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Published May 2013
336 pages
Genre: Thrillers
Publication Information
Conway Sax is a man seeking redemption. A man with a deeply checkered past currently paying for his sins by helping Gus Biletnikov stay sober. Wise-ass Gus, son of a wealthy investment banker, drives Conway nuts. But he also reminds him of his own estranged son, and so Conway finds himself deeply invested in his wellbeing.
When a brutal triple-murder takes place in Gus's halfway house, Conway suspects Gus was the intended victim, and resolves to find the killer in his usual full-tilt, no-holds-barred fashion. The list of suspects soon includes the longtime organized-crime warlord of Springfield, Massachusetts; Gus's own father, who's a bundle of insecurity despite his fortune; the father's second wife, a stunning beauty webbed in ugly motives; and a Houston con man who'll swipe your gold fillings but crack you up while he does so. But the case is no laughing matter to Conway when somebody close to him is murdered. To find the killer and prevent yet more senseless death, he needs help from both an ambitious Brazilian-American state cop, and an unlikely criminal source. Along the way, Conway's personal responsibilities clash with his vow to help fellow alcoholics, forcing him to make his toughest decision yet in this unforgettable page-turner reminiscent of Robert B. Parker and Dennis Lehane.
"Starred Review. Outstanding… Ulfelder has constructed the persona of his hard-edged but sympathetic lead carefully enough to ensure a long series run." – Publishers Weekly
"Ulfelder hits hard and fast, sometimes below the belt, with his fantastic third Conway Sax novel. Sax is an original: flawed, self-aware and undisciplined. He leads the reader on a merry chase through a maze of suspects until he narrows it down to the real perpetrator." – RT BOOK Reviews
"As dark, soulful and violent as the title would suggest. There's a real lullaby and some real shotguns." - Kirkus
"Gritty, intense, completely original. Ulfelder nails the voice, nails the story, and pushes Conway Sax, his unforgettable main character, beyond his breaking point. Shotgun Lullaby is more than just a page-turner of a mystery - it's a masterful study of a good guy gone bad, and his heart-breaking struggle to be good again." - Hank Phillippi Ryan Agatha, Anthony & Macavity winning author of The Other Woman
"Steve Ulfelder is one of the most street-smart authors writing crime fiction today. Shotgun Lullaby is a thrill ride that hits the gas hard on page one and races all the way to a heart-pounding finish." – Paul Doiron, author of Bad Little Falls
"Shotgun Lullaby is exactly as tough, and exactly as full of heart, as the title suggests. Steve Ulfelder is a major talent." – Timothy Hallinan, author of The Fear Artist
This information about Shotgun Lullaby 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.
Steve Ulfelder, author of the Conway Sax mysteries, is an amateur race driver and co-owner of Flatout Motorsports, a Massachusetts company that builds race cars. He was a business and technology journalist for 20 years. His first novel, Purgatory Chasm, was an Edgar Award Finalist.
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