Saturday, January 10, 2009

The Joe Pitt Casebooks

Purchase from Barnes & Noble
I've been reading this series since I discovered author Charlie Huston from his books in the Hank Thompson trilogy (more on that trilogy at the end of this post).

You can learn more about Charlie Huston, whom Stephen King calls "one of the most remarkable prose stylists to emerge from the noir tradition in this century", at the author's website - Pulpnoir.com.

The Joe Pitt Casebooks are an ongoing series of supernatural noir thrillers. Each casebook chronicles Joe Pitt's life as well as his struggles in the underground of vampire clans of New York. At first Pitt is an unaffiliated vampire, living in between the cracks by doing jobs for various clans in exchange for blood and freedom. However, as the series progresses, this shifts and Pitt's life evolves with each book.

As of this posting, there are four books already published in this series:

  1. ALREADY DEAD
  2. NO DOMINION
  3. HALF THE BLOOD OF BROOKLYN
  4. EVERY LAST DROP

Here's the synopsis of the first book, Already Dead:

"Those stories you hear? The ones about things that only come out at night? Things that feed on blood, feed on us? Got news for you: they’re true. Only it’s not like the movies or old man Stoker’s storybook. It’s worse. Especially if you happen to be one of them. Just ask Joe Pitt.

There’s a shambler on the loose. Some fool who got himself infected with a flesh-eating bacteria is lurching around, trying to munch on folks’ brains. Joe hates shamblers, but he’s still the one who has to deal with them. That’s just the kind of life he has. Except afterlife might be better word.

From the Battery to the Bronx, and from river to river, Manhattan is crawling with Vampyres. Joe is one of them, and he’s not happy about it. Yeah, he gets to be stronger and faster than you, and he’s tough as nails and hard to kill. But spending his nights trying to score a pint of blood to feed the Vyrus that’s eating at him isn’t his idea of a good time. And Joe doesn’t make it any easier on himself. Going his own way, refusing to ally with the Clans that run the undead underside of Manhattan–it ain’t easy. It’s worse once he gets mixed up with the Coalition–the city’s most powerful Clan–and finds himself searching for a poor little rich girl who’s gone missing in Alphabet City.

Now the Coalition and the girl’s high-society parents are breathing down his neck, anarchist Vampyres are pushing him around, and a crazy Vampyre cult is stalking him. No time to complain, though. Got to find that girl and kill that shambler before the whip comes down . . .and before the sun comes up."



THE HANK THOMPSON TRILOGY

This was my introduction to the author. Not horror, they are an engrossing example of pulp noir. Great reads, each one!

You can learn more, and even read each of the books in the trilogy online, by clicking here.

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