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A Novel
by Jess Walter
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Beautiful Ruins: a riveting story of witness protection, petty thievery, local politics, and murder—set against the turbulent backdrop of the 1980 presidential election.
It's the fall of 1980, the last week before the presidential election that pits the downtrodden Jimmy Carter against the suspiciously sunny Ronald Reagan. In a seedy suburban house in Spokane, a small-time crook formerly from New York, Vince Camden, pockets his weekly allotment of stolen credit cards and heads off to his witness-protection job at a donut shop. At the shop he takes a shine to a regular named Kelly, who works for a local politician. Somehow he finds himself and the politician in a parking lot at three in the morning, giving the slip to a couple of menacing thugs. And then he crosses the path of a young detective—and discovers his credit-scam partner, lying dead in his passport-photo office with a Cheerio-size bullet-hole in his head. No one writing crime novels today tells a story or sketches a character with more freshness or élan than Jess Walter. Citizen Vince is his funniest and grittiest book yet.
What are you reading this week? And what did you think of last week’s books? (5/28/2026)
...rd, and a saxophone and takes off on a rather bizarre roadtrip. In his now well-known satirical humor Everett shows us how unpredictable life can be. Citizen Vince by Jess Walter. Vince Camden is in Spokane as part of the witness protection program that came from his testimony in a NYC criminal trial. Vince was flipped for run...
-Anne_Glasgow
"Admirably unpredictable ... a story full of wonderful small surprises. Dispassionate and compassionate by turns, and always engrossing. Walter's best by far." ―Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"This tale of unlikely redemption works because of Walter's virtuoso command of character and dialogue—along with a wicked second-act twist... with its Capara-like spirit, it serves as a surprisingly satisfying antidote to the avalanche of cynical chatter emanating from this year's political campaigns and commentators." ―Booklist
"What makes Walter's third novel so enjoyable is Vince, a flawed but sympathetic character trying to find redemption." ―Library Journal
"Citizen Vince is the book of 2005 for me. I flat-out adore it. The dialogue is marvelous, and the characters-man, they sing. It's a stunning, moving piece of work." ―Ken Bruen, author of The Magdalene Martyrs
"It's been a long time since I've read a book as compulsively, indeed greedily, as I read Citizen Vince. Here are characters who seem to live of their own volition, who talk out of a terrible inner need to make themselves known and understood, who reveal not just themselves but the yearning heart of our great flawed democracy." ―Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize winning author of Empire Falls
This information about Citizen Vince was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Jess Walter is the author of eight novels, including the bestsellers So Far Gone, The Cold Millions, and Beautiful Ruins, the National Book Award Finalist The Zero, and Citizen Vince, winner of the Edgar Award for best novel. His short fiction, collected in The Angel of Rome and We Live in Water, has won the O. Henry Prize, the Pushcart Prize and appeared three times in Best American Short Stories. As a reporter, he was a finalist for the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of Ruby Ridge. He lives in his hometown of Spokane, Washington.
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