: Book 20

  Paper Doll

  by Robert B. Parker

  When Boston aristocrat Loudon Tripp hires Spenser to investigate his wife's murder, Spenser uncovers high-class scandals and a corpse who might not be dead after all. Reprint. NYT. K.