After the First Death (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781523936052)

Alex Penn wakes up in a squalid Times Square hotel room. This is what he sees when he finally opens his eyes: "The floor was a sea of blood. A body floated upon this ocean. A girl-black hair, staring blue eyes, bloodless lips. Naked. Dead. Her throat slashed deeply."It had to be a dream. It had to, had to be a dream. It was not a dream. It was not a dream at all."I've done it again, I thought. Sweet Jesus, I've done it again."Years before, Alex Penn woke up in similar circumstances, called the police, went to prison. A technicality freed him-and now there's been another drunken blackout, another dead streetwalker.But something nags at his memory, and he begins to suspect some other hand wielded the knife. And if he didn't murder this woman, maybe he didn't kill the other one, either.So he runs, adrift in an urban jungle, hoping to steer clear of the police long enough to solve the crime.AFTER THE FIRST DEATH is sure to appeal to fans of David Goodis and Cornell Woolrich. And, with its gritty New York setting and its undercurrent of alcoholism, it can be considered a precursor to Lawrence Block's iconic Matthew Scudder series.THE CLASSIC CRIME LIBRARY brings together Lawrence Block's early crime novels, reformatted and with new uniform cover art.

Author: Lawrence Block
ISBN-10: 1523936053
ISBN-13: 9781523936052
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Language: English
Published: 02/07/2016
Pages: 218
Format: Paperback
Weight: 0.53lbs
Size: 8.00h x 5.00w x 0.50d

About the Author
Lawrence Block has been writing award-winning mystery and suspense fiction for half a century. His newest book, pitched by his Hollywood agent as "James M. Cain on Viagra," is The Girl with the Deep Blue Eyes. His other recent novels include The Burglar Who Counted The Spoons, featuring Bernie Rhodenbarr; Hit Me, featuring philatelist and assassin Keller; and A Drop Of The Hard Stuff, featuring Matthew Scudder, brilliantly embodied by Liam Neeson in the new film, A Walk Among The Tombstones. Several of his other books have also been filmed, although not terribly well. He's well known for his books for writers, including the classic Telling Lies For Fun & Profit and Write For Your Life, and has recently published a collection of his writings about the mystery genre and its practitioners, The Crime Of Our Lives. In addition to prose works, he has written episodic television (Tilt!) and the Wong Kar-wai film, My Blueberry Nights. He is a modest and humble fellow, although you would never guess as much from this biographical note.