Cheo Hernandez is a skinny thirteen year old who lives with his mother in a fifth story walkup on Valentine Avenue in The Bronx, New York. The biggest thing giving Cheo's life structure and meaning is baseball. Cheo is the number one pitcher and starting shortstop on his baseball team, and the only person he trusts, other than his mother, is his catcher, City Island Pete. Life is challenging enough, but it quickly becomes even more challenging when a man named Pelios shows up on Valentine Avenue. Straight out of prison, he was convicted of the murder of a mob boss in Queens. Rumor has it that the murdered man buried his fortune somewhere in Queens, but after Pelios went to prison, no one could find the money. Now all eyes are on Pelios, but when he disappears, everyone's attention turns to the only two people he was seen with more than once: Cheo Hernandez and City Island Pete. Pirates and buried treasure are still real, even in The Bronx. Maybe especially in...

This follow-up to The Last Gig features a tough and edgy, one-of-a-kind heroine—an entirely fresh take on the hardboiled women private investigators who dominate so many crime fiction classics.PI Marty Stiles was shot and paralyzed and is now in rehab, trying to decide whether to fight to recover. Meanwhile, his agency is being run by two women: the street-smart and savvy Alessandra Martillo, who's the muscle, and Sarah Waters, a naïve, single mom, new to the job but who quickly becomes the brains. Though the two women grew up only a few miles from each other in Brooklyn, it might as well have been worlds apart. Now they're partners, and for all their differences, are committed to their joint venture. When Sarah's deadbeat ex-husband gets into trouble, Al would rather let him suffer, but she agrees to help Sarah figure out where he is and why another man has ended up dead.Gritty and unputdownable, this is perfect for fans of...

Norman Green, critically acclaimed author of four crime novels, debuts a fresh, edgy character in the streetwise Alessandra Martillo, a female take on the P.I.s of yesteryear. Tough as nails and sometimes heartless, smart and altogether too brave for her own good, Al is one of the most interesting lead characters to hit crime fiction in years.A teenage runaway from the Brownsville projects, Alessandra Martillo lived with an indifferent aunt who had taken her in when her mother killed herself, and later, after more than a year on the streets, a caring uncle found her, took her in, and showed her she had a chance. That was many years ago, and now Alessandra's all grown up, working for a sleazy P.I., repossessing cars, and trolling for waitstaff on the take. The cases aren't glamorous, or interesting, but the work pays the bills. And she's good at it—if there's one thing she's learned since leaving the streets, it's how to take care of herself around...

Combining his pitch perfect voice for the characters who live in New York's underbelly with a compelling new protagonist, Norm Green's Shadow of a Thief grabs you by the throat and doesn't let goIn a previous life, Saul Fowler was a thief-for-hire with an impressive client list, including the US government. When he seeks shelter from his addictions up on the coast of Maine, his past come back to haunt him in the form of his estranged stepfather, Reverend McClendon. "Someone killed my daughter," says the rev. "Find out who did it Saul, I know you can help me. Please?" None of this would be Saul's problem, except that the girl might be his half-sister.Back in NYC, a place he never thought he'd see again, Saul delves deep under the surface of the dead girl's life. Before long he finds himself contending with gangs, pimps, prostitutes, the NYPD, and just maybe, the fifth fundamental universal force. Finding the truth will either change his life forever,...

In the fall of '73, Brooklyn, New York, is home to worn-down hotels, wiseguys, immigrants, the disturbed, the disenfranchised, and a few people just trying to make an honest buck. When Silvano Iurata's troubled brother, Noonie, rumored to be living in Brooklyn Heights, goes missing, Silvano returns to a place he swore he'd never set foot in again.Silvano left Brooklyn a long time ago -- wanting to leave behind his family and their seedy mob connections, and a past that just won't stay buried. The jungles of Viet Nam felt more hospitable to him than his own hometown; now that he's back, he doesn't intend to stay for long. His cousin Domenic has harbored a deadly grudge against him for something that happened when they were teenagers, but they aren't kids anymore, and his cousin has some dangerous friends. Silvano needs to find out what happened to his brother and get out -- fast.A tale of revenge and redemption, The Angel of Montague Street has the same vivid...

Stoney gave up drinking, but it couldn't save his marriage. Leaving the big house in New Jersey to his wife and kids, he's living in the City--still working the profitable, if not 100 percent legal, angles with his partner, "Fat Tommy Bagadonuts." Then, out of the blue, Stoney's teenage daughter shows up with a problem: an unwanted admirer who needs to be cooled down . . . or eliminated.But the secrets Marisa's been keeping from her father--like her night job as an exotic dancer--can't compare with those being guarded by the mysterious and violent man who's stalking her: a dangerous enigma with no past and a made-up name. He does, however, have lots of money--which makes him a very tempting mark for Stoney, Tommy, and their young streetwise "apprentice," Tuco. But people who look too closely into this guy's history have a habit of turning up dead.

You never know, when it happens, what's going to change your life, what's going to bounce you out of the rut you've been in, send you flying off in some new direction.Manny's latest score left him with more money than he's ever dreamed of, but with money comes danger -- from his partner, Rosey, who might get greedy, and from the Russian mobsters they stole it from. Worse, if he's busted again, he'll go back to prison for life, leaving his motherless five-year-old son, Nicky, still trapped in the foster care system.With the kind of guts born of panic and desperation, Manny grabs his son and heads for the wilds of Maine. When he discovers that the bad guys are on his trail, his impulse is, as usual, to run. But the people he's met in Maine -- including the local police chief -- have become his unlikely friends and an unlikely surrogate family to his boy. Now they're all in danger, and it's because of him. Does Manny have what it takes to change his...