NEWS:
Queenpin now in the UK
(see UK cover, left)
Winner of 2008 Edgar® Award!
BookSense Notable Pick
A legendary moll ...
Her ambitious protégé ...
A feminine twist on a classic story of underworld seduction ...
Queenpin
A young woman, hired to keep the books at a down-at-the-heels
nightclub, is taken under the wing of the infamous Gloria
Denton, a mob luminary who reigned during the Golden Era of
Bugsy Siegel and Lucky Luciano. Before she knows it, she's
ushered into a glittering demimonde of late-night casinos,
racetracks, betting parlors, inside heists, and big, big money.
Click here to read an excerpt
"Noir’s
reigning crown princess delivers a royally entertaining
rumination on toxic female friendships set in the harsh neon
underbelly of early-1960s Las Vegas. The tale of an avaricious
assistant to a Virginia Hill–style Mob courier unfolds so
cinematically it’s difficult not to picture it onscreen—perhaps
pitched as The Grifters meets Casino, with Sharon
Stone and Scarlett Johansson under the leering direction of
Quentin Tarantino."
—Frank Sennett, Booklist
"Faster than a blue-haired octogenarian losing her retirement
money on the Vegas slots and as calloused as a gravedigger's
hands, Queenpin is pure pulp noir; a gloriously brutal and
seductive story that—like the dysfunctional relationship between
the novel's young female protagonist and her grifter lover—
roughs you up a little and not only makes you like it but leaves
you wanting more."
—Paul Goat Allen, Chicago Tribune
"Edgar-finalist Abbott delivers a sharp, slender, hardboiled
tale of a protégé’s schooling by a notorious,
been-there-done-that moll. . . . Abbott is pitch-perfect
throughout: Gloria Denton, still turning heads in her 40s, is as
hard a moll as any, and the kid is a beautiful combination of
foil and tool as she strives to emulate her role model. The
collision, violent and inevitable, rips away the facade of glitz
and glamour, and leaves their low-end edifice starkly exposed."
—Publishers Weekly
"If Megan Abbott writes half a dozen more books as good as her
first three ("Die a Little" and "The Song Is You" are
period-piece perfection), she will claim the throne as the
finest prose stylist in crime fiction since Raymond Chandler.
This novella, a distinctly distaff homage to the lurid glories
of 1950s paperbacks, is a splendidly simple but extravagantly
sensual noir coming-of-age story about a young woman's dangerous
apprenticeship to a female gangster. Imagine Hayley Mills
possessed by Jim Thompson."
—Eddie Muller, San Francisco Chronicle
"Acts of stunning brutality, all retold in the narrator's
hipster voice, reveal the ugliness behind the glitz as a little
girl grows up. Abbott produces another stunning, hardboiled
heroine."
—Kirkus Review
"A new star is rising in the midnight sky of noir fiction, and
her name is Megan Abbott. With Queenpin Abbott has established
herself solidly in the tradition of her influences: James
Ellroy, James M. Cain and Raymond Chandler. If Cain boiled down
Ellroy’s complicated mixture of people, places and themes,
dashed in his trademark cynicism and moral ambiguity, and
filtered the brew with Chandler’s masterful use of slang and
dialogue, the result might have the flavor of Abbott’s fiction."
—Timothy J. Lockhart, The Virginian-Pilot
Dig Megan Abbott's Queenpin, so chock-full of tough talk and
high-stakes thrills that it hums. In an unnamed city and
uncertain period, an ambitious young dame (I use the word
advisedly) falls in with an aging but formidable underworld
figure, with satisfyingly twisted results.
—Adam Woog, The Seattle Times
"In the sly and stylish Queenpin, Megan Abbott gives a feminine
spin to hard- boiled crime, crafting a tale of grifters and
their marks."
—Sandra Kent, Boston Herald
"This book screams summer sizzle. Abbott is a good writer with a
gift for careening into character development even as revs up
the plot."
—John Mark Eberhart, Kansas City Star
"[I]t’s the gorgeous descriptive qualities of the narrator’s
world view that pull the reader firmly into her lair. Abbott is
perhaps the eminent hardboiled writer today, and she might be
the logical heir apparent to Hammett and Chandler."
—Anthony Rainone, Lincoln Journal Star
"Abbott’s fascinating exploration of the narrator’s psyche keeps
the pages turning, and there’s a savage inevitability here, a
magnet pull towards destruction. . . . Abbott’s wonderfully
amoral ending does not disappoint, and those of us who love noir
fiction recognize that Abbott is an exciting new voice for this
genre."
—Guy Savage, Mostly Fiction.com
Megan Abbott was born in the wrong time, since she writes like
she was a compatriot of the Chandlers and Hammetts of the world.
With Queenpin, her third novel, she shows no sign of slowing
down in style or substance.
—Bruce Grossman, Bookgasm.com
Abbott dishes up in her third novel stiletto heels, pointed,
deadly, and good over small distances, leaving readers looking
for more. This is All About Eve pulped to a fare-thee-well à la
Jim Thomson.
—Bob Lunn, Library Journal, starred review
"A stunning achievement. With Queenpin, her third superb
book, Megan Abbott proves beyond all doubt she is the new Queen
of Noir."
—Ken Bruen, author of Priest and American Skin
"Subtle, seductive, stunningly violent, this perfectly executed
hardboiled tale of complex relationships between grifters is a
stone-cold classic."
—Allan Guthrie, author of Hard Man)
"Classy, daring, and alluringly amoral, Abbott's portrayal of
a woman desperate for the 'good life' illuminates the deep
motives of a femme fatale, as she chooses tough over soft
and pleasure within pain in order to satisfy her thrill-seeking
personality in an era when opportunities are scarce. A slick,
murderous adventure with passion enough to draw any reader
inside."
—Vicki Hendricks, author of Cruel Poetry
"Megan Abbott's Queenpin is one of the best noir
novels I've read in years. I felt like I was reading a great
Gold Medal novel, from the heyday of crime fiction, yet with an
entirely fresh spin. It reminded me of the best work of Cain and
Chandler. I didn't read Queenpin , I devoured it."
—Jason Starr, author of The Follower
Read the story from which Queenpin derives in Damn
Near Dead, the Edgar®-nominated anthology.
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Publication Date: June 2007
ISBN-10: 1416534288
Price: $13.00
Buy it at one of these wonderful independent bookstores:
Aunt Agatha's (Ann
Arbor, MI)
Murder by the Book
(Houston, TX)
Poisoned Pen
(Scottsdale, AZ)
Murder on the Beach
(Delray Beach, FL)
Dead End Books online
Partners and Crime (New
York, NY)
The Mystery
Bookstore (Los Angeles, CA)
Mystery One Bookstore
(Milwaukee, WI)
Mysterious Bookshop
(New York, NY)
Mysteries to Die For
(Thousand Oaks, CA)
M Is for Mystery (San
Mateo, CA)
Seattle Mystery
Bookstore (Seattle, WA)
Book Em Mysteries
(Pasadena, CA)
and many more! (If you are a bookseller, please
send an email )
Also available on Powells and other online book retailers,
including
Amazon and
Barnes and Noble.
And available as an e-book at retailers everywhere, including:
Order now
and receive 20% off. Just enter the following code at checkout:
ABBO3f1bf
