Books like 'Postal, Vol. 1'
Readers who enjoyed Postal, Vol. 1 by Matt Hawkins, Bryan Edward Hill, Troy Peteri & Betsy Gonia also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
mystery horror crime dark noir family
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The Know by Martina Cole
Rated: 4.28 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsJoanie Brewer' s children meant the world to her. She'd do anything to protect them, even resorting to prostitution and petty crime in order to feed and clothe them. So when her beautiful teenage daughter is raped and murdered, only one thing will stop Joanie's pain - seeing her daughter's killer brought to justice. Joanie knows who he is and she'll do whatever it takes to nail him.. -
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... -
Ramonst by A.F. Knott
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsHidden in the mountains of East Tennessee, an eleven-year old goes about the business of being a boy during the summer of 1970. Within a balance of terror and innocence, he bears silent witness to ghosts of the dead and the cruelties of a teenage killer while local justice plays out in a community carved from legacies of coal mining and religion... -
Drip Drop Dead by Willow Rose
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsEmma Frost is chasing a killer that seems to bend the laws of physics.Things are going well for Emma Frost for once. She has a sweet boyfriend and has just finished a new book. Her daughter, Maya, is doing well in high school and even Victor is thriving and playing with his new best friend, the strange girl who fell from the sky... -
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The Calling by Neil Cross
Rated: 4.18 of 5 stars · 17 ratingsMeet DCI John Luther.He's brilliant. He's intense. He's obsessional. He's dangerous.DCI John Luther has an extraordinary clearance rate. He commands outstanding loyalty from friends and colleagues. Nobody who ever stood at his side has a bad word to say about him. But Luther seethes with a hidden fury that at times he can barely control... -
Witness by Caroline Mitchell
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsTo Rebecca it was a brave decision that led to her freedom from domestic abuse. To Solomon it was the ultimate betrayal.It’s been ten years since Rebecca’s testimony saw Solomon locked away. Enough time for the nightmares to recede, the nerves to relax; enough time to rebuild her life and put the past behind her.Then one day a phone rings in her bedroom—but it’s not her phone... -
The Wind Began to Howl by Laird Barron
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsLaird Barron's acclaimed crime saga makes a triumphant return in The Wind Began to Howl, an all-new story set after the events of Worse Angels. A seemingly benign case gradually pulls mob enforcer-turned-P.I. Isaiah Coleridge into a chilling mix of music, movie magic, mayhem, and madness... -
Lone Wolf by L.T. Vargus, E.M. Smith
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsThe package arrives first class. A manila envelope bulging with bubble wrap. With the top slit open, what lies within can just faintly be seen: A swath of human flesh sealed in plastic.When a popular podcaster receives a disturbing package in the mail, FBI profiler Victor Loshak heads to Denver to investigate. The grisly contents of the bubble mailer are unlike anything he’s seen... -
A Drink Before We Die by Daniel Polansky
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsA thrilling introduction to the world of the widely acclaimed Low Town trilogy.Rigus is the greatest city in the Thirteen Lands, a glittering metropolis of towering citadels and sumptuous manors, where bored nobles settle affairs of honor with cold steel, and sorcerers craft enchantments of wonder and majesty... -
A Long December by Richard Chizmar
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsIn 1996, Richard Chizmar's debut short story collection, Midnight Promises, was a finalist for the World Fantasy Award. Publishers Weekly called it "a sterling collection" while singling out "The Silence of Sorrow" as "an understated masterpiece."Two years later, Subterranean Press published a mini-collection from Chizmar entitled Monsters and Other Stories... -
The Spinster's Fortune by Mary Kendall
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsMoonlit alleys, shadowy tunnels, and buried secrets…Summer of 1929.Of supposed unsound mind without a penny to her name, Blanche Magruder lies alone in a home for the aged and infirm.Meanwhile, her house, a crumbled ruin in the heart of Georgetown, Washington, D.C., is pillaged nightly by thieves looking for treasure rumored to be hidden there... -
All of Us Are Broken by Fiona Cummins
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsIt’s been a long time since the Hardwicke family has been on holiday. But thirteen-year-old Galen has wanted to see the wild dolphins at Scotland’s Chanonry Point for as long as she can remember, and her mother Christine – a lone parent since her beloved husband left – is determined she gets her wish. But their serene trip is about to be interrupted... -
Hell's Half Acre by Will Christopher Baer
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsKidnapping, snuff films, amputee geeks and a requiem of lost love.Cast adrift after the blood symphony of Penny Dreadful, Phineas Poe is looking for answers in the form of a woman. He tracks Jude to San Francisco, where he finds her involved with John Ransom Miller, a wealthy sociopath with a mysterious hold over her... -
Alex by Pierre Lemaitre
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsAlex Prévost—kidnapped, savagely beaten, suspended from the ceiling of an abandoned warehouse in a tiny wooden cage—is running out of time. Her abductor appears to want only to watch her die... -
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Spiderstalk by D. Nathan Hilliard
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsLife hasn't been kind to Adam Sellars lately... In the past year he has broken up with his fiancee, barely survived a terrible car wreck, and had his brother's family vanish while he lay unconscious in the hospital. All they left behind was a frantic call on his cell phone's voice messages, and a blurry photo of a spider... -
Blood and Water by J. David Osborne
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsAfter discovering a body in a local fishing hole, two brothers come to terms with their own poverty as they're inescapably drawn into a surreal world of dangerous criminals.Set against a rural Oklahoma backdrop, Blood and Water is a story of family responsibility, the lure of easy outs and even easier scores, and our own violent impulses... -
Ugly As Sin by James Newman
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsNick Bullman was a wrestling superstar. His alter ego, The Widowmaker, was the monster heel all the marks loved to hate.Now, after a brutal encounter with two psychotic fans left his face horribly disfigured, he's just a monster.Yanked from the spotlight and thrust into the shadows, these days Nick tries to live the life of an average Joe. He avoids mirrors. He's angry. He's alone... -
Looking Glass Sound by Catriona Ward
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 7 ratingsIn a lonely cottage overlooking the windswept Maine coast, Wilder Harlow begins the last book he will ever write. It is the story of a sun-drenched vacation of his youth, of the terrible tragedy that forever bonded him with his friends Nat and Harper in unknowable ways, and of the killer that stalked the small New England town where they spent their summers... -
Kissyman & the Gentleman by Scott Sigler
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsNew York City, 1946. No one knows his real name, but when the job is too dirty, too dangerous, they call Kissyman. Once an elite Nazi SS commando, an honorable soldier, a taker of lives. When he was assigned to Dachau and saw what he was actually fighting for, he went AWOL and ran as far away as he could — to America. He still makes his living with a gun, but he no longer kills for his country... -
Zero Saints by Gabino Iglesias
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsEnforcer and drug dealer Fernando has seen better days. On his way home from work, some heavily-tattooed gangsters throw him in the back of a car and take him to an abandoned house, where they saw off his friend's head and feed the kid's fingers to...something. Their message is clear: this is their territory, now.But Fernando isn't put down that easily... -
The Art of Murder by José Carlos Somoza
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsIn 2006, the art world has moved far beyond sheep in formaldehyde and the most avant-garde movement is to use living people as artwork. Undergoing weeks of preparation to become 'canvases', the models are required to stay in their pose for ten to twelve hours a day and, as art pieces, they are also for sale... -
By Reason of Insanity by Shane Stevens
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThomas Bishop was twenty-five when he escaped from an institution for the criminally insane. Behind him was a grotesque history of pain, murder and rage. Ahead lay a path of horrifying vengeance that would trigger the most intense manhunt in history... -
Vicious by Kevin O'Brien
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsNO MOTIVE For more than two years, he held Seattle in a terror grip. A cold-blooded killer who abducted young mothers right in front of their sons and murdered them execution style. Then, as suddenly as the killings began, they seemed to stop.NO MERCY Susan Blanchette is looking forward to a relaxing weekend getaway with her fianc�, Allen, and young son, Matthew... -
People Like Them by Minka Kent
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsNobody’s perfect—although one beautiful couple certainly comes close. Discover the cracks beneath the polished surface in this unsettling short story from bestselling author Minka Kent.Veronica and Ryan Hartley are the envy of Auburn Drive. When the exclusive neighborhood hosts its annual progressive dinner party, the couple’s perfection is on display... -
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The Mother by T.M. Logan, Gemma Whelan
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFramed for murder. Now she's free . . .A woman attends a funeral, standing in the shadows and watching in agony as her sons grieve. But she is unable to comfort them - or reveal her secret.A decade earlier, Heather gets her children ready for bed and awaits the return of her husband Liam, little realising that this is the last night they will spend together as a family... -
Down in the Zero by Andrew Vachss
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsAndrew Vachss has reinvented detective fiction for an age in which guilty secrets are obsolete and murder isn't even worth a news headline. And in the person of his haunted, hell-ridden private eye Burke, Vachss has given us a new kind of hero: a man inured to every evil except the kind that preys on children... -
Swift to Chase by Laird Barron, Paul Tremblay
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsLaird Barron’s fourth collection gathers a dozen stories set against the backdrops of the Alaskan wilderness, far-future dystopias, and giallo-fueled nightmare vistas... -
High Life by Matthew Stokoe
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsFiction. Jack had gone to Hollywood with one ambition: to become famous, a star, exactly how he didn't care. He just wanted to be like the people whose lives he followed in gossip magazines...Instead he found a world more seedy than anything he could have imagined, a world of whores and deceit, snuff shows, incest, drugs-and despair... -
The Last Whisper in the Dark by Tom Piccirilli
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsProfessional thief Terrier Rand hasn’t gotten caught yet. It’s only his conscience chasing at his heels. In the follow-up to Tom Piccirilli’s acclaimed novel The Last Kind Words, prodigal thief Terrier Rand has come home to the family that has lawbreaking in its blood... -
Hinton Hollow Death Trip by Will Carver
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsFive days in the history of a small rural town, visited and infected by darkness, are recounted by Evil itself. A stunning high-concept thriller from the bestselling author of Good Samaritans and Nothing Important Happened Today. 'Cements Carver as one of the most exciting authors in Britain... -
The City by S.C. Mendes
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsChinatown, 1910. Violence is nothing new to these streets, but the discovery of three bodies—little more than piles of flesh and organs, the bones stolen—have proven to be the most bizarre murders to date. The police turn to Max Elliot, an unstable homicide detective, who six months earlier lost his wife and daughter under similar circumstances... -
Midnight Rain by James Newman
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratings1977... In a small town called Midnight, North Carolina, twelve-year-old Kyle Mackey ventures toward a strange new world called manhood... Kyle's older brother Dan is going away to college. The night before Dan's flight leaves for Florida, Kyle visits what he calls his "Secret Place" -- an old shack in the woods bordering Midnight... -
The New Black by Richard Thomas, Brian Evenson
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsThe New Black is a collection of twenty neo-noir stories exemplifying the best authors currently writing in this dark sub-genre. A mixture of horror, crime, fantasy, science fiction, magical realism, and the grotesque—all with a literary bent—these stories represent the future of genre-bending fiction from some of our brightest and most original voices... -
Desert Flowers by Paul Pen
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsRose and Elmer have created an idyllic sanctuary for themselves and their five daughters in Mexico’s Baja California desert. Out there in the middle of nowhere, blissfully cut off from the burdens of modern society, they’re free to raise their beautiful family…and preserve its secret.And they’re never giving it up.Then a young hiker named Rick comes looking for a place to stay... -
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The Serial Killer's Daughter by Lesley Welsh
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsCharmer, liar, father… Killer. Suzanne’s life changes forever the day she receives a visit from Rose Anderson, the woman who has been living with her estranged father, Don. Don is dead, but Rose wants Suzanne to have his possessions – including a series of intimate diaries and a mysterious collection of photographs of women... -
Confessions About Colton by Olivia Harvard
Rated: 3.93 of 5 stars · 15 ratingsSeven clues, seven steps closer to a killer . . .Bringing us into a world of unrelenting suspense, Olivia Harvard’s astonishing debut explores the ravages of grief and betrayal through the eyes of a teenage boy coping with a heartbreaking loss and its revelations . . .The unthinkable has happened: Colton Crest is dead. And Elliot, Colton’s best friend, is the one who finds him brutally murdered... -
The Slanted Gutter by S. Craig Zahler
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsDarren Tasking is a slick who lives in Great Crown, Florida and considers himself an entrepreneur. Others might refer to him as a criminal or a pimp or an extortionist or all of these things, if they knew what he was doing at night. His income is derived from a number of brothels and gambling parlors that are secreted behind iron doors in what appear to be typical apartment buildings... -
Savage Keepsakes by Marla York
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsI’m not a good man. Never cared to be one.My existence is only darkness and death. The world thinks I shouldn’t be this way, but I am who I am. Turning animals & humans into art is all I’ve ever known. Sending keepsakes of my victims ignites a fire within me, knowing I’m hurting families fuels my passion to continue.I’ve never wanted to be anyone’s hero until Lucy... -
Truck Stop by J.A. Konrath
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsBefore the events of Jack Kilborn's epic horror novel AFRAID...Before the events of J.A. Konrath's critically acclaimed Jack Daniels thrillers FUZZY NAVEL and CHERRY BOMB...Before the events of Jack Kilborn's and Blake Crouch's #1 ebook bestseller SERIAL...A cop and two killers meet for the ultimate showdown at the TRUCK STOP... -
The Light is the Darkness by Laird Barron
Rated: 3.90 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsConrad Navarro is a champion of the Pageant, a gruesome modern day gladiatorial exhibition held in secret arenas across the globe. Indentured by a cabal of ultra-rich patrons, his world is one of blood and mayhem, an existence where savagery reigns supreme while mercy leads to annihilation. Conrad's sister has vanished while traveling in Mexico... -
Hyenas by Joe R. Lansdale
Rated: 3.90 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsHyenas marks the always-welcome return of Joe R. Lansdale’s most indelible fictional creations: Hap Collins and Leonard Pine. Once again, the embattled but resilient duo find themselves enmeshed in a web of danger, duplicity, and escalating mayhem. The result is a tightly compressed novella that is at once harrowing, hilarious, and utterly impossible to put down... -
Cry Father by Benjamin Whitmer
Rated: 3.90 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsIn the tradition of Cormac McCarthy and Larry Brown comes a haunting story about men, their fathers, their sons, and the legacy of violence.For Patterson Wells, disaster is the norm. Working alongside dangerous, desperate, itinerant men as a tree clearer in disaster zones, he’s still dealing with the loss of his young son. Writing letters to the boy offers some solace. The bottle gives more... -
King of Swords by Nick Stone
Rated: 3.88 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsSuch was the acclaim that greeted Nick Stone's amazing debut novel, Mr Clarinet, that a curious syndrome soon developed: if you hadn't read the novel (and claimed to have any interest in the crime genre), you had to say (to all who would listen) 'I really must read Mr Clarinet -- I've heard so much about it!' (preferably said with a pronounced guilty note in the voice)... -
Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Stories My Mother Never Told Me by Alfred Hitchcock
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsEven when Alfred Hitchcock was just a tiny tot, his parents sensed there was something, well, odd about him. The only kind of fairy tales that brought a smile to his childish lips had the ogres and dragons winning, and instead of wanting to know about the birds and the bees, he kept asking about the vipers and the vultures... -
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Corrosion by Jon Bassoff
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsA mysterious Iraq war veteran with a horribly scarred face...A disturbed young man in a strange mountain town...A masked preacher with a terrible secret...Amidst a firestorm of violence, betrayal and horror, their three worlds will eventually collide in an old mining shack buried deep in the mountains... -
68 Kill by Bryan Smith
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsIt started with a couple of dead bodies and $68,000 in stolen cash. Chip Taylor’s girlfriend Liza had the perfect plan to rip off her rich sugar daddy. It should have been an easy in and out kind of deal. Nobody would get hurt and they would come out of it with enough loot to solve their problems... -
Grim Repast by Marc Collins
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsA Quillon Drask NovelTormented by his past, Probator Quillon Drask’s reputation as the go-to detective for strange crimes has led him to the Polaris district of Varangantua. Warring families, corrupt officials, and a monstrous hunger stalk these streets, and Drask must overcome his own inner agonies to bring justice to the tormented city... -
You Were Always Mine by Sheila Bugler
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsYears ago, she went to prison for killing her husband. Now, her daughter is dead too.Cassie McNamara was found guilty of the murder of her husband, Paul Cavellini, but she has always protested her innocence. Upon her release, she is ready to start over and hires local journalist, Dee Doran, to prove she was wrongfully convicted.Cassie and Paul’s young daughter, Grace, was adopted by Paul’s family... -
Peaceable Kingdom by Jack Ketchum
Rated: 3.86 of 5 stars · 14 ratings.This landmark collection gathers more than thirty of Jack Ketchum's most thrilling stories. "Gone" and "The Box" were honored with the prestigious Bram Stoker Award. Whether you are already familiar with Ketchum's unique brand of suspense or are experiencing it for the first time, here is a book no aficionado of fear can do without... -
Train d'enfer pour Ange rouge by Franck Thilliez
Rated: 3.86 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsDepuis six mois que Suzanne a disparu, le commissaire Franck Sharko erre dans un monde peuplé de ténèbres. La découverte d'un cadavre cruellement mutilé, en une mise en scène défiant l'imagination, va le propulser au cœur d'une implacable machinerie meurtrière. Un voyage hallucinant et halluciné, des carrières granitiques bretonnes aux sordides backrooms sadomasos de Paris..
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