Crider's prose slices through conventions and expectations," -Booklist
OUTRAGE AT BLANCO
It's True Grit meets Gran Torino in a blazingly original crime novel from Bill Crider, an Edgar and Shamus finalist and a two-time winner of the Anthony Award
On a bloody day in 1887, death came to Blanco, Texas.
Before the sun went down, the livery stable was torched, an outlaw gang robbed the bank, two men were killed, and young newlywed Ellie Taine was raped. One of the dead was the man who planned the robbery - the son of dying, legendary Texas Ranger Jonathan Crossland - the other was Ellie's husband, an innocent bystander.
The dead don't know fear.
Ellie is dead inside. She takes a gun and rides out after the desperadoes, cold-blooded and fearless, determined to kill the men who ruined her life. She's joined by Jonathan Crossland, who only has days left to live... but would rather die in his saddle making amends for his son than rot in his bed. Together, Ellie and Jonathan set out on a mission of vengeance and justice, one that neither of them expects nor hopes to survive.
"In the hands of Bill Crider, noir seems as atmospheric and doomful as ever," Publisher's Weekly
"Bill Crider is one of the most unpretentious and versatile pure entertainers in the mystery field." Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine
About the Author: Edgar Award Nominee, Shamus nominee, a two-time Anthony Award winner, and Derringer Award Winner. Bill Crider is a native Texan who's lived in the state all his life, and he's been reading, writing, and collecting mystery and western fiction for most of that time. He received a PhD from The University of Texas at Austin, where he wrote his dissertation on Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, and Ross MacDonald. He taught both high school and college before his retirement, and he combined his teaching career with his writing career, publishing more than 75 novels and an equal number of short stories. He's best known for the Sheriff Dan Rhodes series, which features a sheriff in a small Texas county. Though contemporary in setting, the Sheriff Rhodes books have many of the qualities of the classic western. Crider has also written a number of western novels, both under his own name several house names. When he's not writing, Crider is reading one of the thousands (and thousands) of old paperbacks that he's collected over the years or listening to music from decades past. He prefers baseball to football, likes old-time radio shows, and sometimes watches black-and-white movies. He's married to the lovely Judy, who has collaborated with him on several stories and who is always his first reader and editor. They live the quiet life in Alvin, Texas, a small town between Houston and Galveston.