The Million-Dollar Tattoo - Hardcover

Emerson, Earl

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0345400666 ISBN 13: 9780345400666

Publisher: Ballantine Books, 1996

Synopsis

It's the dead of night, and P.I. Thomas Black is dead asleep. What better time for a panicked phone call from a friend?
The friend is Elmer Slezak, better known as Snake, a fellow gumshoe whose life has long since slipped into a dark mire of wine, women, and weirdness. Now, he's begging Black to take on a case that's one for The X-Files. There's a beautiful, exotic-looking woman dead in Snake's bed. He's not sure how she died, but he's certain about where she came from--outer space.
Even a murder rap and the specter of prison can't make Snake change his story. Thomas Black's job? To rescue the increasingly paranoid Snake and discover if indeed "the truth is out there."
What Black finds--after run-ins with a burly biker chick, a loveless homicide cop, a mysterious homeless man who may have witnessed a murder, and a corporation that's courting Black with big bucks--will prove to be more "out there" than even he could ever imagine. . . .
Hot on the heels of The Portland Laugher and The Vanishing Smile, Earl Emerson brings back Seattle's sassiest, savviest shamus, Thomas Black. With his trademark wit, storytelling verve, and muscular prose, Emerson once again confirms that he is "carving out his own special niche among a new generation of private-eye writers" (The Washington Post). The Million-Dollar Tattoo is an indelible tale of intrigue that's guaranteed to astonish and delight.

About this title

From the Publisher

Earl Emerson's acclaimed series about Seattle private investigator Thomas Black is much beloved by readers and critics. And with justification. (These novels, running the gamut from THE RAINY CITY to the just-issued CATFISH CAF, are among my all-time favorite detective tales, and I'm not just saying that because I'm Earl's editor.) But I don't know any other crime novelist who amasses such fervent praise from his peers. It would be a crime to call Earl Emerson merely a "writer's writer." But there sure are a lot of talented authors who revere him. To wit . . .

Aaron Elkins: "In every book he tries something new, and he always comes up a winner. In the best tradition of American crime fiction, Emerson is a master of witty dialogue; clever, complex plotting; and lucid, meaty prose."

Robert Crais: "Earl Emerson writes with the richness and grace of a poet, evincing a quality of phrase and nuance that elevates the genre."

Ann Rule: "Earl Emerson and Thomas Black only get better and better! Earl Emerson has taken his place in the rarefied air of the best of the best!"

'Nuff said.

--Joe Blades, Associate Publisher

From the Back Cover

"EARL EMERSON'S BEST YET, witty and fast-moving, with rich, well-drawn characters and a twisting, lively plot. . . . [His] hard-boiled riff is still state-of-the-art."
--The Cleveland Plain Dealer

"An intelligent, complex, often riotous tale of totally modern murder."
--St. Petersburg Times

About this edition

• Publisher: Ballantine Books
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0345400666
• ISBN 13: 9780345400666
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 259