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Last Call for the Living: A NovelPeter Farris
Forge Books, May 2012
ISBN: 978-0765330079
Prodigious talent Peter Farris has written a backwoods fairy tale of fate and flight that is also a dark, modern thriller.
Like the bastard child of Stephen Hunter's Dirty White Boys and Cormac McCarthy's No Country for Old Men, Last Call for the Living is a smashing debut from a writer whose unique and disturbing vision of the world cannot be ignored.
Hobe Hicklin--a member of the Aryan Brotherhood, fresh out of prison--kills a bank teller and takes another hostage; dragging him to his mountain hideout. The teller, Charlie Colquit, is a young man who has practically given up on life until he finds himself fighting for it. As Charlie deals with his situation and develops a relationship with Hicklin and his meth-addled girlfriend, a steadfast sheriff and Georgia FBI agent are on Hobe’s trail, as well as the Brotherhood members Hobe crossed.
But while Hicklin may be planning on waiting out the heat, said heat’s coming on awfully fast in the form of Georgia Bureau of Investigation agent Sallie Crews, Jubilation County Sheriff Tommy Lang and Leonard Lipscomb and Nathan Flock, two of Hicklin’s Aryan Brotherhood members with a mini-arsenal in their truck.
On the surface things unfold as a classic fugitive in hiding tale, with the twist of Hicklin being wanted by not just the law but his former Aryan Brotherhood members as well. Which makes Hicklin an extremely motivated and dangerous man, one who's flashbacks to his time in prison demonstrate he is every bit the ruthless, coldblooded killer as the two on his trail.
Heroes are in short supply in this dark, gritty, southern noir grinder of a novel, but the characters who populate it, and their strong but strange bonds, make this novel a standout in its field. Peter Farris knows what a hard core crime fiction fan wants, and he delivers the tropes with a fresh take in Last Call for the Living.
PETER FARRIS is a graduate of Yale University. He lives in Cobb County, Georgia. Last Call for the Living is his first published novel. Visit lastcallfortheliving.com.
ISBN: 978-0765330079; ISBN10: 0765330075; Imprint: Forge Books; On Sale: 5/22/2012; Format: Hardcover; Pages: 304; $24.99
