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The hooker was young, pretty...and dead, butchered in a Greenwich Village apartment. The prime suspect, a minister's son, was also dead, the victim of a jailhouse suicide. The case is closed, as far as the NYPD is concerned. Now the murdered prostitute's father wants it opened again--that's where Matthew Scudder comes in.

When ex-cop Matt Scudder thought back on the summer of '75, two faces emerged from behind the smoky haze of a half dozen boozy saloons that made up his beat - Skip Devoe and Tommy Tillary - two bar flies he wouldn't have given a second thought to in the bright light of day. Yet they and their troubles were the reason that moved him a little farther out of the bleary-eyed mess that had become his life.

In this first in a series of wickedly funny mysteries, best-selling author Lawrence Block introduces Bernie Rhodenbarr, sometimes burglar, sometimes sleuth. Pulling only an occasional, very discreet job, Bernie manages to maintain his comfortable New York City apartment and keep his unorthodox vocation a closely-guarded secret. Every burglar knows never to trust anonymous phone calls. But when the caller offers easy money for an hour's work, Bernie can't ignore the job.

Florida private eye Doak Miller agreed to help the local cops by posing as a hit man to catch a woman looking to get rid of her husband. But then he met the wife - and fell, hard. Now he's plotting with her to commit a murder that could net them millions of dollars and the chance to be together. But to pull it off under the watchful eyes of the police, it'll have to be the perfect crime....

Bernie Rhodenbarr is actually trying to earn an honest living. It’s been an entire year since he’s entered anyone’s abode illegally to help himself to their valuables. But now an unscrupulous landlord’s threat to increase Bernie’s rent by 1,000 percent is driving the bookseller and reformed burglar back to a life of crime—though, in all fairness, it’s a very short trip.

Private detective Matt Scudder investigates a series of kidnappings that always end in brutal murder. Best-selling author Lawrence Block takes us into the seedier back alleys and side-streets of New York City, rendering his subject with a gritty realism.

Lawrence Block's talent for creating colorful characters, sophisticated dialog, and engaging atmosphere has earned him many awards: the title of Grand Master, three Edgar Awards, four Shamus Awards, and a Nero Wolfe Award. One of his most popular series follows the adventures of the suave bookseller and crook, Bernie Rhodenbarr. Bernie's sweetheart has dumped him. But although his heart is broken, he hasn't lost his love for fine books - or for an occasional discrete burglary.

Keller is a regular guy. He goes to the movies, works on his stamp collection. Call him for jury duty and he serves without complaint. Then every so often he gets a phone call from White Plains that sends him flying off somewhere to kill a perfect stranger. Keller is a pro and very good at what he does. But the jobs have started to go wrong. The realization is slow coming, yet when it arrives, it is irrefutable: Someone out there is trying to hit the hit man. Keller, God help him, has found his way onto somebody else's hit list.

Lawrence Block is a best-selling author of popular mystery fiction. With over 30 of his works in print, he is as prolific as he is skilled. This collection of essays and articlesfrom his Writer’s Digest columns has been in print for over 20 years. Here he provides invaluable advice to the aspiring writer and the established author. Featuring a witty and honest narration from the author himself, Block presents an illuminating look into the world of the professional writer.

The conclusion of Hit and Run found Keller living in a big old house in post-Katrina New Orleans' Lower Garden District, with a new name (Nicholas Edwards), a new wife (Julia), a new career (rehabbing houses), and a baby on the way. It certainly looked as though he was done killing people for money. But old habits die hard, and when the economic downturn knocked out the construction business, a phone call from Dot draws him back into the old game.

What Do You Do When You're A Kid And: --You find that your heterosexuality is shaken when you become part of a lesbian triangle? --You are a boy enmeshed with a passionate woman old enough to be your mother and you try to pass her sexual lessons on to girls your own age? --You discover you are a total homosexual at the age of twelve, with an irresistible attraction toward grown-up men? --You are a girl leading a totally promiscuous life at the age of thirteen, with a married man slavishly dependent on your favors? These are but some of the personal stories from adolescents that make up this...

Keller's a hit man. For years now, he's had places to go and people to kill. But enough is enough. He's got money in the bank and just one last job standing between him and retirement. So he carries it out with his usual professionalism, and he heads home, but guess what?

Keller is a regular guy, a solid citizen. He goes to the movies, watches the tube, browses the art galleries, and works diligently on his stamp collection. But every now and then a call from the breezily efficient Dot sends him off to kill a total stranger. He takes a plane, rents a car, finds a hotel room, and gets back before the body is cold.

In this brand-new novella, Keller, everyone's favorite assassin for hire, is Chicago-bound on Amtrak's City of New Orleans, ready to do what he does best. But it's complicated. Usually there's someone ready to point him toward the target. Or he'll have a photo, say. Or, bare minimum, a name and address. Not this time. When he gets to Baker's Bluff, Illinois, he'll have to play private detective before he can get down to business. Well, okay. He knows how it works. So before he even packs his suitcase, Keller buys a fedora.

A deranged, derelict, crazed Vietnam vet has been arrested for gunning down successful young lawyer Glenn Holtzmann at a corner phone booth on 11th Avenue—and the suspect's brother wants unlicensed private investigator Matthew Scudder to prove the madman innocent. But Scudder's curiosity and dedication are leading him to dark, unexplored places in his own heart…and to passions and secrets that could destroy everything he loves. In this unmerciful metropolis, no one is truly innocent—including Matthew Scudder.

Bernie Rhodenbarr has gone legit—almost—as the new owner of a used bookstore in New York’s Greenwich Village. Of course, dusty old tomes don’t always turn a profit, so to make ends meet, Bernie’s forced, on occasion, to indulge in his previous occupation: burglary. Besides which, he likes it.

While he is probably best known as a novelist and short-story writer, Lawrence Block has produced a rich trove of nonfiction over the course of a 60-year career. Over the years, Block has written extensively for magazines and periodicals. Generally Speaking collects his philatelic columns from Linn's Stamp News, while his extensive observations of crime fiction, along with personal glimpses of some of its foremost practitioners, have won wide acclaim in book form as The Crime of Our Lives. Hunting Buffalo with Bent Nails is what he's got left over.

Battling the bottle one day at a time, ex-cop, sometime PI Matthew Scudder finds that next to staying sober, staying alive seems easy. But in the mean streets of New York City it never is. Not for the prostitute who wanted out and got her beautiful self slashed to ribbons. Not for a pimp named Chance who is betting his life that the broken-down detective can find her murderer. And not for Matthew Scudder - just trying to stay alive in a city that knows nothing better than how to die.

Dave Robicheaux felt the bone-grinding pain rip through his body as the .45 did its damage. Through the agonizing haze that enveloped him, he heard an almost inhuman laugh - the hideous, victorious cackling of Jimmie Lee Boggs - a sound he would never forget. It had started out as an ordinary prisoner transfer, then turned into a blood bath when the convicted murderer got hold of a gun.

Matthew Scudder knows that justice is an elusive commodity in the big city, where a harmless man can be shot dead in a public place criminals fly free through holes in a tattered legal system. But now a vigilante is roaming among the millions, executing those he fees deserve to die. He calls himself "The Will of the People"—an ingenious serial killer who announces his specific murderous intentions to the media before carrying through on his threats.