Top 2020 Reads!

 Preface: The following are my top reads for 2020, not all books were published in 2020.

1, City of Margins By William Boyle 

Comments: Boyle creates characters and plots so vivid in tension that your skin crawls and also why I can’t let this blistering novel go from the must read novel of the year. Brooklyn NY has never been so gritty and vivid. You’ll be hard pressed to find another writer with his plotting and prowess to create emotion from the reader. Book of year, maybe decade!

2, Charlie 316, Four book series, by Colin Conway and Frank Zafiro 

Comments: This four book series is by far the best cop drama set of books I have ever read. Think Homicide, Life on the Street crosses with Hill Street Blues. Characters feel real at each page. I felt like the characters sat with me and read with me. Each book ups the next in suspense and tension so much that I blasted the conclusion to see what has taken three previous novels to build up too. 

3, The Searcher by Tana French

Comments: It’s fairly obvious that Tana French can flat out create a powerful narrative that sends cold shivers of reader delight. Filled with tension, drive and characters that shake your core thoughts. Absolutely must read for crime or otherwise readers looking for wonderfulness. 

4, The Last Thing to Burn by Will Dean

Comments: A true privilege to get an early opportunity to read this suspense filled, disturbing page turner. Dean just goes for it and just digs a hole of human depravity that shakes the reader with hate filled emotion at his protagonist. Incredible! I believe you can pre order for Deans first chance to show us Americans what we’ve been missing. 

5, When These Mountains Burn by David Joy

Comments: What Boyle does for Brooklyn, Joy does the same gritty character slow burns for The mountains of North Carolina hill people. No fancy writing or heroics are found in a Joy novel. But they leave you stunned with people looking to seek revenge for wrongs done to them by societal prejudices.

6, More Better Deals by Joe Lansdale

Comments: Scoundrels and cons come alive in this wonderful crime novel by a master East Texas novelist. If you love reading characters each trying to double cross and triple cross this is a delight and fun  to page turn. I couldn’t put it down.  

7,Wyoming by J P Gritton 

Comments: A gritty tale of family poverty, drug addiction, dysfunction. Unlike many crime novels you’ll read. I look forward to more soon. If you like a off the path heist novel, this is must read.

8, Lost River by J Todd Scott

Comments: A stand-alone novel by a rising star writer Scott. He delves into the raging drug crisis in a small border city between Kentucky and West Virginia. It feels very personal, because it was. Lots of emotions surround this novel and you can’t stop turning the pages. A heart breaker because without your knowledge this could be you. Currently Scott is active DEA agent. So he definitely puts the real in writing.  

9, The End of October by Lawrence Wright

Obviously Wright wrote the novel prepandemic but oh boy do we see a similarity in today’s events. A blistering story of a virus and how it spreads while trying to find the cure and fight the denial of its existence. Complete dystopian future ahead. 

 10, That Left Turn at Albuquerque 

Comments: Scott Phillips is the author no one knows about. And it’s a crime you don’t. He is an amazing underrated writer that can create a story that will swing you on the hilarious crime. He writes mostly about      the heist from perspectives of wit. You should read all of his novels. Yes he’s written several and one made it to the big screen. 

Honorable mention: Broken by Don Winslow

Comments: Broken deserves a higher place here and its entertaining as any book written this year. Winslow writes several short stories based on past novels that are equally great.   

Last minute addition, 

Cutter and Bone by Newton Thornburg

Comments: Two severely alcoholic men who drink excessively are obsessed with a scheme to threaten a man who Bone may have witnessed dumping a body while he walked home from a bar. Long periods of obsessive drinking lead me to almost dislike this crime novel, then the ending happened. Must read!