Home > Fiction & Literature > General Fiction > Six Bad Things

Six Bad Things: A Novel

List Price: $13.95

Save 10.0%

You Pay: $12.55

Want this eBook?Our eBook Library Software is required to purchase and download eBooks. Download it here.

Tell a Friend

Overview

Hank Thompson is living off the map in Mexico with a bagful of cash that the Russian mafia wants back and many, many secrets. So when a Russian backpacker shows up in town asking questions, Hank tries to play it cool. But he knows the jig is up when the backpacker mentions the money . . . and the family Hank left behind. Suddenly Hank's in a desperate race to get to his parents in California before anyone can harm them. Along the way he'll face Federales and Border Patrol, mafiosi and vigilantes, extortionists and drug dealers, and a couple of psychotic surf bums with an ax to grind. From the golden beaches of the Yucatán to the seedy strip clubs of Vegas, Charlie Huston opens a door to the squalid underworld of crime and corruption-and invites the reader to live it in the extreme. From the Trade Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

More than fulfilling the promise of Huston's 2004 debut, Caught Stealing, this remarkably assured hard-boiled caper has rapid-fire pacing, dead-on dialogue and a beleaguered protagonist who just can't get a break. Former minor league baseball player Hank Thompson barely escaped with his life at the end of Caught, making off with $4 million of the Russian mafia's money. Several years later, he's running a breakfast place in the Yucatan, down the shore from his secluded hut. When a Russian bounty hunter shows up asking questions, Hank Fed-Exes his bankroll to a friend in Las Vegas and sneaks north across the border. When not trying to kill him, two surf bum criminals convince him they're allies; as the book reaches its climax, Hank finds himself dodging a memorable cast of lowlifes, would-be mobsters and scammers. Huston takes care with Hank, making him funny and sympathetic (even as he reminds us that he has killed six people in New York), and giving even cardboard situations and slight exchanges charge. (One of the surfers on a pair of boots: "Kind of metallish for my taste, but fuck it, we're incognito, right ") This second installment of a planned trilogy will leave readers anxious for more. Agent, Simon Lipskar at Writers House. 5-city author tour. (July 1) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information. -- PUBLISHERS WEEKLY.

Author Information

Bio of Charlie Huston

Charlie Huston is the author of The Shotgun Rule, the Henry Thompson trilogy: Caught Stealing, Six Bad Things (an Edgar Award nominee), and A Dangerous Man, and the Joe Pitt novels: Already Dead, No Dominion, Half the Blood of Brooklyn, and Every Last Drop. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife, the actress Virginia Louise Smith.

Customer Reviews

  • 5 stars out of 5great continuation

    Posted January 14, 2009 by nodwink, jacksonville, fl

    I'm hooked!! First I read Caught Stealing, and just finished Six Bad Things. Very action packed.. totally loved it! My only sad thought, is that after A Dangerous Man, which I started last night.......... I won't have anymore to read about Hank.

  • 3 stars out of 5just like "caught stealing"

    Posted February 03, 2009 by jim, honolulu

    set in mexico, california, and las vegas, this is a sequel to "caught stealing." whereas the first novel interrupted the plot for asides about baseball, this does the same with football. recommended if you don't mind violence and bad language

  • 2 stars out of 5An easy read that is hard to stomach

    Posted March 10, 2009 by Tony, Jacksonville, FL

    While I enjoyed Caught Stealing, the first book in this series, I started to struggle here and I'm not sure I will even read the third and final installment, A Dangerous Man. At least in Caught Stealing, I managed to have some feelings for Henry or Hank or whatever he decides to call himself as a pathetic character whose very existence is overcome by a series of unfortunate incidents. In Six Bad Things, any sympathy or feeling for the main character is lost as he descends further and further into an amoral abyss. As I read on, I started to feel like someone was pumping by blood full of the endless supply of stimulants and depressants that the main character seems to consume throughout the entire story and unlike his attempts to talk to the police in book one, which showed some sense of right and wrong, in this story he is really no better than any of the waste of humanity he associates with and you can't help but wonder why his parents, friend T or any of the other quasi-normal people he comes across in the story wouldn't just excuse themselves from the room and call 911 to turn Hank over to the police. Charlie Huston is a very good writer and his books are easy to read, but when you start to hate the alleged hero, perhaps it is time to look elsewhere.

  • 4 stars out of 5Keep you wanting more.

    Posted March 20, 2009 by Jason, In a Book

    I read the first 2 book very fast and i could not wait to read this one.

Additional Info

Imprint

Random House

Filesize

1.26 MB

Number of Pages

305

eBook ISBN

9780345484369

Awards

  • Anthony Award
  • Edgar Awards (Edgar Allan Poe Awards)

Excerpt from: Six Bad Things by Charlie Huston

December 4,11, 2003
Four Regular Season Games Remaining

I m sitting on the porch of a bungalow on the Yucat n Peninsula with lit cigarettes sticking out of both my ears.

I like to go swimming in the mornings. When I first came to Mexico I liked to go drinking in the mornings, but after I got over that I took up swimming and I discovered something. I have unusually narrow ear canals. Go figure. I discovered this while I was trying to sober up, paddling around in the lukewarm morning waters, and found that my ears were clogged. I tilted my head from side to side and banged on my skull, trying to dislodge the water, but no luck. I plugged my nose, clamped my mouth shut, and blew until it felt like my brain might pop out of my ass. No good. I crammed Q-tips up my ears, prodding at the blockage. That s when things got really bad. For a few days I walked around half-deaf, feeling like my entire head was packed with waterlogged cotton. Then I went to a doctor. I have a habit of saving doctors for a last resort.

Dr. Sanchez looked in my ears and informed me of the tragic news: unusually narrow ear canals. The water was trapped deep inside and my irresponsible Q-tip use had sealed it in with earwax. He loaded a syringe the size of a beer can with warm mineral water and injected it into my ears until the pressure dislodged the massive clogs of wax and washed them into the small plastic basins I held just below my ears. He gave me drops. He told me never to stick anything in my ear other than my elbow, and laughed at his own joke. He nodded sagely and told me the solution to my problem was quite simple: When my ears became clogged, I must stick a cigarette into each one and light them. The cigarettes, that is. Then he handed me a pack of Benson & Hedges, told me they were his preferred brand for the task, and charged me a thousand pesos.

.