Blacktop Wasteland
Ratings35
Average rating4.4
15
Ratings35
Average rating4.4
Los Angeles Times Book Prize Winner • New York Times Notable Book • NPR’s Best Books of the Year • BookPage’s #1 Mystery and Suspense of the Year • Sun Sentinel’s #1 Best Mystery of the Year
“I loved Blacktop Wasteland...[A] fast-paced, bareknuckle thriller.” -Stephen King
“A roaring, full-throttle thriller, crackling with tension and charm.” -The New York Times Book Review
"One of the year's strongest novels." -Sun Sentinel
A husband, a father, a son, a business owner...And the best getaway driver east of the Mississippi.
Beauregard “Bug” Montage is an honest mechanic, a loving husband, and a hard-working dad. Bug knows there’s no future in the man he used to be: known from the hills of North Carolina to the beaches of Florida as the best wheelman on the East Coast.
He thought he'd left all that behind him, but as his carefully built new life begins to crumble, he finds himself drawn inexorably back into a world of blood and bullets. When a smooth-talking former associate comes calling with a can't-miss jewelry store heist, Bug feels he has no choice but to get back in the driver's seat. And Bug is at his best where the scent of gasoline mixes with the smell of fear.
Haunted by the ghost of who he used to be and the father who disappeared when he needed him most, Bug must find a way to navigate this blacktop wasteland...or die trying.
Like Ocean’s Eleven meets Drive, with a Southern noir twist, S. A. Cosby’s Blacktop Wasteland is a searing, operatic story of a man pushed to his limits by poverty, race, and his own former life of crime.
Reviews with the most likes.
It's been a long time since I've read a book this savage, this pained and frankly this compelling. It was perfection. Gritty southern noir. I loved every word of it. Those of us who know Virginia will revel in the familiar locales. Those of us who love a good crime novel will be thrilled with the story and the perfect plotting. 10 out of 10. Highly recommend.
read for the tarot readathon 2023: ace of cups
s.a. cosby literally has the perfect balance of wellcrafted writting, fleshed out characters, commentary, and high action/gore. he eats down
Book had me on the edge of my seat. I couldn't put it down. Great cast of characters.
This originally appeared at The Irresponsible Reader.
—
MEET MEAUREGARD MONTAGE
The secret ain't about the motor. That's part of i it, yeah, but that ain't the main thing. The real thing, the thing most people don't want to talk about, is how you drive. If you drive like you scared, you gonna lose. If you drive like you don't want to have to rebuild the whole engine, you gonna lose. You gotta drive like don't nothing else matter except getting to that line. Drive like you fucking stole it.
Beauregard heard his Daddy's voice every time he drove the Duster.
Beauregard thought about the clichéd scene in every crime movie where the main character who has gotten out of the “Life” buries his weapons under a hundred pounds of concrete only to have to dig them up when his enemies come knocking at his door.
He understood the appeal of the symbolism for filmmakers. It was just unrealistic. You were never out of the Life completely. You were always looking over your shoulder. You always kept a gun within reach, not buried under cement in your basement. Having a gun nearby was the only way you could pretend to relax.
* Beauregard tends to think of himself as “Bug” when he's thinking of the reckless, thrill-seeking lawbreaker side of him, and “Beauregard” when he's living the way he should. I'm following that.
—and
love
Blues Brothers
Bourne Identity
Baby Driver
Matrix
* I realize people who aren't red-blooded American males frequently love them, too, I'm not arguing against that. It just seems more definitional of RBAM.
everyone
THAT
Men like your Daddy, like me, like you used to be, we don't die in hospital beds. Ant wasn't perfect. He loved driving, drinking, and women, in that order. He lived life at 100 miles per hour. Men like that, well, they go out on their own terms, usually with a bang.
that
BLACKTOP WASTELAND
She Rides Shotgun
Blacktop Wasteland
Blacktop Wasteland
Blacktop Wasteland
