Шедевр на все времена, лучшая работа писателя!Таинственная смерть подростка по имени Аса, тело которого было найдено в городском саду, сеет панику в обществе.Обстоятельства трагедии наводят на предположение, что это не несчастный случай, а очередной кровавый штрих в серии зверских преступлений, потрясших город двадцать лет назад.Есть только трое, кто может расставить точки над «i». Когда-то они были одной командой, но жизнь развела их…Теперь им придется воскресить ужасные воспоминания, чтобы понять, что же это — поворот судьбы или кошмарное дежавю?Джордж Пелеканос создал роман, в котором есть все: отчаянное преследование, харизматичные персонажи и необратимый рок.

What does it mean to be a father?

What does it mean to be a son?

What does it mean to be a man?

In Men From Boys seventeen masters of crime fiction answer these questions in a multitude of ways. Here are worlds that are instantly recognisable and believable, yet set widely apart. From a deprived London housing estate to the trenches of the First World War, from the claustrophobic confines of a late-night back room poker game to a rundown jazz joint in Manhattan, the writers address just what it means to be a man.

The characters who inhabit these stories strive to determine what is right, what will give them dignity, what will earn them self-respect. Some succeed, some fail: little is perfect.

Gathered together in this anthology are some of the very best names in contemporary crime writing, introduced and edited by John Harvey.

Michael Hudson spends the long days in prison devouring books given to him by the prison’s librarian, a young woman named Anna who develops a soft spot for her best student. Anna keeps passing Michael books until one day he disappears, suddenly released after a private detective manipulated a witness in Michael’s trial.

Outside, Michael encounters a Washington, D.C. that has changed a lot during his time locked up. Once shady storefronts are now trendy beer gardens and flower shops. But what hasn’t changed is the hard choice between the temptation of crime and doing what’s right. Trying to balance his new job, his love of reading, and the debt he owes to the man who got him released, Michael struggles to figure out his place in this new world before he loses control.

Whether they’re cops or conmen, savage killers or creative types, gangsters or God-fearing citizens, George Pelecanos’ characters are always engaged in a fight for their lives. They fight to advance or simply to survive; they fight against odds, against enemies, even against themselves. In this, his first collection of stories, the acclaimed novelist introduces readers to a vivid and eclectic cast of combatants.

A seasoned claims investigator tracks a supposedly dead man from Miami to Brazil, only to be thrown off his game by a kid from the local slum. An aging loser takes a last stab at respectability by becoming a police informant. A Greek-American couple adopts an interracial trio of sons and then struggles to keep their family together, giving us a stirring bit of background on one of Pelecanos’ most beloved protagonists, Spero Lucas. In the title novella — which takes its name from... Hollywood slang for the last shot of the day, the one that comes before the liquor shots begin — we go behind the scenes of a television cop show, where a writer gets caught up in a drama more real than anything he could have conjured for a script.

By turns heartbreaking and humane, brutal and funny, these finely constructed tales expose the violence and striving beneath the surface of any city and within any human heart. Tough, sexy, fast-paced, and crackling with energy, The Martini Shot is Pelecanos at his very best.