American Crime

Waiting to enter a movie theater to see "Dr. No," the first James Bond movie, Simon sees a cute Black girl standing in a separate line that leads to the balcony, the "colored" section. A friend tells him, "You're in the South. Stick with your own kind.” Simon doesn't. It's the steamy summer of 1963. Simon Klein has moved with his family, Jews from St. Paul, Minnesota, to Pickettville, Alabama, where his father has taken a job at a nearby Army base. He is as mystified of the South as Southerners are of a Jew While gathering information for a story he is writing for his school paper, Simon ...

Hot Mr. Scrooge is my neighbor. Hope The man loathes Christmas. What person doesn’t warm up to the best holiday of the year? The cabin I purchased mentioned it needed light work, not a gut renovation. Looks nothing like the picture. The brooding beast next door said he’d help spruce up the place if it will get me to leave him alone. Deal. Because who wants to be around the Grinch longer than they have to? Even if he’s tall. Has a gorgeous face you can stare at all day. And a body you’d love to mount on your sleigh repeatedly. Then I wondered could I help Mr. Non-Christmas ...

A senior at Harvard, Will fits comfortably in his carefully curated roles: a perfect student, an art history major and sometimes artist, the eldest son who has always been his parents' American Dream. But when a mysterious Chinese benefactor reaches out with an impossible—and illegal—job offer, Will finds himself something else as well: the leader of a heist to steal back five priceless Chinese sculptures, looted from Beijing centuries ago.

“A trim yet potent tale…” – Kirkus Reviews Advance praise for Carra Roe’s debut Ain’t No Sunshine: “Roe’s moving, character-driven book is compelling, well written, and decorated throughout with authentic Southern Creole vernacular, which creates a distinctively unique tone and atmosphere…spirited, captivating characters to behold…charming anecdotes and humorous country-folk foibles…an impressive work…” – Kirkus Reviews "I absolutely adore your writing style and your expert use of dialogue...You left me wanting more but in a good way. Great job." -Cortney ...

The State of Jones is a true story about the South during the Civil War, the real South. Not the South that has been mythologized in novels and movies, but an authentic, hardscrabble place where poor men were forced to fight a rich man's war for slavery and cotton. In Jones County, Mississippi, a farmer named Newton Knight led his neighbors, white and black alike, in an insurrection against the Confederacy at the height of the Civil War.

Enforcer and drug dealer Fernando has seen better days. On his way home from work, some heavily-tattooed gangsters throw him in the back of a car and take him to an abandoned house, where they saw off his friend's head and feed the kid's fingers to...something. Their message is clear: this is their territory, now. But Fernando isn't put down that easily. Using the assistance of a Santeria priestess, an insane Puerto Rican pop sensation, a very human dog, and a Russian hitman, he'll build the courage (and firepower) he'll need to fight a gangbanger who's a bit more than human....

When Harlem gets off on a murder charge due to insanity, the asylum he’s sent to feels worse than death, with one exception: the beautiful Nurse Daphane. As their relationship grows, so do the stakes: She has the ability to help him escape, and he has the ability to set her free from her abusive relationship. Yet Harlem has one big secret: He was perfectly sane when he committed his crime. But in the end, Daphane’s own secret may be the deadliest of all....

Caren Gray manages Belle Vie, a sprawling antebellum plantation that sits between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, where the past and the present coexist uneasily. The estate's owners have turned the place into an eerie tourist attraction, complete with full-dress re-enactments and carefully restored slave quarters. Outside the gates, a corporation with ambitious plans has been busy snapping up land from struggling families who have been growing sugar cane for generations, and now replacing local employees with illegal laborers. Tensions mount when the body of a female migrant worker is found in a shallow grave on the edge of the property.

Most of us come into this world with an inborn need for religion, a higher power to believe in. However, when fear and misunderstanding are the driving forces behind that desire, the result is rarely a good thing. Eight years ago, Laura Bradford mysteriously disappeared off campus, causing quite a disturbance in the lives of Kenny Elliot and Gerald Reynolds, a journalism student with a fascination with Mesoamerican artifacts. When Gerald calls unexpectedly to tell Elliot he’s recently seen Laura then sets up a meeting only to be a no-show, Elliot tracks him down to get some answers. ...

"Blacks are 13% but commit half of the crime!" Using statistics, facts, charts, arguments never heard before, and common sense, this book factually challenges many firmly held beliefs, such as “Blacks make up 13% of the population but commit half of the violent crimes.” Offering a comprehensive examination of street crime in America's inner cities, it navigates diverse topics with clarity. Drawing from various disciplines, the author explores how mental illness, systemic racism, black apathy, drugs, family breakdown, American values, and the financial gains from illicit activities fuel ...

Rodeo Grace Garnet lives alone, save for his old dog, in a remote corner of Arizona known to locals as the Hole. He doesn't get many visitors, but a body found near his home has drawn police attention to his front door. The victim is not one of the many illegal immigrants who risk their lives to cross the border just south of the Hole, but is instead a member of one of the local Indian tribes.

Four action packed, urban stories in one grand collection. Whatever It Takes Cash rules everything around us and that’s not excluding the rent. Quay stepped into the strip game not by choice, but because she didn’t have any other options. After her good-for-nothing man puts them in a bind that could get her and her daughter thrown out in the harsh, rough streets of Jacksonville, Florida, Quay makes a decision to cross the ultimate line. When her brash plot to get deeper in the game puts her life on the line, Quay has to do whatever it takes to survive. Diggin’ Gold There's not a woman...

Mississippi, 1955: 14-year-old Emmett Till was murdered by a white mob after making flirtatious remarks to a white woman, Carolyn Bryant. Till's attackers were never convicted, but his lynching became one of the most notorious hate crimes in American history. It launched protests across the country, helped the NAACP gain thousands of members, and inspired famous activists like Rosa Parks to stand up and fight for equal rights for the first time.

After the fallout between Bird and Tre, The Commission looks as if it might be falling apart. The brotherhood has been broken beyond repair and it seems as though everyone is scrambling to chose sides. It's hard to trust anyone, but like always life goes on and so does business........ The heat is on for Tre and his team after the Tasker Street massacre. Everyone is looking for a place to hide out at except for Tre. He doesn't change up his lifestyle one bit even though he knows he's a wanted man. He and Diana continue to have their every night get high parties at their beach house. That is...

Mexico in the 1970s is a dangerous country, even for Maite, a secretary who spends her life seeking the romance found in cheap comic books and ignoring the activists protesting around the city. When her next-door neighbor, the beautiful art student Leonora, disappears under suspicious circumstances, Maite finds herself searching for the missing woman—and journeying deeper into Leonora’s secret life of student radicals and dissidents.

Karen Abbott illuminates one of the most fascinating yet little-known aspects of the Civil War: The stories of four courageous women - a socialite, a farmgirl, an abolitionist, and a widow - who were spies. After shooting a Union soldier in her front hall with a pocket pistol, Belle Boyd became a courier and spy for the Confederate army, using her charms to seduce men on both sides. Emma Edmonds cut off her hair and assumed the identity of a man to enlist as a Union private, witnessing the bloodiest battles of the Civil War.

She gave herself to save her brother. He took her to make her kneel and then couldn’t stop watching her fall. Zoe walks into the ritual hall of the Black Veil to trade her dignity for her brother’s life. Stripped, displayed, and offered like a sacrifice, she expects cruelty. She expects pain. What she does not expect is Yuri, the Bratva enforcer masked in silver and control, who claims her with quiet authority and terrifying focus. He does not touch her first. He watches. And what begins as survival quickly spirals into spectacle, obedience, and obsession. Yuri was trained to control ...

As a painter travels the world and creates his art, he also mourns the death of his queen, his wife. He is secluded from the world and finds an escape through the drawings in his work. Not until he gets an unexpected knock at his door does his life take a drastic turn. The guest presents a problem that traps them inside of a home for 72 hours and this quiet suburban estate becomes the devil’s playground. The painter is then thrown into a psychological game that has twists and turns, which leads to an unforeseeable ending.

Organized crime - the Italian American kind - has long been a source of popular entertainment and legend. Now Thomas Reppetto provides a balanced history of the Mafia's rise - from the 1880s to the post-World War II era - that is as exciting as it is authoritative. Structuring his narrative around a series of case histories featuring such infamous characters as Lucky Luciano and Al Capone, Reppetto draws on a lifetime of field experience and access to unseen documents to show us a locally grown Mafia.

Dr. Sandra Tanner is an award-winning author. What is the significance of a dislocated shoulder, an upcoming family reunion, and cellophane wrappers? They all interweave to solve a four-year-old murder. But how? When private investigator Kadence McKnight learns of her family’s strong adverse reactions to the upcoming quinquennial family reunion, she realizes she has a problem on her hands. She knows the backlash is because the murderer of Satrine Campbell has not been captured. Satrine’s body was found four years ago, a few feet beyond the back fence of the McKnight family cemetery, ...