The sexual violence that occurs here and there in Lawrence Block’s short stories may be borderline gratuitous, but if you’re looking for some classic pulp from the author’s back catalogue, you’d be borderline insane for not picking up this Hard Case Crime edition. Inside are four pieces written by Block in the 1960s, the eponymous Borderline being the main one – it’s the longest and the best. Five drifters looking for drink, gambling, sex and murder intermingle with one another on the border between El Paso, Texas and Juarez in Mexico – now the homicide capital of the world. The remaining stories feature a lumberjack, an arsonist and a stag party gone wrong. What more could you want? Oh, a great pulp cover? Well it’s got that too. Full review here.
