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Escucha y lee

Ken Bruen

“Hip, violent and funny vignettes of the mean streets of southeast London tie together this rowdy set of short novels” from the Irish crime writer (Publishers Weekly).

At sixty-two, Chief Inspector Roberts is nearly too old to be a cop, but he makes up for his age with a ferocity that the younger detectives cannot match. After four decades on the force, he has a daughter who hates him, a wife who cheats, and a bank account that grows emptier every year. But on London’s darker streets, Roberts is a force to be reckoned with. With his partner, the gleefully brutal Detective Sergeant Brant, Roberts looks for every policeman’s dream: the White Arrest, a high-profile success that makes up for all their past failures. 

In A White Arrest, their target is a bat-wielding lunatic who knocks off drug dealers. In Taming the Alien, they hunt a mysterious hit man who earned his nickname by carrying out a hit while watching Ridley Scott’s sci-fi classic. And in The McDead, Roberts and Brant set their sights on a cunning kingpin ruling London’s southeast side. Gripping and gritty, Ken Bruen’s White Trilogy is an unforgettable noir portrait of London’s seedy underworld.

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The White Trilogy

The White Trilogy: A White Arrest, Taming the Alien, and The McDead

A pair of rough cops hunts for a career-making arrest in this first novel of the “hip, violent and funny” trilogy set in Southeast London (Publishers Weekly).

After four decades at the precinct, and close to forcible retirement, all London’s Chief Inspector Roberts has to show for it is a hateful daughter, a faithless wife, and a dwindling bank account. With his partner, the bullying Irish Detective Sergeant Brant, Roberts is still looking for every cop’s badge of honor: the White Arrest—that career-changing bust that could make them chat show heroes. Or least wipe their dirty slates clean. And they have a lot to work with right now …

A racist Death Wish–inspired street gang is lynching drug dealers from Brixton lampposts. And in the quiet suburb of Balham, a bat-wielding lunatic has been bashing in the skulls of a schoolboys’ cricket team. With any luck Roberts and Brant will make the front page—by any means necessary.

With two unforgettable—and arguably irredeemable—tough London cops, award-winning author Ken Bruen again proves he’s “become the crime novelist to read” (George Pelecanos).

A White Arrest

Cops Roberts and Brant come back swinging in book two of the “hip, violent and funny” crime novel trilogy set on “the mean streets of southeast London” (Publishers Weekly).

South London’s Chief Inspector Roberts and his partner, the reckless and thuggish Irish Detective Sergeant Brant, are at odds with who has it worse: Roberts, with a mortgage in Dulwich, a pregnant daughter in boarding school, and a dire medical diagnosis; or Brant, relegated to desk duty after getting knifed in the back, and living to see his complete Ed McBain collection destroyed by a psycho with a baseball bat. That particular nut job has been dubbed the Alien, a hit man so named for carrying out a skull-smashing job while watching Ridley Scott’s sci-fi classic, and hanging around in the spatter to finish the film.

But this time the carnage isn’t confined to southeast London. As Brant heads to New York by way of Dublin to catch the couple who knifed him and the Alien goes to San Francisco to pay a surprise visit to his former girlfriend, Bruen’s broad, brutal canvas once again shows why he’s been hailed as one of “the most original and innovative noir voices of the last two decades” (Los Angeles Times Book Review).

Taming the Alien

Chief Inspector Roberts combs London for the Irish gangster who killed his brother in “the most striking and original crime series of the decade” (British GQ).

With his personal life all but flushed down some deep dark hole, Chief Inspector Roberts is waiting for the next punch to the heart. Working with his Irish partner, Detective Sergeant Brant, in a London precinct so dangerous even the pit bulls travel in pairs, Roberts is prepared for almost anything—just not the murder of his sad and wasted transient brother, Tony.

The thug responsible for it is an ex-con named Logan who’s established himself as the south side’s smartest: a master of money laundering, quick hits, and outrunning the cops. His only weakness is his temper—and it’s about to bring his sordid empire tumbling down. Roberts is going to see to that …

“Fans of British procedurals and noir novels will savour every speck of grit in this unrelenting crime novel. ” —Booklist