Official Author Web site
Deadline ManHe's a man whose life is so intertwined with his job that we know him only as "the columnist." He writes for a Seattle newspaper and isn't afraid to stir up trouble and keeps his life — including his multiple lovers and his past — in safe compartments. It's all violently upended when he goes out on what seems the most mundane of assignments, looking into a staid company that " never makes news."
But from the moment one of his sources takes a dive off a downtown skyscraper, the columnist is plunged into a harrowing maze of murder, intrigue and secrets powerful forces intend to keep hidden at all costs.
Winner: Best Mystery of 2010, Arizona Book Publishing Association.
Critical acclaim:
Talton combines a moving paean to the free press with a chillingly plausible thriller built around black ops...A knockout novel — Booklist starred review
Well-rounded characters and a lightning-paced plot raise this well above the average global conspiracy story — Publishers Weekly
Deadline Man takes off from the first chapter and never lets up. This is a great read! — Michael Connelly.
Purchase this book now
The Cincinnati Casebooks
The Pain Nurse: A doctor’s brutal murder shakes a big-city hospital and someone stalks nurse Cheryl Beth Wilson. But to the police, she’s a potential suspect. One patient, a detective, knows the chilling truth: this killer will strike again and the clock is running.
Talton, author of the award-winning David Mapstone series, demonstrates his versatility...A strong series launch. — Library Journal starred review
The David Mapstone Mysteries:
Concrete Desert: Meet David Mapstone -- unemployed history professor forced to come home to Phoenix, where his only job prospect is working for his old friend in the Sheriff's Office. Using the historian's tools along with his .357 magnum Colt Python, Mapstone adapts. The thinking person's modern noir hero. Purchase.
Cactus Heart: The sequel to Concrete Desert traces David Mapstone's uneasy re-entry into law enforcement and his tentative relationship with Deputy Lindsey Adams. All is unended by the new evidence in a notorious Phoenix kidnapping from the 1940s, a very contemporary killer on the loose, and a mysterious and very beguiling new woman in Mapstone's life. Purchase.
Camelback Falls: When Sheriff Peralta is nearly assassinated, David and Lindsey are racing the clock to find the killer and the mysterious meaning of the sheriff's last words. The trail takes David back 20 years to his days as a young deputy. Purchase. (Look for the paperback this spring).
Dry Heat: The mean streets of Phoenix have never been more dangerous, with Lindsey on the run from the Russian mafia and David struggling to solve the 40-year-old murder of an FBI agent -- whose badge turns up on a dead homeless man. Winner of Arizona Highways' 2005 Best Fiction award. Purchase.
Arizona Dreams: When a skeleton is found in the desert, it's not an ordinary Phoenix body dump. Historian-turned-deputy Mapstone is soon caught up in a quintessential Arizona crime -- with lethal stakes. Meanwhile, Lindsey has her own secret turn up. "Talton crisply evokes Phoenix's New West ambience and keeps readers guessing with unexpected plot twists," writes Publishers Weekly. Purchase.
And enjoy Jon's short story in Phoenix Noir, from Akashic Books.
