Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
When his father leaves town, twelve-year-old Rodney Culver's mother takes up with Otis Dell, a fry cook at the local diner--and a well-known petty thief. While Rodney resists the man's influence at first, Otis soon draws the boy into his small-time criminal world. After a simple heist goes violently wrong, Rodney becomes an unwitting fugitive, swept away from his mother to the primitive mountain sanctuary of the mysterious Lester Fanning. But with Lester's skeptical lady friend in the way, and the town sheriff grappling with a curiously placed corpse, what once seemed like an easy plan quickly devolves into a knot of complications.
Synopsis
"One Simple Thingis fit to burst with grit, atmosphere, pathos and suspense. With his expertly paced second novel, Mr. Read invites comparisons to the crime masters of the mid-twentieth century--guys like Chandler, and Thompson, and Willeford."―Jonathan Evison
"In Warren Read's stories, setting is a character, stealthy, lush, and full of hidden depths. The very air has texture, holding the characters tight as their small town worlds unfold. A twisting, twisted tale full of well-developed characters and dense setting, One Simple Thing is a story that will hold you in its grip until the satisfying end." ―Jessica Barksdale Incl n, author of The Burning Hour and When We Almost Drowned
"One Simple Thing is anything but simple. This tense, layered story brings us into the world of hardscrabble folks who are fighting and often failing to get by. Opening on a boy's heart-wrenching journey through the implosion of his family, One Simple Thing flowers into a captivating crime mystery. While tempting to compare Warren Read to classic crime writers, he also vividly chronicles lives lived on the margins, like writers such as Larry Brown or Willy Vlautin.