All the sinners bleed

Cosby follows Razorblade Tears (2021) with a tale that begins in tragedy in a Virginia town when a former student guns down a popular schoolteacher and then is shot to death by sheriff's deputies. The sheriff, former FBI agent Titus Crown, faces a firestorm of publicity and a community demanding answers. It's a racially charged situation. The victim was Black, the deputies are white, but Crown, the community's first Black sheriff, does his damnedest to put race aside and concentrate on the central issue. Why did this young man kill his teacher? What he discovers in his search for the truth is downright chilling, and then there are his own secrets to deal with. Again Cosby's literary skills are exceptional. His characters feel so real, his dialogue is pitch-perfect, and the story, which delves into the town's grim past, a local church, and a far-right-wing group's plan for celebrating the Confederacy, is of such moral complexity it wholly commands the reader's close attention. This is a crime novel to savor and ponder.HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Cosby's stature and audience grows exponentially with each book, and his latest is as topical as crime fiction gets.

In this superb thriller from Anthony Award winner Cosby (Razorblade Tears), Titus Crown, the first Black sheriff of Charon County, Va., is investigating a high school shooting that leaves a history teacher and his killer dead. Before long, Titus uncovers evidence that both men participated in the ritualistic killings of seven Black children who had disappeared from the area over the past several years. Recovered video of the children's murders reveals the involvement of a third party and presumed ringleader: a mysterious figure hidden behind a wolf mask. As Titus and his deputies set out to find the third man, the investigation narrows onto both a local church run by a white racist and on one of the county's most powerful families, and more murders stack up. The hard-edged storytelling is supplemented by richly developed characters, especially Titus and his family, and Cosby elegantly layers his narrative over Virginia's racial history, giving the proceedings uncommon emotional depth. This is easily the author's strongest work to date. Agent: Josh Getzler, HG Literary. (June)

When he left the FBI under a cloud, Titus Crown returned home to Charon, VA, where he was elected the first Black sheriff in the town's history. It begins to feel like less of an honor when there's a report of an active shooter at the high school. When everything is over, there are two dead men: a beloved teacher, Jeff Steadman, and the shooter, Latrell Macdonald. Before he died, Latrell's comments were strange. Crown follows up, searching cell phones and computers, where videos of young Black people being sexually abused and killed are a sickening sight he'll never forget. But Steadman and Latrell were only two out of three figures on those clips. Now Crown's small team must find the third killer from the videos, who wore a wolf mask, while also trying to juggle the community's uneasiness, more murders, and the upcoming march by white men who want to keep their Confederate statue in town. First, he has to find the religious, bigoted killer of Black children who is hiding in plain sight in Charon. VERDICT Cosby, the multi-award-winning author of Blacktop Wasteland and Razorblade Tears, has a unique, powerful voice for social justice and racism. His compelling writing will have readers rooting for his latest unforgettable, flawed hero.--Lesa Holstine

A gripping cat-and-mouse game between a twisted White religious killer and the first Black sheriff of a small Virginia community. Welcome to Charon County, a "teardrop-shaped peninsula" on the Chesapeake Bay with a cursed name and a blood-soaked history, where "equality's surest foothold was found on the autopsy table." The latest tragedy is a school shooting, terrible enough on its own but only the beginning of the fresh hell descending on Charon: Both the shooter and the lone victim are connected to a string of unthinkable abuses targeting Black children. And there is a mysterious killer still at large, his gruesome crimes steeped in Scripture and religious iconography. Recently elected Sheriff Titus Crown--organized, decisive, and conflicted between justice and vengeance--is on the case, using his FBI training to profile a madman. As in any good noir, everyone is an enemy and a suspect; Titus is hounded by bigots of all stripes: biased officers, casually racist locals, and venom-spitting White supremacists. Titus is basically the only three-dimensional character, though this isn't a major hindrance. The novel crackles along with each new clue and obstacle; scenes and dozens of characters are sketched with efficiency. The diffuse subjects of Titus' wrath are treated solemnly if unsubtly--institutional Christianity in particular takes it in the teeth. Tight pacing mostly keeps the contrivances at bay, though there may be the occasional eye roll at Titus' pithy True Detective--style platitudes about how broken the world is. Nevertheless, readers will cheer at Titus' brutal screeds against those who push him past the point of patience. "Evil is rarely complicated," Titus explains. "It's just fucking bold." Cosby's previous works, Blacktop Wasteland (2020) and Razorblade Tears (2021), have both been optioned for film adaptations, and his latest seems destined for the same treatment. Another provocative and page-turning entry in the Southern noir genre. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

*Starred Review* Cosby follows Razorblade Tears (2021) with a tale that begins in tragedy in a Virginia town when a former student guns down a popular schoolteacher and then is shot to death by sheriff's deputies. The sheriff, former FBI agent Titus Crown, faces a firestorm of publicity and a community demanding answers. It's a racially charged situation. The victim was Black, the deputies are white, but Crown, the community's first Black sheriff, does his damnedest to put race aside and concentrate on the central issue. Why did this young man kill his teacher? What he discovers in his search for the truth is downright chilling, and then there are his own secrets to deal with. Again Cosby's literary skills are exceptional. His characters feel so real, his dialogue is pitch-perfect, and the story, which delves into the town's grim past, a local church, and a far-right-wing group's plan for celebrating the Confederacy, is of such moral complexity it wholly commands the reader's close attention. This is a crime novel to savor and ponder.HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Cosby's stature and audience grows exponentially with each book, and his latest is as topical as crime fiction gets. Copyright 2023 Booklist Reviews.

Disgusted by the racist police force he encounters when he returns to his small Southern hometown, FBI agent Titus Crown tosses his name in the ring and becomes the town's first Black sheriff. A year later, after his deputies shoot a young Black man to death, he investigates what happened and finds himself on the trail of a serial killer. From the author of the New York Times best-selling Razorblade Tears.

When he left the FBI under a cloud, Titus Crown returned home to Charon, VA, where he was elected the first Black sheriff in the town's history. It begins to feel like less of an honor when there's a report of an active shooter at the high school. When everything is over, there are two dead men: a beloved teacher, Jeff Steadman, and the shooter, Latrell Macdonald. Before he died, Latrell's comments were strange. Crown follows up, searching cell phones and computers, where videos of young Black people being sexually abused and killed are a sickening sight he'll never forget. But Steadman and Latrell were only two out of three figures on those clips. Now Crown's small team must find the third killer from the videos, who wore a wolf mask, while also trying to juggle the community's uneasiness, more murders, and the upcoming march by white men who want to keep their Confederate statue in town. First, he has to find the religious, bigoted killer of Black children who is hiding in plain sight in Charon. VERDICT Cosby, the multi-award-winning author of Blacktop Wasteland and Razorblade Tears, has a unique, powerful voice for social justice and racism. His compelling writing will have readers rooting for his latest unforgettable, flawed hero.—Lesa Holstine

In this superb thriller from Anthony Award winner Cosby (Razorblade Tears), Titus Crown, the first Black sheriff of Charon County, Va., is investigating a high school shooting that leaves a history teacher and his killer dead. Before long, Titus uncovers evidence that both men participated in the ritualistic killings of seven Black children who had disappeared from the area over the past several years. Recovered video of the children's murders reveals the involvement of a third party and presumed ringleader: a mysterious figure hidden behind a wolf mask. As Titus and his deputies set out to find the third man, the investigation narrows onto both a local church run by a white racist and on one of the county's most powerful families, and more murders stack up. The hard-edged storytelling is supplemented by richly developed characters, especially Titus and his family, and Cosby elegantly layers his narrative over Virginia's racial history, giving the proceedings uncommon emotional depth. This is easily the author's strongest work to date. Agent: Josh Getzler, HG Literary. (June)