In 1928 New Orleans, eighteen-year-old Sonny LaSalle is a top prep student and champion amateur boxer - and he venerates his fraternal twin uncles, Buck and Russell, armed robbers who love their profession. Sonny secretly believes that he, too, is a natural outlaw and persuades his uncles to take him on as a partner. But when a bank job goes bad, Sonny is sent to jail, where he unintentionally kills a policeman who is the son of the most feared lawman in Louisiana, widely known as "John Bones." After nine months in the infamous Angola penitentiary, Sonny makes a harrowing escape and manages to reunite with Buck and Russell. The carefree trio head out for the boomtowns of west Texas, where the money flows as freely as the oil, unaware that vengeance follows close behind, as the cool, calculating John Bones begins a relentless campaign to hunt down Sonny . . . no matter what.

A World of Thieves: A Novel

Literature & Fiction

Blake, James Carlos

United States

William Morrow Paperbacks

Hailed as "one of the greatest chroniclers of the mythical American outlaw life" (Entertainment Weekly), James Carlos Blake now turns to the blazing story of Stanley Ketchel, the ragtime-era middleweight boxing champion and daring rakehell whose brief and meteoric life burned with violence and tragedy in and out of the ring. Fierce and tender, sexy and funny, vast in setting and rich in historical detail, The Killings of Stanley Ketchel is Blake at his robust and lyrical best.
In 1903 seventeen-year-old Ketchel makes a violent break from his father and flees his family's Michigan farm to ride the rails as a hobo, brawling with tramps and brakemen and cops. He finds a home among the hard-living mine workers and seductive ladies in one of the last wild towns of the old west -- Butte, Montana -- where he falls in love with a free-spirited woman who will haunt his heart forever.
But Ketchel also discovers his true calling in Butte: cracking skulls as a saloon bouncer leads him to prizefighting, a bloodsport barely hindered by rules in that day. Despite his lack of formal training as a boxer, his ferocious and unbridled style quickly earns him a reputation as the "Michigan Assassin." He soon outclasses every middleweight in the West and, shortly thereafter, the world -- winning the middleweight title in 1908.
Only the reigning heavyweight champion, fearsome Jack Johnson, rivals Ketchel's claim to be the greatest boxer of the era. The first black to hold the world title and one of the most controversial figures of the time, Johnson becomes Ketchel's obsession. Driven to prove himself the best, Ketchel challenges Johnson to a title fight -- even though the "Galveston Giant" has an advantage on him of forty pounds and several inches. Their match is one of boxing's most memorable dramas and leads to a unique bond between the two men. But its outcome also sets Ketchel on a willful and tragic course.
Steeped in the sweat and blood of the life of a legend, The Killings of Stanley Ketchel is a sweeping and powerful literary adventure by one of our most daring novelists.

The Killings of Stanley Ketchel: A Novel

William Morrow

Hailed as "one of the greatest chroniclers of the mythical American outlaw life" (Entertainment Weekly), James Carlos Blake turns to the blazing story of Stanley Ketchel, the legendary ragtime-era middleweight boxing champion and daring rakehell, whose brief and meteoric life burned with violence and tragedy in and out of the ring. The Killings of Stanley Ketchel is a sweeping and powerful literary adventure by one of our most daring novelists.

Harper-perennial

In the Rogue Blood

The offspring of a whore mother and a homicidal father, Edward and John Little are driven from their home in the Florida swamplands by a sching parent's treacheries, and by a shameful, horrific act that will haunt their dreams for the rest of their days. Joining the swelling ranks of the rootless--wandering across an almost surreal bloodland populated by the sorrowfully lost and defiantly damned--two brothers are separated by death and circumstance in the lawless "Dixie City" of New Orelans, and dispatched by destiny to opposing sides in a fierce and desperate territorial struggled between Mexico and the United States. And a family bond tempered in hot blood is tested in the cruel, all-consuming fires of war and conscience.With soaring and masterful prose, James Carlos Blake brings to life an enthralling historical time and place--and a cast of memorable characters--in a stunning tale of dark instinct, blood reckoning, and fates forged in the zeal of America's "Manifest Destiny."

Blake J.

James Carlos Blake is a masterful chronicler of the restless, outcast, the lawless, and the lonelyheart. His previous novel, In the Rogue Blood, was awarded the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction. Now he has written a powerful and rousing historical saga of family loyalties, blood feuds, and betrayed friendships; of bank robberies and bootlegging; and of a passionate love as wild at heart as the Everglades. It is the story of sworn enemies: John Ashley, a criminal and folk hero, the brightest star in a family destined to become the most notorious in south Florida; and Bobby Baker, a lawman born of lawmen, a violent, hard-hearted man driven by the searing memory of past affronts and the enduring hatreds the engendered. Ashley and Maker will clash many times over many decades. And as the twentieth century encroaches on their world—and the wildlands give grudging way to the rising boomtown of Miami—a feral, sensual mating will place one man in gravest peril...while his adversary contrives a dark, personal vengeance that could leave countless lives—his own included—in ruin.

Red Grass River: A Legend

The award-winning author of In the Rogue Blood presents a collection of eight pieces of short fiction that explores issues of love, violence, and vengeance in the stories of a colorful cast of characters who make their home amid the harsh world of the Borderlands. Original.

Borderlands: Short Fictions

Avon/Books

From the raw clay of historical fact, James Carlos Blake has sculpted a powerful novel of both a man and an America at war with themselves. Here is the brutally honest story of free-spirit William Anderson, who is pulled into a savage conflict of state against state in the years leading up to the Civil War. When Bill suffers a catastrophic loss, a fury is unleashed in his anguished soul. He becomes the most fearsome guerrilla captain and earns a name that becomes whispered with reverence and terror: "Bloody Bill."

Wildwood Boys: A Novel

The winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction for In the Rogue Blood weaves a powerful saga, set in the Everglades in the early twentieth century, that follows the blood feud between two men--outlaw John Ashley and lawman Bobby Baker.

American history is a complex weave of heroism and courage, conquest and carnage -- and no novelist today better understands the checkered character of our past than Los Angeles Times Book Prize winner James Carlos Blake. In prose as richly colored as an artist's palette, he again proves himself one of our most accomplished authors in this epic story set amid the Civil War's guerrilla conflict along the Kansas-Missouri borderland.Wildwood BoysLike his free-spirited father, William T. Anderson was never meant for the farming life. Born in Missouri on the coldest day of 1840, he is raised in a fiercely independent family given to the pleasures of poetry and music -- yet ever ready to defend itself. The family resettles in Kansas, where Bill and his brother Jim are tutored by their father in the rustling trade. They revel in the thrill of horse thieving -- until the imminence of the Civil War turns their adopted homeland into "Bleeding Kansas." Despite the family's efforts to stay clear of hostilities, the first Anderson casualty soon follows, and the rest of the family is banished back to Missouri.
Now the entire border region is aflame with violence Kansas "redlegs" spreading terror under the Union banner, Missouri "bushwhackers" flying the black flag of no quarter. Its loyalties torn between North and South, Missouri becomes the bloodiest ground of the Civil War, its major centers under Yankee control, its wildwood country ruled by rebel guerrillas. Before long the Anderson brothers are riding with Quantrill's raiders, the most notorious of the bushwhacker bands, though most of them are barely more than boys. Then Bill Anderson suffers a catastrophic loss -- and an implacable fury is unleashed in his anguished soul. He becomes the most fearsome guerrilla captain of them all and earns a name some whisper with reverence, some with terror: Bloody Bill.
From the raw clay of historical fact, Blake has sculpted a powerful novel of a man and an America at war with themselves. It is a poignant and brutally honest work about relentless passions -- including Bill's abiding devotion to a pair of unforgettable women with wills as indomitable as his own. The heroic and unsettling saga of "Bloody Bill" Anderson is as American as a Missouri country ballad of violence, honor, and ill-fated love. It is a story only James Carlos Blake could tell so splendidly.

Contemporary

James Carlos Blake writes literary novels of adventure -- of daring exploits and desperate hearts, of men and women whose characters shape their fate. Now, in A World of Thieves, he renders a story of crime and love in the closing years of the Roaring Twenties.
In 1928 New Orleans, eighteen-year-old Sonny LaSalle is a top prep student and champion amateur boxer -- and he venerates his fraternal twin uncles, Buck and Russell, armed robbers who love their profession. Sonny secretly believes that he, too, is a natural outlaw and persuades his uncles to take him on as a partner. Their early robberies go smoothly, and Sonny begins an affair with Brenda Marie, a rich and free-spirited art dealer in the French Quarter. But when a bank job goes bad, Sonny is sent to jail, where he unintentionally kills a policeman, the son of the most feared lawman in Louisiana who is widely known as "John Bones." After nine months in the infamous Angola penitentiary, Sonny makes a harrowing escape and reunites with Buck and Russell -- unaware that he is being hunted by the vengeful John Bones.
Sonny and his uncles head for the boomtowns of West Texas, where the money flows as freely as the oil. But after one of their robberies erupts in a gunfight, one uncle is badly wounded and the other is arrested and sentenced to a prison road gang. As Sonny sets out to free his imprisoned uncle, he finds himself caught between conflicting loyalties, and the story hurtles toward a thundering climax as the relentless John Bones catches up with Sonny at last.
A jazz-age story of vibrant joy and violent conflict, reckless passion, and an implacable nemesis, A World of Thieves is at heart the tale of a young man's reckoning with the truth of his own soul.

Genre Fiction

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Blake, James Carlos. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Blake, James Carlos

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Blake, James Carlos. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

A World of Thieves: A Novel

The Killings of Stanley Ketchel: A Novel

The Killings of Stanley Ketchel: A Novel

In the Rogue Blood

Red Grass River: A Legend

Borderlands: Short Fictions

Wildwood Boys: A Novel

Red Grass River: A Legend

Wildwood Boys: A Novel

A World of Thieves: A Novel