| Title | : | Life During Wartime: Stories |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | - |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9781370056521 |
| Format Type | : | ebook |
| Number of Pages | : | - |
| Publication | : | Published January 29, 2018 |
Take a ride on the neuter scooter in “The Big Snip”, selected as one of the best crime stories of 2016. Follow a mountain man who’s not what he seems into a snowbound frontier town where evil has sunk its claws. Dine at the most exclusive restaurant in New York, where “Eat the Rich” takes on a whole new meaning. And meet Denny the Dent, a hulking 350 pounds of muscle who wouldn’t harm a fly…but who’ll glad crush a bully’s skull. And read the Jay Desmarteaux yarn that takes off where Bad Boy Boogie ends.
Read the stories readers call “hard-hitting bombs” full of “gut punches and belly laughs”…and be ready to get Plucked.
Praise for Thomas
“Thomas Pluck is a crime writer to watch. Steeped in the genre’s grand tradition but with heart and bravado all his own, his writing is lean, smart and irresistibly compelling.” —Megan Abbott, author of You Will Know Me and Queenpin
“He writes those quick, hard-hitting bombs as well or better than anybody on the scene today. Keep ’em coming.” —Wayne Dundee, author of the Joe Hannibal PI series and creator of Hardboiled Magazine
“If you don’t know who Thomas Pluck is, you will soon enough. His short fiction is all over the internet and he combines jabs of clever humor with full-impact gut shots.” —Johnny Shaw, author of Dove Season and Big Maria
Life During Wartime: Stories Reviews
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Reading rough-and-tumble Tom Pluck is not for the faint-hearted. He's a chronicler of the mean, messy, dirty streets, and of those who cause pain to others. Then there are his characters who fight back, either for justice or just plain revenge, and they exact a bloody toll on the abusers. The stories will chill you and stay with you- the mark of good writing. He can really make you wince when the rubber meets the road.
These are well-told, bare-knuckle tales of violence, but with a purpose. The stories range in theme, from Springsteen-type hot rodders (can you tell he's from Jersey?) to a cross between Laura Ingalls Wilder and Stephen King, or an hommage to Manly Wade Wellman (extra points for this). A nice mix of his favorite characters (you won't forget Denny the Dent) and some new ones. Pour a glass of good whiskey, grab some bandages, and go a few rounds with stories from Life During Wartime. -
Read the older version, Steel Hearts, and it seems this collection has most of the stories from that edition. It’s a bunch of short stories which are definitely gritty and dark. It’s not the crimes and twists that grab you, excellent as they are, but the warmth of the prose and characters. They’re engaging, you want to spend time with them, even as they’re doing dodgy dealings.
It’s Denny the Dent who you root for the most - again. I first encountered the character in Beat to a Pulp’s Superhero’s anthology (a brilliant collection I can’t recommend enough) and here Pluck goes deeper and rips out your guts. I’m going to have to plunge into the collection of shorts about him Pluck put out a while ago.
A highly entertaining read worth your time.
