Kirjahaku

"If you like your crime hard and fast, Kalteis is for you." -- The Globe and Mail Set to the cranking beat and amphetamine buzz of Vancouver's early punk scene, Zero Avenue follows Frankie Del Rey, a talented and rising punk star who runs just enough dope on the side to pay the bills and keep her band, Middle Finger, together. The trouble is she's running it for Marty Sayles, a powerful drug dealer who controls the Eastside with a fist. When Frankie strikes up a relationship with Johnny Falco, the owner of one of the only Vancouver clubs willing to give punk a chance, she finds out he's having his own money problems just keeping Falco's Nest open. Desperate to keep his club, Johnny raids one of the pot fields Marty Sayles has growing out past Surrey, along Zero Avenue on the U.S. border. He gets away with a pickup load and pays back everybody he owes. Arnie Binz, bass player for Waves of Nausea, finds out about it and decides that was easy enough. But he gets caught by Marty's crew. Johnny and Frankie set out to find the missing Arnie, but Marty Sayles is pissed and looking for who ripped off his other field -- a trail that leads to Johnny and Frankie.

Jeff Nichols -- a man strong of conviction but weak of character -- is fresh out of the Don Jail, looking for work -- any kind of work -- and a way back into Ann Ryan's good graces. She waited for his return from prison but is quickly running short on patience. An ex-inmate and friend gets Jeff a job at Ted Bracey's used car lot, selling cars for commission only. But it's not enough to keep him and Ann afloat in mid-80s Toronto, and the lure of easy money soon gets Jeff involved in smuggling guns from upstate New York. With that sweet Poughkeepsie cash, now he can keep his promises to Ann; he even buys them a house, but conceals the source of the money. As Jeff gets in deeper and deeper, everyone around him learns how many rules he's willing to bend and just how far he'll go to get on the fast track to riches. That he's a guy who doesn't let lessons from past mistakes get in the way of a good score.

"If you like your crime hard and fast, Kalteis is for you." -- Globe and Mail A surefire plan that will end his marital and money problems in one swoop ... what could go wrong? Lenny Ovitz has plenty of secrets, and his wife, Paulina, has become a liability. His life would be so much better without her in it. It's the mid-'60s in Toronto, and Lenny works for a ruthless gangster whose travel agency is a front for a collections racket in the Kensington Market area. Lenny's days are spent with his partner, Gabe, terrorizing the locals into paying protection on their shops and their lives. On the side, Lenny and Gabe co-own a tenement block that they bought with dirty money borrowed from shady individuals. Overextended, Lenny plans to pay them back with more borrowed money from other loans and by re-mortgaging his house, without the knowledge of his wife. Tired of his lies and scheming, Paulina demands a divorce. Lenny is certain she's going to take him for everything, leaving him unable to pay the debt on the tenement block. And that's likely to get him pitched off one of his own rooftops. Lenny would rather get than be gotten, so he comes up with a surefire way to end both his marital and money problems -- Paulina's going to have to get whacked.

A page-turning crime tale based on a true story Notorious outlaws Alvin Karpis and Fred Barker meet the old-fashioned way: serving time in Kansas State Prison. After their release in 1931, the two reconnect and form the infamous Barker-Karpis Gang and begin a spree of robberies that leave a wake of terror in their path, including two dead cops. Now hunted in several states, the gang settles into hiding in St. Paul, Minnesota, where they thrive under the protection of a crooked police chief, who happily turns a blind eye to their activities -- so long as they commit crimes outside of his jurisdiction. With increased security at banks, the Barker-Karpis Gang switches to kidnapping, catching the attention of J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI and landing them at the top of the most-wanted list. How long can these wily men evade capture? Who can they trust? Where will they run when the entire country is hunting them, dead or alive?

"Kalteis is a sharp observer who delivers history with a wallop and brings the past back to bloody life." -- Emily Schultz, author of Sleeping with Friends and The Blondes "Kalteis's punchy, hard-boiled prose vividly captures the brutality behind the glitz of the Jazz Age." -- firstCLUE For readers of Elmore Leonard comes a riveting, fast-paced ride through 1920s Prohibition-era Chicago, the epicenter of crime, corruption, and commerce Trouble has a way of following Huckabee Waller like a shadow. Involved in the death of a gangster in his hometown of New Orleans, Huckabee hops a northbound freight and heads for the promise of Chicago. Tough times force him to make his way bare-knuckle fighting and running booze, and before long he finds himself entangled in the escalating tension between notorious rival gangs and the city's deadly taxis wars. Caught up in vice and violence, Huckabee lands in the crosshairs of Al Capone. The smart thing to do would be to get out of Chicago -- fast -- that is if the life he wants to leave behind doesn't kill him first.

Part coming-of-age story and part family drama, set against the harsh backdrop of World War II Ukraine and Germany. Where does one seek refuge when all the world's gone mad? The last winter of the war comes as young Jakob Fritsch's German village in Ukraine is torched by Russian troops. Separated from his mother and younger brother, he's shoved onto a train's stock car. Rumors float among them; they're being taken to a work camp over the Urals, where they will be worked to death. As morning dawns, a lone Stuka dives from the sky, dropping its bomb on the locomotive, and the stock cars are blown from the tracks, tipped, and smashed. Through splintered boards, Jakob and others scramble out, running for the surrounding woods as the Russian guards begin shooting them down. Jakob escapes into the endless pines, running until he's exhausted. Some time later, he chances upon other survivors from the train: his sick and aging schoolmaster who's a Nazi supporter at heart and the disagreeable postmaster, a man Jakob can't stand and doesn't trust. Always on the lookout for deserters, partisans, and Russian soldiers, the three make their way across war-torn Ukraine, begging for food and shelter where they can. A tragic turn of events forces Jakob to journey on alone. Ever watchful, he must chance crossing the desolate countryside of Poland en route to Berlin, the only place he can go -- the land of his forefathers, the heart of Germany, which is being bombed to its knees and torn apart from all sides.