Now this was a nice change. I was just starting to get burnt on the clever protagonist says witty things to get out of a jam and gets away with the dame and the loot type stories. No shiny side to this one. Almost need to take a shower after reading it. Not a single character is entirely sympathetic, you just pick your favorite scumbag and hope they come out on top of the scumbag dog pile. I wasn't rooting for any particular low-life and I was pleasantly surprised by the result. Only one flaw--

When I picked this book I had no idea of what I was in for. Bust was a book that made me think simultaneously of Fargo and Bonfire of the Vanities. And I enjoyed every minute of it. I wished I had picked it up earlier. It was that good. Max Fisher is screwing his secretary, Angela. He thinks he's in love with her - or at least he's in love with her ... attributes. The only problem is that bitch of a wife of his will take him for everything he's got if he divorces her. Angela and Max cook up a so...

It is true this one has so many twists and turns you feel washed, scrubbed, and tumble-dried when it’s over. At first it seemed like a clever ploy going down, but toward the middle, end-center it really took off as unique and brilliant with plot execution.I didn’t latch on in the beginning…the writing style of the opening scene was well-arranged and kept me searching, but then it seemed to slow with Angela to things that, while I could keep reading, it just dragged too much. It didn’t help that

Sometimes blurbs blow my mind. And I should know better than to believe them. While this was an okay read it certainly wasn’t “hilarious” or “extremely funny”. It had some nonsensical character actions and some pointless and mindless plot twists. Readable but certainly not something you couldn’t miss.

Meet Max & Angela--the George & Gracie of crime. They are two of the most unlikable characters you will ever meet in the pulp world of crime novels. They are greedy, immoral, psychotic & above all, stupid with a capital "S". He is a corrupt businessman who is always looking for a con while she is his smokin' hot, herpes carrying secretary who is banging him for his money--the one who talks Max into hiring her serial killing boyfriend to knock off Max's wife for the insurance money. Little does M...

I find myself agreeing with other reviewers: every character in the book is dispicable. I wouldn't think this would bother me given my number one pet peeve with most commercial fiction: the flawless protagonist. So I don't know...I guess I like my bad guys to be a little more badass. The authors might've reolved the nobody-to-like problem by having a larger role for the police detective.

The story of a man, Max Fischer, having an affair with his conniving secretary. Fischer hires a psycho to kill his wife. The psycho is the secretary's boyfriend. In true noir fashion, everything goes to hell. This was a collaboration involving Ken Bruen and Jason Starr. I have never read any Starr. My feelings about Bruen are overwhelmingly positive. I found this book to be generally worthwhile to read, though I do not think it stands up to any of Bruen's solo material. I will read the two other...

Good book but not sure I enjoyed it. I'm not usually bothered by unlikeable characters but these people were so unredeeming, it spoiled the enjoyment of the book.

I sped through it, so that's obviously a good sign. But a small chunk from the end, I lost interest, as all of the characters just began playing ping pong with the Idiot Ball. I skipped to the end, and was extremely disappointed that (view spoiler)[Max and Angela both come out alive and walking free?! Unless that was part of a "dying dream" or something. Anyway, I won't be taking this one with me when I move. (hide spoiler)]

Like Fargo it just keeps going wrong.

As I was reading (and enjoying this) I found myself thinking about the parallels between hardboiled/noir fiction and the sonnet. Each is a form that implies a subject: sonnets are fourteen lines of metered verse, and they’re usually about love, requited or otherwise. Noir is a short novel with clipped sentences, and it’s usually about murder, sex, and betrayal, There are great exceptions in either case (think of Auden’s sonnets or James Ellroy’s noir) but part of what makes each great is that th...

Max Fischer hires a hitman to kill his wife so he can marry his secretary, the surgically enhanced Angela. Little does he know, the hitman is actually Angela's boyfriend and they're plotting against him. Throw in a blackmailer who catches Max and Angela in a compromising position and you have Bust.Trying to choose someone to root for in this story is like trying to choose which shit sandwich you want to eat. They're all double dealing. You lose count of all the double crosses in this book as it

3.5 stars because I didn't like a single character in the book, but they were all believable & fascinating at the same time. My attention was riveted to the hackneyed plot; man is tired of wife, hires wife killed & then winds up in trouble. Oh, but what trouble! It's fantastic. There weren't many characters, but I felt I'd met each of them at one time or another since they were so well drawn. They actually reminded me of various people I have known. This was written with Jason Starr. It's a good...

Terrible, sleazy people doing awful things to each other and everyone around them.

Riveting crime-thriller brilliantly plotted.Up there with the best of Donald E. Westlake's thrillers.Highest Recommendation!

I mentioned this before,but an irish friend told me that in Belfast(Circa the Troubles)the kids played tag with hatchets.I almost feel guilty that I laughed at the shenanigans in this book,but...I am looking forward to the next installment in this series.

“Basically, he wanted Deirdre gone.” Deliciously reprehensible. Surprisingly light on its feet too; fifty pages of this stuff goes down like a shot. ‘Stuff’ is ‘kill the wife’ and it goes south most entertainingly. “Bust” isn’t anything you haven’t seen before but it won’t half make the commute fly by. This is a soufflé, a romp, populated by cartoonishly horrible people out to do each other over in search of money and sex and whatever else they can get. We have Dillon – a.k.a. “Popeye” – a psych...

Actual rating 4.0 stars.Slick, dirty, crude and dark humour.This book caught me off guard as I expected it to be set somewhere between the 1960s-1980s. However the word "online" was used in the first 20 or so pages and instantly realised I was wrong.Plenty of twists and surprises in this one and you cannot assume any of the characters are going to do what they set out to achieve as there is much plotting afoot.

The best part of Bust is its title and cover. The title is great because of its intentional ambiguity. Does it mean an arrest, a failure, a statue, or a woman’s breasts? The cover is neat because of its five important lessons to be learned by reading Bust: not to pick a psycho as a hit man to kill your wife; not to use Drano for getting rid of a corpse; not to depend on hotel room locks, not to use a curly, blonde wig as a disguise; and not to keep secrets that can kill.Inside the novel is a wor...

“In this business, it’s make or break, and you gotta go for bust.” I was pleased to see the Hard Case Crime sale and jumped at a chance to read all three of these books for under $10.00. I buy books all the time (too many) and don't often read them as soon as I buy them, but in this case I started BUST right away. I suspect my expectations were unreasonable... the idea that Ken Bruen and Jason Starr teamed up to write a three book series received a lot of hype in 2007... and our MostlyFiction.co...