The Best of Whatever--Naomi Johnson

I tried to whittle this list down to ten, but I had to stretch it to eleven. I'm listing only novels here, not collections or anthologies. That would have stretched the list out much further. In no particular order:

NO SLEEP TILL WONDERLAND by Paul Tremblay. Tremblay turns what seems like a gimick (a narcoleptic PI) into lyrical and evocative reading.

PRINT THE LEGEND by Craig McDonald. It's no secret how much I love the Hector Lassiter series. I can't even think about this book without wanting to re-read it.

WAKE UP DEAD by Roger Smith. Brutal and brilliant, and better still: revelatory.

MEMORY by Donald Westlake. Some Westlake fans found this very serious bit of literature not to their taste. I thought it was heartbreaking and bleak and a significant work from a master.

THE WOLVES OF FAIRMOUNT PARK by Dennis Tafoya. Powerful and provocative, with passages so beautiful and moving it's hard to believe this is only Tafoya's second novel.

BUCKET NUT by Liza Cody. Sharp, funny, and altogether original.

THE CARETAKER OF LORNE FIELD by Dave Zeltserman. A classic, and that's all there is to it.

SAVAGES by Don Winslow. Ultra-cool. Witty, sophisticated writing.

THE GLASS RAINBOW by James Lee Burke. One of Burke's best. Highly charged and beautifully written.

BURY ME DEEP by Megan Abbott. Genuine noir. Accept no substitutes. Exquisite prose.

EVERY BITTER THING by Leighton Gage. Quick, entertaining procedural that turns the tables on the reader in the final chapter.

Oh, and I haven't finished Benjamin Whitmer's PIKE yet, but I won't be surprised if by book's end this one makes the list, too.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Naomi Johnson is a fitful writer whose work can occasionally be found at A Twist of Noir. She has also had work published at Crime Factory and in Encounters Magazine. She writes the occasional review at The Drowning Machine.

Rawson's list of Whatever--#10: Killer by Dave Zeltserman

Okay, before I get started with this, I'll give you the skinny. Like most of the contributors who've sent me lists so far, my selections are in no particular order. I enjoyed each of the books I'm spotlighting equally with no bias towards any particular title.
With that said, here we go.

One of the near constants I've been running into while reviewing the top tens I've received so far is that one name keeps popping up:

Dave Zeltserman

And this is with good reason, over the past year Dave Z has released 4 stellar projects (Killer, the Caretaker of Lorne Field, the Kindle release Vampire Crimes, and 21 Tales) but for me, the conclusion to Zeltserman's loose 'Man Out of Prison' trilogy was one of the highlights of my reading year. Below is my review of Killer, which originally appear over at Spinetigler, plus the video trailer for the novel.

Killer by Dave Zeltserman

There are few novelists working in crime fiction who are as prolific and produce such high quality novels as Dave Zeltserman. The first two novels of Zeltserman’s loose ‘Man out of Prison’ trilogy—Small Crimes and Pariah—have both made my year end ‘best of’lists and for good reason and with the release of the third of the trilogy, Killer, it will easily make that list yet again.

Killer is the story of Leonard March. March has spent the past fourteen years in prison after turning state witness against his former employer, mob boss Salvatore Lombard. As a condition to his plea bargain March had to admit to his past crimes, which just happened to include 18 contract killings. Needless to say, the public and the press are plenty pissed when Leonard is released and are screaming for the old sociopaths blood the second he steps foot on free soil. Of course, all Leonard wants is to be left alone to work as a janitor and lead a quiet life in his shitty basement apartment reading library books, cope with his incessant migraine headaches, and maybe reconnect with his estranged children

None of this is going to happen.

Almost from the moment March walks out of jail he’s being hounded by the media, people on the street treat him like a leper, plus he’s receiving threatening phone calls from his former crime family and waiting for the inevitable bullet to the back of the skull. March’s only solace is eating at greasy spoons and in the company of a seemingly damaged young woman named Sophie.

Right off the bat let me tell you that Killer is the best of the ‘Man out of prison’ trilogy. Don’t get me wrong, the casual psychopathic meanderings of Joe Denton in Small Crimes was a sinister treat and the over the top violence and subtle social satire of Pariah was out-and-out brilliant. But with Leonard March, Zeltserman has found a wholly empathic narrator. Readers will connect with March and feel for his struggle to assimilate into a society that he was never really apart of and will be enthralled with how Zeltserman craftily alternates the story lines between March’s dismal present and the chapters which detail his evolution as a hired killer

As with his previous novels, Zeltserman’s prose is stripped down gutter poetry and his voice has never seemed as confident as it is with Killer.

What truly drove the narrative of Killer for me, though, was the humanness of March. He appears so frail, so out of sorts and institutionalized, as if he’s simply traded one type of prison for another once he’s left jail. Of course, the honesty of the narrative and its protagonist is brought into question once you reach the end of this incredibly satisfying, fast paced novel.

The Best of Whatever--Kieran Shea

What’s this now? Oh Christ. A top ten best of list? Really? No way am I doing a top ten best of for you. Have you any idea how much I read, how all over the board that reading is? It’s ridiculous. Like Crimespree turbo-Jordan-ridiculous. I've got sci-fi, I've got westerns, I've got philosophy....oh, all right. Stop your whining Comic-wise? Get hip and get wise to Greg Rucka’s STUMPTOWN while there’s still a pause in the action. Saw Mr. Rucka at the B’con bar this Fall and he promises more. Also, I know it’s relatively new but jump on board with the spree killer pre-Katrina cop drama SWEETS by newcomer Kody Chamberlain. What else? Can’t say enough about Ba and Moon's DAYTRIPPER or Layman's CHEW. Non-fiction real life shivers? Get some of Ollestad’s CRAZY FOR THE STORM or watch Ellroy unravel like a horny roll of infected bandages in THE HILILKER CURSE. Steampunk got you fascinated? Without question read BONESHAKER by Cherie (God, I so have a crush on you, girl) Priest. You will never read another zombie novel ever. Goddamn it, if some Quackenstein ground up Lehane’s pacing and Pelecanos’ pathos and added some high-powered action sequences that takes your breath away they’d call it Tafoya's THE WOLVES OF fucking FAIRMOUNT PARK. Oh, and you know what else? I don’t care if he’s Jack Sparrow’s brother BABYLON NIGHTS (the follow up to Daniel Depp’s Shamus-nominated LOSER’S TOWN) was awesome. THE FIRST RULE shows us where the real the real Crais hangs his hat (and it ain't in no clown's a-frame in the hills.) Another kind of Pike would be, of course, PIKE by Ben Whitmer. Okay, one more. Zeltserman's THE CARETAKER OF LORNE FIELD shows you why he's the quiet Lou Piniella of crime fiction. That’s enough. You’ve had your fun. Now go away.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Jersey-born writer, gadfly, and débrouillard...Kieran Shea scratches at the eightball of crime fiction like a lot of sordid lots. Recently his work was nominated for The 2009 Story South Million Writers Award. Sometimes you can find him at 39.070388 N,-76.545241 W other times at 39.277616 N,-74.5746 W, but mostly he's at large. You can find him lurking around his blog, Black Irish Blarny