So I forgot about Charlie Huston.
Then I started hearing murmurs about the books he had written being pretty darn cool. Apparently he'd written a crime series about vampires. Well, I like me some vampires. Who doesn't?
So I head over to the ol' Barnes and Noble and pick up a little book called Caught Stealing.
I keep waiting for the vampires to show up. They never do. But guess what? I don't give a good goddamn. This book is so fucking great I can't even tell you. This is possibly the best hard-boiled crime novel I've ever read (and I've read a few. Spillane, Lehane, Chandler, Westlake, make room for Huston). So brutal. So hilarious. So completely feasible. The best part is, the main guy, Hank Thompson, is so terribly relatable. He could be me, he could be you, he could be one of my old drinking buddies gone bad. I recognize the way he thinks, the way he talks, the way he acts.
If you like crime novels, or hell, just good books, you owe it to yourself to read this story. And, good news! It's just the first in a trilogy. I just finished the sequel, Six Bad Things, and it's just as good as the first, with maybe even a cooler bunch of supporting characters.
I'm halfway through the closer, A Dangerous Man, and it continues right along the merry path to glorious hell.
Be warned though, these are not books for the faint of heart. They are dark and brutal things and will make you wince and writhe and feel very glad that you are, in fact, not Henry Thompson.
Oh, yeah. Apparently Charlie Huston did write a book with vampires in it. It's called Almost Dead. That one's next on my list.
Here's a sketch of our boy Hank:
I think I'm gonna have to reread that Moon Knight series.
Now off to the bookstore with you!
