Jim Thompson
Thompson also co-wrote two screenplays (for the Stanley Kubrick films The Killing and Paths of Glory). Several of his novels have been filmed by American and French directors, resulting in classic noir including The Killer Inside Me (1952), After Dark My Sweet (1955), and The Grifters (1963).
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By the Author
Pop. 1280
Nick Corey is a terrible sheriff on purpose. He doesn't solve problems, enforce rules or arrest criminals. He knows that nobody in tiny Potts County…
Wild Town
In trouble more often than not, guilty of assault, manslaughter, and honorably discharged from the military by the skin of his teeth, David "Bugs" McKenna…
Nothing More than Murder
Joe Wilmot can't stand his wife Elizabeth. But he sure loves her movie theater. It's a modest establishment in a beat-down town--but Joe has the…
The Criminal
Everyone in Kenton Hills knows that short-tempered, tongue-tied Bob Talbert wasn't the one responsible for the brutal crime that ended Josie Eddleman's life. Nevermind that…
Recoil
Patrick Cosgrove used to think he'd do anything not to be a prisoner of Sandstone State Reformatory. Fifteen years on the inside for a victimless…
The Transgressors
Deputy sheriff Tom Lord knows by now that far-west Texas is the place he'll always call home. He's spent too much time in the region's…
South Of Heaven
Orphaned by a tragic accident at sixteen, Tommy Burwell's been scraping out a meager existence working dead-end jobs for years. When he and fellow nomad…
The Golden Gizmo
"Gizmo" is the GI term for the unidentifiable -- and that's the way that Toddy Kent has begun to think of the reasons behind the…
Cropper's Cabin
Tommy Carver may be every inch the angry, rebellious young man his teachers and parents accuse him of being. But sometimes, there are reasons for…
The Alcoholics
Dr. Peter S. Murphy needs fifteen thousand dollars by the end of the day, or the city of Los Angeles can say goodbye to the…
Texas by the Tail
To everyone he's every played dice with, Mitch Corley seems like the luckiest guy around. But in truth, Corley's fast hands are the only gift…
Now and on Earth
San Diego in the years before World War II. James Dillon is barely scraping by working a menial job in manufacturing, trying to raise a…
Savage Night
Jake Winroy had no looks, no education, and little else before he'd worked his way to the top of a million-dollar-a-month horse-betting ring. But when…
Bad Boy
From the beginning, Jim Thompson knew he was going to catch hell no matter what he did. And during a childhood spent at the mercy…
The Rip-Off
Britton Rainstar never knew he could love a woman as deeply as he does Manuela Aloe and be so terrified of her at the same…
A Hell of a Woman
Frank "Dolly" Dillon has a job he hates, working sales and collections for Pay-E-Zee Stores, a wife named Joyce he can't stand, and an account…
Heed the Thunder
In the rural town of Verdon, Nebraska, in the early days of the 20th century, you can't go ten feet without running into one of…
Roughneck
By the time Jim Thompson was sixteen years old, he had been a newspaper boy, a burlesque show hawker, a plumber's helper, a comedian in…
Pop. 1280
Nick Corey is a terrible sheriff on purpose. He doesn't solve problems, enforce rules or arrest criminals. He knows that nobody in tiny Potts County…
Wild Town
In trouble more often than not, guilty of assault, manslaughter, and honorably discharged from the military by the skin of his teeth, David "Bugs" McKenna…
The Getaway
Doc McCoy is the most skilled criminal alive. But when for the first time in Doc's long criminal career, his shot doesn't hit the mark,…
The Kill-Off
Luane Devore's days are numbered. All her neighbors in the declining seaside resort town of Manduwoc want her dead. Some, like her young husband Ralph…
Nothing More than Murder
Joe Wilmot can't stand his wife Elizabeth. But he sure loves her movie theater. It's a modest establishment in a beat-down town--but Joe has the…
A Swell-Looking Babe
It was supposed to be only a temporary job -- something to pay the bills until Dusty could get his feet back on the ground…
The Killer Inside Me
In The Killer Inside Me, America's "Dimestore Dostoevsky" Jim Thompson goes where few novelists have dared to go, giving us a pitch-black glimpse into the…
The Grifters
Jim Thompson's classic The Grifters is one of the best novels ever written about the art of the con, an ingeniously crafted story of deception and…
The Nothing Man
War changed Clinton Brown. Permanently disfigured by a tragic military accident, he's struggling to find satisfaction from life as a rewrite man for Pacific City's…
After Dark, My Sweet
A classic crime novel about a kidnapping scheme gone wrong from Jim Thompson's, America's "Dimestore Dostoevsky." William "Kid" Collins was once a respected boxer. Now he's a…