James Sallis

Backwater by James Sallis

24 September, 2026

In his novel The Killer is Dying back in 2011, James Sallis considered how a life of crime comes to an end, among other things. Essentially, it looked at a hitman who was not just losing his touch, but slowly losing his battle with a…

News

On the Radar: Scratching the surface

By crimefictionlover

21 August, 2026

Judging by the amount of submissions we receive for news and reviews, crime fiction is doing very well indeed. They say people are reading less… well they’re not reading less crime fiction, lemmetellya. As a result, this week’s new books report barely scratches the surface…

Features

First Look: Backwater by James Sallis

By crimefictionlover

17 June, 2026

In January 2025, the crime fiction world lost one of its greats with the passing of the American author James Sallis. However, when he passed away of pneumonia aged 81, the author left behind one last manuscript – Backwater – and it’s coming out in…

Features

CIS: A classic revisited - The Long-Legged Fly

By Zachary Colbert

11 September, 2015

This spartan but stylish New Orleans noir was James Sallis’s debut novel and the first book in his Lew Griffin series. The Long-Legged Fly introduces us to the grizzled private detective through an exchange that’s the epitome of crime noir – beautiful and brutal in…

Book Club

The Mad and the Bad

By crimefictionlover

8 October, 2014

When a kidnapping goes wrong a young nanny, just released from an asylum, and her charge are pursued across the French countryside by bungling gangsters and a dyspeptic English hitman. This story is equal parts hardboiled thriller and capitalist satire. Winner of the French Grand…

Print Reviews

The Mad and the Bad by Jean-Patrick Manchette

By RoughJustice

14 August, 2014

Translated by Donald Nicholson-Smith — Last month we celebrated Bastille Day with a look at the best French crime fiction. My two suggestions for that list were written by Manchette. The quality of this author hasn’t escaped the eye of publishers New York Review Books,…

iBook Kindle Print Reviews

OxCrimes edited by Mark Ellingham and Peter Florence

By Andre

25 May, 2014

If you’ve been a regular visitor to Crime Fiction Lover, you’ll have noticed our exclusive extracts from OxCrimes, an anthology that will raise money for Oxfam’s aid and development work in the UK and abroad. Of course, you’d have to be pretty mean-spirited to find…

iBook Kindle Print Reviews

Others of My Kind by James Sallis

By crimefictionlover

28 October, 2013

Jenny Rowan is a survivor. At a young age she was abducted and kept in a box for two years by a paedophile. He’d push the box under his bed, getting it out now and again to feed her ice cream sundaes and/or abuse her….

Crime Fiction Lover

Backwater by James Sallis

On the Radar: Scratching the surface

First Look: Backwater by James Sallis

CIS: A classic revisited - The Long-Legged Fly

The Mad and the Bad

The Mad and the Bad by Jean-Patrick Manchette

OxCrimes edited by Mark Ellingham and Peter Florence

Others of My Kind by James Sallis

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