Searching for a contemporary, hard-boiled, gritty work....not a sequel to something else, just a one off edge of your seat novel. Whats the consensus on must read crime? (fiction)
Jason Starr is contemporary but writes in an old school hard boiled style. Ken Bruen's books are all awesome for neo-noir. High Life by Matthew Stokoe is great, but also disturbing and sorta disgusting. They all bring the "grit" more than a lot of recent crime authors. I'm a big fan of older stuff like Jim Thompson and Stark/Westlake's Parker books, for more modern stuff these fit the bill.
If you are not limited to newer stuff, check out Charles Willeford as well. One of my all time faves, ranks up there with Thompson who I already mentioned. Good resource for finding this sort of book: http://www.weeklylizard.com/ Jo Nesbo is also good... recently read a few of his.
I'd go with "The Poet" by Michael Connelly. It works as a stand-alone, but has sequels as well, should you wish to continue. The main character is a journalist trying to figure out his brother's suicide, written first person. Lots of stuff with the FBI. Is very good
The Poet was good, one of Connelly's better efforts. Like his stuff, but it lacks the grittiness of the others I mentioned. A lot of my suggestions are authors writing as a series of books, but all will stand alone as well... no need to read them in any order unless you want to.
I just stumbled across his first John Corey book (Plum Island) in the kindle store for 0.99$ and grabbed it... pleasantly surprised (only about 2/3 of the way through) and will check out more of his stuff.
Check out Stuart Neville... Ghosts of Bellfast and Collusion are really good... I read his third one too and liked it (don't remember what it's called though) John Connolly's Every Dead Thing is really good too... It's a little more comparable to a Silence of the Lambs type story, but a great read
The Yiddish Policeman's Union. Michael Chabon. Great read, a little touch of historical fiction but mostly a crime novel.
oh... Raymond Chandler is a good one... I think he worte mostly durring/right after the great depression, and it's all that hard boiled gritty type stuff you might be looking for... check out "The Big Sleep" if you're interested (I think they might be free in the kindle store too if that's an option for you)
Lots of good suggestions in here, but honestly the modern master (as of right now) is Bruen. Phenomenally well written and dark. If I pick up one of his books (and have read them all) it's not getting put down until I'm done with it. http://www.kenbruen.com/novels.php
I've read so damn many of these it's hard to recall them all. Some more modern authors to look into: Tom Picirilli Duane Swierczynski Walter Mosley George Pelecanos (excellent, wrote for the TV show The Wire as well) Dennis Lehane I'm sure I'm forgetting more still. It's my favorite genre and usually I read 3-5 books a week. I've literally read thousands of noir/neo-noir books.
Plum Island was great. Being from Long Island, it was easy for me to follow. Stick with the John Corey series if you can. But, my favorites are The Gold Coast and The Gate House. They go together. They aren't John Corey stories. Of the John Corey series, I liked Wild Fire the best. The only Nelson DeMille book that I didnt' like was The Rivers of Babylon. I actually didn't even finish it. It's the only one that didn't draw me in.
