Little Underworld: A Novel [Paperback]

Chinatownmeets the Coen brothers in 1930s Omaha in this atmospheric noir by a native Nebraskan.

Omaha, 1930. PI Jim Beelys life wasnt a peach to begin with. And now theres a dead guy in his backseat. The last thing he needs to deal with is a copmuch less the notoriously crooked Frank Tvrdik. But where a square-dealing lawman would see homicide, Frank spots opportunity. He can make the body disappear. All Jim needs to do is double-cross a politician bent on shuttering Omahas speakeasies, some of the few places to make an illegal, honest living in a city thats a racket.

After the double-cross goes haywire, Jim gets his bell rung in a bizarre attack. A man on his payroll turns up dead. And Jim and Frank form an unlikely alliance, digging for the reality behind patently false headlines. They comb the citys bordellos, gin joints, and gambling houses. They search for answers in the fun-house mirror of Omaha politics. All the while, the death toll mounts, outmatched only by the absurdity of it all.

As the clock runs down, Jim and Frank must make a choice that cant be unmade. One that leaves them asking what it means to be good. And how the hell you go on living when youre not. Laying bare historical myth and political corruption, Chris Harding ThorntonsLittle Underworldis a searing, darkly funny novel and a ferocious romp through a world not so distant from our own.

Nebraska-bornChris Harding Thorntonholds an MFA from University of Washington and a PhD from University of Nebraska. Her first novel,Pickard County Atlas(MCD/FSG), was chosen by author Tana French (In the Woods,The Searcher) as a PBS Masterpiece Best Mystery of 2021. The book was also featured in theWall Street Journal,The NewYorker,The New York Times, and elsewhere. It was released in paperback (Picador) and appeared in German translation (Polar Verlag) in 2022. Her second novel,Little Underworll³…