A curmudgeonly shut-in's life is turned inside-out when he becomes involved with a trash-talking femme fatale, a trio of psychotic gangsters, and a dog whose incessant barking has caused him years of sleepless nights. Spiked with ample doses of sex, violence, and campy humor, Dead Dog is a riotous road trip from an Arizona trailer park to hell.

Dead Dog

Mystery, Thriller & Suspense

Segretto, Mike

Mystery

Contemporary Press

29-year-old Pauline works too hard for every cent she ever made until she meets Anton. He's willing to give her more cash than she's ever imagined … for one small favor. Like any classic pulp story, Down Girl is about the struggle between greed, weakness, and the exercise of pure sexual power. Not shy in its sanguine portrayal of the darker side of the human character, this book is a carnivore in the vegan world of literature.

Down Girl

Jess Dukes

Wet Work is the story of lusty agents turned on by violence, lazy detectives on the take, and drug abusing Russians looking to kill American officials. When the world needs saving, look to those who have the least to lose. Wet Work takes on all comers and mops up the floor with them.

Wet Work

Brida, Jay

On the eve of the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York City, a political fixer named Flanagan receives an unwelcome assignment: find out what happened to his boss's lover before his wife does. As a wave of conservatives descend on a prickly, pugnacious Manhattan, Flanagan gets caught in a whirlwind of sexual secrecy, murder, and the dark acts of a political party bent on empire. From the political influence of Joey Ramone to the restless, heated energy of New York in August, the raw political friction and firecracker sexuality of G.O.P. D.O.A make for a racy, briskly paced mystery and a summer no one will soon forget.

G.O.P. D.O.A.

Literature & Fiction

United States

With retirement looming on the horizon, Detective Hicks is going through the motions of investigating yet another murder case. But hell breaks loose and procedure breaks down when Hicks realizes the killer is impersonating him. In the unreal world of celebrity, power brokers, and decadence, the good detective spends the home stretch of his career tracking a twisted murderer and clearing his name. Like Michael Tolkin’s The Player, Dead Rite both embraces and satirizes the pulp tradition, reviving it for a younger audience while turning an unsparing noir eye toward an older generation of classic works.

Dead Rite

Gilmore, Jim

Fans of pulp - particularly those who like it in short, sharp doses - will appreciate this arsenal of tales penned by up-and-coming writers from across the United States. Populated by an unforgettable cast of heinous hoods and deadly dames,  Danger City  pumps out story after story in Contemporary Press's trademark sardonic, edgy style. Stories include a fatal run-in with a Brooklyn ice cream truck, a misunderstood clone that terrorizes urban lovers, and a Hollywood street fight that goes unnoticed.

Danger City: Urban Short Fiction

Dark, slapstick comedy rules in the hilarious I, An Actress . As a teen, Karen Hitler dreams of escaping her surname and her small town roots to become a real Hollywood starlet. When Karen's mother runs off to become a hobo, she and her father change their names and drive to Los Angeles. The young actress gets her start in a traveling minstrel show where she has an affair with the washed-up Fletcher Bisque and acquires a taste for sordid love. From there it's on to mobster Tony Tarantella, but when he catches Karen with another man, she gets shipped off Guatemalan revolutionary Juan Banana. Karen eventually returns to the United States and becomes a star long enough for Senator Joe McCarthy to haul her up before the House Un-American Activities Committee for Communist sympathies. After her fall, Karen bounces from one drug habit to the next until an improbable transformation makes her the star she always knew she was. Relentlessly doling out morbid humor and mercilessly skewering Hollywood clichés, I, An Actress is a rabid romp through the dark side of Hollywood fame.

I, An Actress: The Autobiography of Karen Jamey

Humor & Satire

Wizzer Whale has a problem. He’s madly in love with a headless corpse he found in the trash behind his junk shop; but that's not the problem. The problem is the corpse — named Elsa, after his dead wife — displays a distressing tendency to slaughter anyone in Wizzer’s path. A job in a freak show only fans the flames of Elsa’s murderous impulses, and soon the two are pursued by a raging mob, a pair of bumbling hoods, an unstoppable reporter, and a homicidally jealous puppet.

The Bride of Trash

Digging the Vein's unnamed narrator has a problem: He has a burgeoning drug habit and a wife he's only known for two days, but no job, no money, and no way out. As the narrator's life crumbles, the pills, booze, and problems multiply until he hits on a brilliant solution: heroin. Soon the narrator is associating with a cabal of street freaks. Just as the comedy is piling up, things go sour, making Digging the Vein a brutal look at a self-destructed, marginal life.

Digging the Vein

O'Neill, Tony

Home from a brutal stint fighting the Japanese in the Pacific, Burns finds himself unemployed. What's worse, he's been blackballed as a whistleblower from the only mill in town that's still hiring. His life changes forever when Stephen Ketchum, the son of a prominent mill owner, is found murdered and the family pays Burns $5,000 to find the killer. In order to do so, Burns will have to battle the local, corrupt police, other Ketchum family members, Pittsburgh's wealthy elite, and his own alcoholism. Sparse, wicked, and satisfying,  Small Brutal Incidents  marks the debut of a fresh new voice.

Small Brutal Incidents

Dittman, Michael

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Books by Contemporary Press