Books like 'Write to Kill'
Readers who enjoyed Write to Kill by Daniel Pennac also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
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L.A. Requiem by Robert Crais
Rated: 4.32 of 5 stars · 25 ratingsRobert Crais (Free Fall, Monkey's Raincoat) returns with his eighth Elvis Cole mystery, L.A. Requiem, a breakneck caper that leaves the wise-cracking detective second-guessing himself. Cole's partner, the tight-lipped, charm-free Joe Pike, gets a call from his friend Frank "Tortilla" Garcia. Not only is Garcia a wealthy businessman, he's a political heavyweight and father of Karen, Joe's ex... -
![The Flaw by Antonis Samarakis]()
The Flaw by Antonis Samarakis
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsA man is seized from his afternoon drink at the Café Sport by two agents of the Regime - though what exactly he is suspected of we do not know, and neither, apparently, does he.What follows is a journey by car toward Special Branch headquarters, and the interrogation that undoubtedly awaits him there... -
![Cianură pentru un surâs by Rodica Ojog-Braşoveanu]()
Cianură pentru un surâs by Rodica Ojog-Braşoveanu
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsÎntr-un imobil oarecare din strada Crăiței, cu ocazia unei inundații, cinci locatari dau peste două tablouri de o valoare inestimabilă. Cei cinci fac planuri pentru a se îmbogăți, dar, unul câte unul, încep să moară otrăviți. De fiecare dată, cei rămași trebuie să ascundă cadavrele și să fenteze Miliția, ducând mai departe, în paralel, planul pentru a vinde tablourile peste hotare... -
![The Deptford Trilogy by Robertson Davies]()
The Deptford Trilogy by Robertson Davies
Rated: 4.32 of 5 stars · 29 ratingsThe complete volume of Robertson Davies's acclaimed trilogy, featuring Fifth Business, The Manticore, and World of Wonders, with a new foreword by Kelly Link Fifth Business Ramsay is a man twice born, a man who has returned from the hell of the battle-grave at Passchendaele in World War I decorated with the Victoria Cross and destined to be caught in a no man's land where memory, history, and... -
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![I Hate to See That Evening Sun Go Down: Collected Stories by William Gay]()
I Hate to See That Evening Sun Go Down: Collected Stories by William Gay
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsWilliam Gay established himself as "the big new name to include in the storied annals of Southern Lit" (Esquire) with his debut novel, The Long Home, and his highly acclaimed follow-up, Provinces of Night. Like Faulkner's Mississippi and Cormac McCarthy's American West, Gay's Tennessee is redolent of broken souls... -
![Pulp Fiction: A Quentin Tarantino Screenplay by Quentin Tarantino, Manohla Dargis]()
Pulp Fiction: A Quentin Tarantino Screenplay by Quentin Tarantino, Manohla Dargis
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsQuentin Tarantino - director of "Reservoir Dogs" and writer of "True Romance" - won the Palme d'Or for best film at the 1994 Cannes Film Festival for "Pulp Fiction, " his unique vision of the underworld, starring John Travolta, Uma Thurman, Bruce Willis, Samuel Jackson, and Harvey Keitel... -
![Lullaby Town by Robert Crais]()
Lullaby Town by Robert Crais
Rated: 4.16 of 5 stars · 25 ratingsHollywood's newest wunderkind is Peter Alan Nelson, the brilliant, erratic director known as the King of Adventure. His films make billions, but his manners make enemies. What the boy king wants, he gets, and what Nelson wants is for Elvis Cole to comb the country for the airhead wife and infant child the film-school flunkout dumped en route to becoming the third biggest filmmaker in America... -
![The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolaño]()
The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolaño
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsFirst published in Spanish in 1998, The Savage Detectives was immediately hailed as a critical success, wining the Herralde Prize and the Romulo Gallegos Prize. But with the 2007 English-language translation the book became more than a bestseller -- it began the global sensation of Bolanomania. New Year's Eve 1975, Mexico City... -
![Night in Question by Tobias Wolff]()
Night in Question by Tobias Wolff
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsAuthor most recently of a stunningly clear-eyed memoir, This Boy's Life, Tobias Wolff's new collection of short stories maintains a similar steady gaze on his fictional creations. The author steels himself with a fine sense of irony and an awareness of moral ambiguity against the unjust suffering that is part of life... -
![The Elusive Mrs. Pollifax by Dorothy Gilman]()
The Elusive Mrs. Pollifax by Dorothy Gilman
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsNote: This is an alternate cover edition of ISBN 0449235637.While waiting for a view of her night-blooming cereus, the mild-seeming Mrs. Pollifax received urgent orders for a daring mission to aid an escape. Soon, the unlikely-looking international spy was sporting a beautiful new hat that hid eight forged passports... -
![Crimson Rivers by Jean-Christophe Grangé]()
Crimson Rivers by Jean-Christophe Grangé
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsA horrifically mutilated corpse is discovered wedged in an isolated crevice. The highly-regarded but unpredictable ex-commando Pierre NiTmans is sent from Paris to the French Alps to investigate. Meanwhile, Karim Abdouf, a young Arab policeman, is trying to find out why the tomb of a young child has been desecrated... -
![Beetle in the Anthill by Arkady Strugatsky, Boris Strugatsky]()
Beetle in the Anthill by Arkady Strugatsky, Boris Strugatsky
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 23 ratingsMaxim Kammerer is given a high-priority assignment as a security officer: track down Lev Abalkin, whose unorthodox, individualistic way of living threatens the status quo... -
![Tales of the Unexpected by Roald Dahl]()
Tales of the Unexpected by Roald Dahl
Rated: 4.18 of 5 stars · 33 ratingsA wine connoisseur with an infallible palate and a sinister taste in wagers. A decrepit old man with a masterpiece tattooed on his back. A voracious adventuress, a gentle cuckold, and a garden sculpture that becomes an instrument of sadistic vengeance. Social climbers who climb a bit too quickly. Philanderers whose deceptions are a trifle too ornate... -
![The Lime Works: A Novel (Vintage International) by Thomas Bernhard]()
The Lime Works: A Novel (Vintage International) by Thomas Bernhard
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsFor five years, Konrad has imprisoned himself and his crippled wife in an abandoned lime works where he’s conducted odd auditory experiments and prepared to write his masterwork, The Sense of Hearing. As the story begins, he’s just blown the head off his wife with the Mannlicher carbine she kept strapped to her wheelchair... -
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![Accidental Death of an Anarchist by Dario Fo, Joseph Farrell]()
Accidental Death of an Anarchist by Dario Fo, Joseph Farrell
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIn its first two years of production, Dario Fo's controversial farce, Accidental Death of an Anarchist, was seen by over half a million people. It has since been performed all over the world and is widely recognised as a classic of modern drama... -
![The Dead Girls by Jorge Ibargüengoitia]()
The Dead Girls by Jorge Ibargüengoitia
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThis is the first appearance in English of a Mexican novelist of enormous talent. His brilliant novel is based on fact: the discovery in the yard of a small-town brothel of the corpses of six prostitutes... -
![Three Witnesses by Rex Stout]()
Three Witnesses by Rex Stout
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIn three cases--a millionaire who writes his own death warrant, a dog who becomes a killer's worst enemy, and an answering service which refuses to talk about a murder--three witnesses hold the solution for detective Rex Stout... -
![Monsieur Malaussène by Daniel Pennac]()
Monsieur Malaussène by Daniel Pennac
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsParisian scapegoat Benjamin Malaussène, along with his family of half sisters and brothers, are once again the target for a series of increasingly catastrophic mishaps that culminate in Malaussène’s imprisonment on 21 counts of murder. Meanwhile, the real serial killer remains at large... -
![What a Carve Up! by Jonathan Coe]()
What a Carve Up! by Jonathan Coe
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsIf Charles Dickens and Agatha Christie had ever managed to collaborate, they might have produced this shamelessly entertaining novel, which introduces readers to what may be the most powerful family in England--and is certainly the vilest. A tour de force of menace, malicious comedy, and torrential social bile, this book marks the American debut of an extraordinary writer... -
![No Beast So Fierce by Edward Bunker]()
No Beast So Fierce by Edward Bunker
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsAfter serving an eight-year term in Folsom State Prison, Max Dembo is determined not to return to his former way of life, in a realistic, suspenseful study of the pressures facing ex-convicts as they attempt to negotiate the straight world. Reissue... -
![The Hustler by Walter Tevis]()
The Hustler by Walter Tevis
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThe legendary novel from the bestselling author of The Queen's Gambit about an ambitious pool shark who discovers what it takes to make the big time. The basis for the acclaimed film starring Paul Newman. To the strangers he plays in darkened pool halls, at first "Fast" Eddie Felson seems like a sloppy pool player with bright eyes and an extraordinary grin... -
![I'm Not Stiller by Max Frisch]()
I'm Not Stiller by Max Frisch
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsArrested and imprisoned in a small Swiss town, a prisoner begins this book with an exclamation: "I'm not Stiller!" He claims that his name is Jim White, that he has been jailed under false charges and under the wrong identity... -
![The Secret of Terror Castle by Robert Arthur]()
The Secret of Terror Castle by Robert Arthur
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsFinding a genuine haunted house for a movie set sounds like fun -- and a great way to generate publicity for the Three Investigators' new detective agency... -
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![The Last Good Kiss by James Crumley]()
The Last Good Kiss by James Crumley
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsAn unforgettable detective story starring C.W. Sughrue, a Montana investigator who kills time by working at a topless bar. Hired to track down a derelict author, he ends up on the trail of a girl missing in Haight-Ashbury for a decade. The tense hunt becomes obsessive as Sughrue takes a haunting journey through the underbelly of America's sleaziest nightmares... -
![The Friends of Eddie Coyle by George V. Higgins, Mark Hammer]()
The Friends of Eddie Coyle by George V. Higgins, Mark Hammer
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsEddie Coyle works for Jimmy Scalisi, supplying him with guns for a couple of bank jobs. But a cop named Foley is on to Eddie and he's leaning on him to finger Scalisi, a gang leader with a lot to hide. And then there's Dillon-a full-time bartender and part-time contract killer--pretending to be Eddie's friend. Wheeling, dealing, chasing, and stealing--that's Eddie, and he's got lots of friends... -
![Death Is Now My Neighbor by Colin Dexter]()
Death Is Now My Neighbor by Colin Dexter
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe peaceful quadrangle of Lonsdale College seems remote from the shocks of the outside world—such as the shooting of a young woman in her North Oxford home. But things at Lonsdale are not as tranquil as they appear. The Master of the college is retiring, and two senior dons, Denis Cornford and Julian Storrs, are vying, discreetly but furiously, to succeed him... -
![The Snack Thief by Andrea Camilleri]()
The Snack Thief by Andrea Camilleri
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsIn the third book in Andrea Camilleri's Inspector Montalbano series, the urbane and perceptive Sicilian detective exposes a viper's nest of government corruption and international intrigue in a compelling new case... -
![Stalking the Angel by Robert Crais]()
Stalking the Angel by Robert Crais
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 25 ratingsThe second blistering Elvis Cole novel from the bestselling author of THE FIRST RULE.Bradley Warren had lost something very valuable, something that belonged to someone else: a rare thirteenth-century Japanese manuscript called the Hagakure... -
![The Monkey's Raincoat by Robert Crais]()
The Monkey's Raincoat by Robert Crais
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsTaking the mystery community by storm, this Elvis Cole novel was nominated for the Edgar, Anthony, Shamus, and Macavity awards and won both the Anthony and Macavity for Best Novel of the Year.When Ellen Lang's husband disappears with their son, she hires Elvis Cole to track him down. A quiet and seemingly submissive wife, Ellen can't even write a check without him... -
![Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less by Jeffrey Archer]()
Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less by Jeffrey Archer
Rated: 4.03 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsThe conned: an Oxford don, a revered society physician, a chic French art dealer, and a charming English lord. They have one thing in common. Overnight, each novice investor lost his life's fortune to one man. The con: Harvey Metcalfe!!A brilliant, self-made guru of deceit. A very dangerous individual. And now, a hunted man... -
![The Fairy Gunmother by Daniel Pennac]()
The Fairy Gunmother by Daniel Pennac
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 29 ratingsMaybe the worst indignity for a Paris cop is to be shot dead by an old granny he is trying to help cross the street in Paris on a frosty morning. An old lady needs protection with so many druggies around these days. Dressed as an elderly Vietnamese woman, Inspector Van Thian goes to investigate... -
![Music for Chameleons by Truman Capote]()
Music for Chameleons by Truman Capote
Rated: 4.09 of 5 stars · 32 ratingsAt the centre of Music for Chameleons is Handcarved Coffins, a ‘nonfiction novel’ based on the brutal crimes of a real-life murderer. Taking place in a small Midwestern town in America, it offers chilling insights into the mind of a killer and the obsession of the man bringing him to justice... -
![Kiss Kiss by Roald Dahl]()
Kiss Kiss by Roald Dahl
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 33 ratingsIn these dark, disturbing stories Roald Dahl explores the sinister side of human nature: the cunning, sly selfish part of each of us that leads into the territory of the unexpected and unsettling.Originally published in 1960, Kiss Kiss brings together 11 of Roald's macabre adult tales... -
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![Encyclopedia Brown, Boy Detective by Donald J. Sobol]()
Encyclopedia Brown, Boy Detective by Donald J. Sobol
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsA Civil War sword...A watermelon stabbing...Missing roller skates...A trapeze artist's inheritance...And an eyewitness who's legally blind!Theses are just some of the ten brain-twisting mysteries that Encyclopedia Brown must solve by using his famous computerlike brain... -
![The Demolished Man by Alfred Bester]()
The Demolished Man by Alfred Bester
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsIn a world in which the police have telepathic powers, how do you get away with murder?Ben Reichs heads a huge 24th century business empire, spanning the solar system. He is also an obsessed, driven man determined to murder a rival. To avoid capture, in a society where murderers can be detected even before they commit their crime, is the greatest challenge of his life... -
![Plum Island by Nelson DeMille]()
Plum Island by Nelson DeMille
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 45 ratingsThe hair-raising suspense of The General's Daughter... the wry wit of The Gold Coast...this is vintage Nelson DeMille at the peak of his originality and the height of his powers.Wounded in the line of duty, NYPD homicide cop John Corey is convalescing in rural eastern Long Island when an attractive young couple he knows is found shot to death on the family patio... -
![The Scapegoat by Daniel Pennac]()
The Scapegoat by Daniel Pennac
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsPathetic, contrite and hapless, Benjamin is nonetheless the scapegoat at The Store: there is nothing for which he cannot be blamed. While his blunders remain minor, most of his unwitting victims can find it in their hearts to forgive him, but when violent explosions begin to follow him around, he inevitably becomes the prime suspect... -
![The Mystery of the Stuttering Parrot by Robert Arthur]()
The Mystery of the Stuttering Parrot by Robert Arthur
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsHot on the trail of seven talking parrots that have seemingly vanished into thin air, the Three Investigators are in more trouble than ever. Danger lurks at every turn as they search for the birds, each of whom can quote part of a coded message from a mysterious dead man... -
![The Smell of the Night by Andrea Camilleri]()
The Smell of the Night by Andrea Camilleri
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe number of Inspector Montalbano fans will continue to grow with this ingenious new novel featuring the earthy and urbane Sicilian detective. Half the retirees in Vigáta have invested their savings with a financial wizard who has disappeared, along with their money... -
![A Feast of Snakes by Harry Crews]()
A Feast of Snakes by Harry Crews
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsFrom the acclaimed author of such novels as "Blood and Grits" and "Childhood" comes a wildly weird and breathtakingly original visit to the rural South that reveals the exotic subculture that erupts in all its glory at the Rattlesnake Roundup in Mystic, Georgia. "No number of adjectives in the thesaurus can do full justice to the dazzlingly bizarre nature of Crews' creations"... -
![Cosmos by Witold Gombrowicz]()
Cosmos by Witold Gombrowicz
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsA dark, quasi-detective novel, Cosmos follows the classic noir motif to explore the arbitrariness of language, the joke of human freedom, and man’s attempt to bring order out of chaos in his psychological life.Published in 1965, Cosmos is the last novel by Witold Gombrowicz (1904–1969) and his most somber and multifaceted work... -
![Gantenbein by Max Frisch]()
Gantenbein by Max Frisch
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA stranger walks out of a bar and is later found dead at the wheel of his car. The narrator creates the story of this man -- or, rather, two stories, based on the two personae that he has imagined. One of these is named Enderlin; the other, Gantenbein.Originally published as A Wilderness of Mirrors... -
![Nightwork by Irwin Shaw]()
Nightwork by Irwin Shaw
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA dead man’s briefcase presents a down-on-his-luck pilot with the chance of a lifetime.Pilot Douglas Grimes’s best days are long behind him. Grounded due to a medical condition, Douglas has resigned himself to menial work as a desk clerk at a seedy hotel. But his fortune flips when he discovers a hotel guest dead from a heart attack and, next to him, a tube jammed with hundred-dollar bills... -
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![Christie Malry's Own Double-Entry by B.S. Johnson, John Lanchester]()
Christie Malry's Own Double-Entry by B.S. Johnson, John Lanchester
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsChristie Malry is a simple man. His job in a bank puts him next to, but not in possession of, money. As a clerk he learns the principles of Double-Entry Bookkeeping and adapts them in his own dramatic fashion to settle his personal account with society... -
![Little Boy Blue by Edward Bunker]()
Little Boy Blue by Edward Bunker
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsRaised within the confines of a system that has done nothing but provide him with pain, Alex Hamilton's frustration and anger are completely natural--and inherently dangerous.Since his parents split up, Alex has been constantly running from foster homes and institutions, yearning to be with his father, a broken man who cannot give his son the home he desperately needs... -
![The Little Sister by Raymond Chandler]()
The Little Sister by Raymond Chandler
Rated: 3.96 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsRaymond Chandler's fifth novel has Philip Marlowe going to Hollywood as he explores the underworld of the glitter capital, trying to find a sweet young thing's missing brother. Along the way he uncovers a little blackmail, a lot of drugs, and more than enough murder... -
![The Black Book by Ian Rankin]()
The Black Book by Ian Rankin
Rated: 3.96 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsAlternative cover edition of ISBN 1857974131When a close colleague is brutally attacked, Inspector John Rebus is drawn into a case involving a hotel fire, an unidentified body, and a long forgotten night of terror and murder. Pursued by dangerous ghosts and tormented by the coded secrets of his colleague's notebook, Rebus must piece together a jigsaw no one – perhaps not even he – want completed... -
![De lachende politieman by Maj Sjöwall, Per Wahlöö]()
De lachende politieman by Maj Sjöwall, Per Wahlöö
Rated: 3.95 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsIn this classic police procedural, the ever-dyspeptic Martin Beck has nothing to be amused about, even though it's Christmastime. Åke Stenstrom, a young detective in Beck's squad, has just been killed in an unprecedented mass murder aboard a Stockholm city bus... -
![Rumpole of the Bailey by John Mortimer]()
Rumpole of the Bailey by John Mortimer
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThese six short stories introduce all the lovable (or not so lovable) characters from the delightful Rumpole series.Horace Rumpole, the irreverent, iconoclastic, claret-swilling, poetry-spouting barrister at law, is among the most beloved characters of English crime literature...
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