Books like 'Bust'
Readers who enjoyed Bust by Ken Bruen & Jason Starr also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
mystery crime noir hard-boiled pulp humor
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Stories and Early Novels: Pulp Stories / The Big Sleep / Farewell, My Lovely / The High Window by Raymond Chandler
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsIn Raymond Chandler’s hands, the pulp crime story became a haunting mystery of power and corruption, set against a modern cityscape both lyrical and violent. Now Chandler joins the authoritative Library of America series in a comprehensive two-volume set displaying all the facets of his brilliant talent... -
![Janet Evanovich Boxed Set #3 by Janet Evanovich]()
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![Clint Wolf Boxed Set: Books 4 - 6 by BJ Bourg]()
Clint Wolf Boxed Set: Books 4 - 6 by BJ Bourg
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsBooks 4-6 (But Not Forever, But Not For Naught, and But Not Forbidden) of the Clint Wolf Mystery Series by award-winning author BJ Bourg now available as a boxed set! BUT NOT FOREVER After a year of working as a tour guide in the swamps of Louisiana--and the day after a man’s body is found in a canal--former Police Chief Clint Wolf realizes he can’t stay away from law enforcement work... -
![Later Novels and Other Writings: The Lady in the Lake / The Little Sister / The Long Goodbye / Playback / Double Indemnity (screenplay) / Selected Essays and Letters by Raymond Chandler]()
Later Novels and Other Writings: The Lady in the Lake / The Little Sister / The Long Goodbye / Playback / Double Indemnity (screenplay) / Selected Essays and Letters by Raymond Chandler
Rated: 4.42 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsWith humor, along with an unerring sense of dialogue and the telling details of dress and behavior, Raymond Chandler created a distinctive fictional universe out of the dark side of sunlit Los Angeles. In the process, he transformed both crime writing and the American language.Written during the war, The Lady in the Lake (1943) takes Philip Marlowe out of the seamy L.A... -
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![The Raven Song by J.M. Dalgliesh]()
The Raven Song by J.M. Dalgliesh
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsOne song for the dying... sung by the dead...When the body of a young woman is discovered at the home she shared with her disabled daughter, DI Tom Janssen and his team must investigate the circumstances surrounding her death.The woman was a single mother, well regarded and popular among the group she frequented, but she had a chequered past... a life she kept secret from those around her.. -
![Collected Stories by Raymond Chandler]()
Collected Stories by Raymond Chandler
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratings(Book Jacket Status: Jacketed)The only complete edition of stories by the undisputed master of detective literature, collected here for the first time in one volume, including some stories that have been unavailable for decades... -
![Analysis & Reivew of Tricky Twenty-Two by Janet Evanovich by aBookaDay]()
Analysis & Reivew of Tricky Twenty-Two by Janet Evanovich by aBookaDay
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWarning : This is an independent addition to Tricky Twenty-Two , meant to enhance your experience of the original book. If you have not yet bought the original copy, make sure to purchase it before buying this unofficial summary from aBookaDay .SPECIAL OFFER$2.99 (Regularly $3... -
![The Maltese Falcon, The Thin Man, Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett]()
The Maltese Falcon, The Thin Man, Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratings(Book Jacket Status: Jacketed)The three classic novels published here in one volume are rich with the crisp prose, subtle characters, and intricate plots that made Dashiell Hammett one of the most admired writers of the twentieth century. A one-time detective and a master of deft understatement, Hammett virtually invented the hard-boiled crime novel... -
![Bună seara, Melania! by Rodica Ojog-Braşoveanu]()
Bună seara, Melania! by Rodica Ojog-Braşoveanu
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsRodica Ojog-Braşoveanu a publicat romane poliţiste, istorice şi alte povestiri. Maestră in arta suspansului, Rodica Ojog-Brasoveanu se arată o fină cunoscătoare a maștilor dincolo de care se ascund întotdeauna oamenii și în literatura, și în viata. Această carte o dovedește din plin.Despre "Ciclul Melaniei": Melania este cheia întregii serii, prin unicitatea ei... -
![Consummatum est by César Pérez Gellida]()
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![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... -
![In My Time Of Dying by Douglas Lindsay]()
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![Le ossa parlano by Antonio Manzini]()
Le ossa parlano by Antonio Manzini
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsMentre Rocco Schiavone affronta a Roma i suoi fantasmi con la sensazione che a quella città non abbia più niente da dire, ad Aosta nei boschi vicino Saint-Nicolas, vengono rinvenute alcune minuscole ossa umane. Sono di Mirko Sensini, un bimbo di 8 anni strangolato dopo aver subito violenza sessuale. Rocco stavolta dovrà scavare nel terreno più torbido della psicopatologia la pedofilia... -
![Vecchie conoscenze by Antonio Manzini]()
Vecchie conoscenze by Antonio Manzini
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsRocco Schiavone indaga sull’omicidio di una professoressa in pensione. E intanto l’ombra del passato si fa pressante: la pena per Sebastiano, l’amico fraterno che non ha mai smesso di dare la caccia a Enzo Baiocchi, che gli ha assassinato la moglie, lo rende inquieto e gli ruba il sonno... -
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![The Big Knockover: Selected Stories and Short Novels by Dashiell Hammett]()
The Big Knockover: Selected Stories and Short Novels by Dashiell Hammett
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsHammett's continental op - tough, tired, intelligent, a snap-brimmed Sir Galahad with a Browning - was the prototype for a whole new tradition of private eye thrillers.Here are ten of his classic suspense stories from the twenties and thirties - selected and introduced by Lillian Hellman... -
![Write to Kill by Daniel Pennac]()
Write to Kill by Daniel Pennac
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 29 ratingsBenjamin Malaussene is a downtrodden publisher at Vendetta Press. Treated as a scapegoat by Queen Zabo, the redoubtable doyenne of publishing, he has finally had enough. After one row too many with her, he resigns, only to have Zabo offer him a starring role. All he has to do is impersonate the world's best-loved but hitherto anonymous author, J.L.B... -
![Lone Wolf by L.T. Vargus, E.M. Smith]()
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... -
![Fortuitous Justice by Dennis Carstens]()
Fortuitous Justice by Dennis Carstens
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWHEN THEY THROW THE BOOKAT YOU, WHO YOU GONNA CALL? You’d better call top Minneapolis criminal defense attorney Marc Kadella.Fixer Burt Chayson had well and truly fixed it this time. About to be charged in a vote-buying scandal, he was overheard declaring that if he went down, he’d take some people with him... -
![Black Wings Has My Angel by Elliott Chaze]()
Black Wings Has My Angel by Elliott Chaze
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsShe had the face of a madonna and a heart made of dollar bills.She was sitting on the floor, naked, in a skitter of green bills. Beyond her was the custodian, still simpering in death. She was scooping up handfuls of the green money and dropping it on top of her head so that it came sliding down along the cream-colored hair, slipping down along her shoulders and body... -
![The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories by Otto Penzler]()
The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories by Otto Penzler
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsAn unstoppable anthology of crime stories culled from Black Mask magazine the legendary publication that turned a pulp phenomenon into literary mainstream. Black Mask was the apotheosis of noir. It was the magazine where the first hardboiled detective story, which was written by Carroll John Daly appeared... -
![The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps: The Best Crime Stories from the Pulps During Their Golden Age - The '20s, '30s & '40s by Otto Penzler]()
The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps: The Best Crime Stories from the Pulps During Their Golden Age - The '20s, '30s & '40s by Otto Penzler
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsThe biggest, the boldest, the most comprehensive collection of Pulp writing ever assembled. Weighing in at over a thousand pages, containing over forty-seven stories and two novels, this book is big baby, bigger and more powerful than a freight train—a bullet couldn’t pass through it... -
![Drowned Hopes by Donald E. Westlake]()
Drowned Hopes by Donald E. Westlake
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsJohn Dortmunder, anti-hero of such comic crime classics as The Hot Rock and Good Behavior , returns home at dawn after another failed burglary. He is horrified to find his apartment occupied by an old cellmate everyone supposed (and hoped) had been locked up for life. Tom Jinson needs Dortmunder's help. Nearly thirty years ago, before his last prison stretch, Tom pulled a big job up near Albany... -
![Why Me? by Donald E. Westlake]()
Why Me? by Donald E. Westlake
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsBe careful what you steal . . . A fast-paced crime caper from the Edgar Award–winning author and “funniest man in the world” (The Washington Post Book World).The Byzantine Fire is much more than a ninety-carat ruby. As a stone it’s worth over a million dollars, a value vastly increased by its pure gold band—but its history makes it priceless... -
![What's The Worst That Could Happen? by Donald E. Westlake]()
What's The Worst That Could Happen? by Donald E. Westlake
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsDortmunder is in the midst of a routine burglary of a Long Island mansion when who shows up toting a gun but the owner, nasty billionaire Max Fairbanks. Worse, Fairbanks takes Dortmunder's supposedly lucky ring. Highly insulted, Dortmunder and his gang execute their own peculiar reign of terror, and although they acquire quite a bit of Fairbanks' swag, they never quite get the ring back... -
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![The Way We Die Now by Charles Willeford]()
The Way We Die Now by Charles Willeford
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsWhen Miami Homicide Detective Hoke Moseley receives an unexplained order to let his beard grow, he doesn't think much about it. He has too much going on at home, especially with a man he helped convict ten years before moving in across the street... -
![Cockfighter by Charles Willeford, Jesse Pearson]()
Cockfighter by Charles Willeford, Jesse Pearson
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThe sport is cockfighting, and Frank Mansfield is the Cockfighter--a silent and fiercely contrary man whose obsession with winning will cost him almost everything. In this haunting, ribald, and percussively violent work, the author of the Hoke Mosely detective novels yields a floodlit vision of the cockpits and criminal underbelly of the rural South... -
![Shella by Andrew Vachss]()
Shella by Andrew Vachss
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsFrom the author of the acclaimed Burke private-eye series comes an ambitious and chilling novel that shows us not only what evil is, but where it comes from. For Shella is nothing less than a tour of evil's spawning ground, conducted by one of its natural predators... -
![The Seventh by Richard Stark]()
The Seventh by Richard Stark
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsWhy not?Just because no one had ever tried it before? What better place for a heist, if it was timed right, than a football stadium?There'd have to be money in the box office; the game was a sellout. Every eye in the place would be glued to the action down on the field. Even the getaway would be a cinch... -
![Dies irae by César Pérez Gellida]()
Dies irae by César Pérez Gellida
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 15 ratingsDespués de Memento mori... ha llegado el día de la ira.La acción de este thriller implacable arranca en la peculiar ciudad italiana de Trieste, frontera entre dos mundos. Augusto Ledesma elige el que fuera hogar de James Joyce como primer escenario para continuar su siniestra obra, que alimenta del aliento de sus víctimas y de la humillación de sus perseguidores... -
![The Dreadful Lemon Sky by John D. MacDonald]()
The Dreadful Lemon Sky by John D. MacDonald
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsTravis McGee has been offered easy money by a longtime lady friend. But when she gets killed, McGee's got a boatload of mystery. Navigating his boat into troubled waters, he heads for the seamier side of Florida--where drug dealing, twisted sex, and corruption are easy to find--but murderous riddles are hard to solve... -
![The Chill by Ross Macdonald]()
The Chill by Ross Macdonald
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIn The Chill a distraught young man hires Archer to track down his runaway bride. But no sooner has he found Dolly Kincaid than Archer finds himself entangled in two murders, one twenty years old, the other so recent that the blood is still wet... -
![The Scarlet Ruse by John D. MacDonald]()
The Scarlet Ruse by John D. MacDonald
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsTravis McGee is too busy with his houseboat to pay attention to the little old man with the missing postage stamps. Except these are no ordinary stamps. They are rare stamps. Four hundred thousand dollars worth of rare. And if McGee doesn't recognize their value, perhaps Mary Alice McDermit does, a six-foot knockout who knows all the ways to a boat bum's heart... -
![A Purple Place for Dying by John D. MacDonald]()
A Purple Place for Dying by John D. MacDonald
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA beautiful woman calls Travis McGee to Arizona. She needs his help recovering the money that her good-for-nothing, soon-to-be-ex-husband stole from her. But she's not long for the world, and even though his employer dies, Travis isn't giving up. It's not often he leaves Florida, and he's not about to go home empty-handed. The third Travis McGee adventure... -
![The Mongolian Conspiracy by Rafael Bernal]()
The Mongolian Conspiracy by Rafael Bernal
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsOnly a couple of days before the state visit of the President of the United States, Filiberto Garcia -- an impeccably groomed "gun for hire," ex-Mexican revolutionary, and classic anti-hero -- is recruited by the Mexican police to discover how much truth there might be to KGB and FBI reports of a Chinese-Mongolian plot to assassinate the Soviet and American presidents during the unveiling of a... -
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![Flashfire by Richard Stark]()
Flashfire by Richard Stark
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsMelander likes to do things flashy. When Parker finds himself working with Melander on a bank heist in a mid-sized midwestern city, his job is throwing a Molotov cocktail into a gas station. The resulting explosion sends the cops and fire trucks to the east side of town, while Melander and his gang plunder the bank on the west side. Parker doesn't care for flashy... -
![Cast in Stone by G.M. Ford]()
Cast in Stone by G.M. Ford
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsLeo’s boyhood hero, Henry “Heck” Sundstrom, was larger than life. Lately, however, Heck’s life has been spiraling out of control. First there was the honeymoon boating accident that killed Heck’s son and new daughter-in-law, Allison. And now the big man himself is dying—struck down by a delivery truck in a seedy section of Seattle... -
![Vanilla Ride by Joe R. Lansdale]()
Vanilla Ride by Joe R. Lansdale
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratings"There's no bullshit in a Joe Lansdale book. There's everything a good story needs, and nothing it doesn't. Joe pulls up the truck, says, 'Get in the back, we're going for a ride.'You know it might get a little scary and it might get a little crazy, but you get in, because you know in the end, it's going to be a fun ride... -
![Don't Ask by Donald E. Westlake]()
Don't Ask by Donald E. Westlake
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsIn his latest caper, Dortmunder is hired to steal the femur of a 16-year-old girl who was canonized because, 800 years ago, she was killed and eaten by her family. Now two European countries and the Catholic church are fighting like dogs over the bone. How will this free-for-all end? Don't Ask... -
![Rusty Puppy by Joe R. Lansdale]()
Rusty Puppy by Joe R. Lansdale
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsHap and Leonard investigate a racially motivated murder that threatens to tear apart their East Texas town.While Hap, a former 60s activist and self-proclaimed white trash rebel, is recovering from a life-threatening stab wound, Louise Elton comes into Hap and Leonard's PI office to tell him that the police have killed her son, Jamar... -
![On the Street Where You Die by Al Stevens]()
On the Street Where You Die by Al Stevens
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsStanley Bentworth is not all that tough. Previously a homicide cop, he drank his way out of a job and now runs a one-man private eye agency finding people who don’t want to be found... -
![Hollywood Blood by M.Z. Kelly]()
Hollywood Blood by M.Z. Kelly
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsLAPD Detective Kate Sexton and her canine partner, Bernie, return in this edge-of-your-seat thriller with laugh-out-loud humor. Hollywood Blood is the second book in the Hollywood Alphabet Series Thrillers. If you think you’ve got problems, meet LAPD cop, Kate Sexton... -
![No Happy Ending: A Hector Belascoaran Shayne Detective Novel by Paco Ignacio Taibo II]()
No Happy Ending: A Hector Belascoaran Shayne Detective Novel by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThe third English language case for Mexico City independent detective Hector Belascoaran Shayne, No Happy Ending, is Paco Ignacio Taibo II at his subversive, darkly comic best. First, Hector discovers the body of a dead actor, dressed like a Roman in full breastplate and regalia, propped up on the toilet in his office... -
![Killer on the Peaks: A twisting British murder mystery by J.F. Burgess]()
Killer on the Peaks: A twisting British murder mystery by J.F. Burgess
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsHe watches. He waits, until they are alone.In the historic Staffordshire market town of Leek, Detective Jessica Ryan, a resilient single mother of two kids, faces life's challenges. It's taken four years to rebuild her family after her husband Darren suspiciously disappeared whilst working undercover for the National Crime Agency... -
![Killer, Come Back To Me by Ray Bradbury]()
Killer, Come Back To Me by Ray Bradbury
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsCelebrating Ray Bradbury's centenary, this collection commemorates his finest crime stories – tales as strange and wonderful as his signature fantasy... -
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![The Killing by Lionel White]()
The Killing by Lionel White
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsJohnny Clay, an ex-con determined to strike it rich, has worked out a fool-proof scheme to knock off a racetrack payroll. The two million bucks should be enough to last him a lifetime or two. But a two-faced dame has another idea: Let Johnny do the work, then she'll grab the swag for herself and her boyfriend... -
![Repressed by Meghan O'Flynn]()
Repressed by Meghan O'Flynn
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsNo matter where you go, your past follows. For once in his life, Curtis Morrison has it good. A newly-married detective on the Ash Park police force, Morrison spends his days working to heal the ails of society to make up for his own checkered past... -
![The Slanted Gutter by S. Craig Zahler]()
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... -
![Honky Tonk Samurai by Joe R. Lansdale]()
Honky Tonk Samurai by Joe R. Lansdale
Rated: 3.93 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsOnly Hap and Leonard would catch a cold case with hot cars, hot women, and ugly skinheads. The story starts simply enough when Hap, a former 60s activist and self-proclaimed white trash rebel, and Leonard, a tough black, gay Vietnam vet and Republican with an addiction to Dr. Pepper, are working a freelance surveillance job in East Texas... -
![Dove Season by Johnny Shaw]()
Dove Season by Johnny Shaw
Rated: 3.93 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsJack Veeder is dying. Soon. And that impending event brings his son Jimmy back to the Imperial Valley of southern California just north of the Calexico/Mexicali border. Jimmy hopes he can spend what time his father has left laughing and reminiscing. But Jack's got one dying request. He needs Jimmy to find a Mexican prostitute named Yolanda... -
![Pain Management by Andrew Vachss]()
Pain Management by Andrew Vachss
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsBurke is back, but still lurking in the shadows, unable to return home. He is prowling the unfamiliar streets of Portland, Oregon, in search of a runaway teen. By all accounts, Rosebud Carlin is a happy, well-adjusted girl. She doesn't fit the profile of the runaway kids Burke knows so well�and once was...
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