Corbett thunders out of the gate with this gritty, moving debut about an ex-con's readjustment to freedom and his efforts to reunite with a former lover. Ten years after being sentenced for drug dealing, Dan Abatangelo emerges from prison with one thought in mind: finding Shel Beaudry and rekindling their relationship. Abatangelo is a changed man harder, less patient, prone to bursts of violence. Despite the advice of friends, who warn him that no good can come from reuniting with Shel, he pushes forward. He eventually finds her living north of San Francisco, beholden to a drug-addled, mentally unstable man named Frank Maas and the crime ring that employs him. When Shel and Abatangelo finally meet, she waffles on returning to him, but before he can convince her, a local drug war breaks out and Shel is taken hostage. Abatangelo responds with a daring rescue mission that takes him deep into his former world and ignites a gruesome chain of violence and death. Corbett, a San Francisco private investigator for more than a decade, brings a wealth of real-world detail to his swift, highly atmospheric narrative. His plotting could sometimes use a little more glue, and a few characters particularly newspaperman Bert Waxman border on caricature. But Corbett's prose dazzles, cutting across the page with passionate force, articulating themes of devotion, lost hope and spiritual renewal in an unforgiving world.
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“Will leave you weak and shaken, exhilarated.”
—JOE GORES
Author of
Hammett
“CORBETT WRITES WITH AN INTENSITY OF FEELING. . . . Without compromising the stark realism of his bruising style, [he] has written an astonishingly tender love story.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“A TENSE, TERRIFIC STORY, BEAUTIFULLY WRITTEN . . . When I finished it I thought of Ross Macdonald; David Corbett is that good.”
—MAX BYRD
Author of
Jefferson,
Jackson, and
Grant
“ENGROSSING . . . RICHLY DEVELOPED . . . [A] STAR IS BORN WITH
THE DEVIL’S REDHEAD.”
—Deadly Pleasures
“ADDICTIVE, BRUTALLY REALISTIC, AND ULTIMATELY VERY MOVING . . . Corbett writes crime with a deft touch, a professional investigator’s knowledge, and a rare talent for telling details.”
—MARK COGGINS
Author of
The Immortal Game
“
The Devil’s Redhead isn’t a walk on the wild side, it’s a flat-out run for your life with the hounds chasing after you. David Corbett writes with flair and passion, creating characters who live and breathe and do very bad things. I believed every word of it. Hit me again.”
—ROBERT FERRIGNO
Author of
Flinch “Corbett handles both selfless love and unspeakable brutality with a poet’s hand.
The Devil’s Redhead is the best debut novel I’ve read in years.”
—MARTIN J. SMITH
Author of
Straw Men“Often dark, often hopeful,
The Devil’s Redhead takes you deep into the world of crime and drugs and the lives they inevitably consume. This is a compelling novel about loyalty, love lost and renewed, and the price we all must pay when we live too close to the edge.”
—JAMES BROWN
Author of
Lucky Town
“What a story . . . Corbett has taken the threads of life . . . and woven a roller-coaster ride through tunnels of good, bad, murder, and redemption. Hold on tight, readers, you’re in for a thrill.”
—
The Clarion-Ledger (Jackson, MS)
“A THRILLING DEBUT . . . Its scintillating plot and edgy characters create a wrecking ball story with a flash-bang ending.”
—
Easy Reader
“There are no easy answers in [
The Devil’s Redhead]. It is at once a novel of white-knuckle suspense, a serious and even literary exploration of the human psyche, and a love story of two badly flawed people fighting against the odds in any way they can.
The Devil’s Redhead is a bullet-fast, high-wire act without a safety net.”
—JOE GORES
“Set in a brilliantly evoked Northern California landscape,
The Devil’s Redhead succeeds as both a gritty romance and a terrifying insider’s view of the awesome stupidity and insanity of methamphetamine-fueled criminal elements.”
—
Pages magazine
“
The Devil’s Redhead is filled with taut suspense and wonderfully vivid details—Corbett uses his words to maximum effect. . . . [He] is a talented author who will take the mystery world by storm.”
—
Romantic Times
“Corbett thunders out of the gate with this gritty, moving debut. . . . [His] prose dazzles, cutting across the pages with passionate force.”
—Publishers Weekly
From the Trade Paperback edition.
