Gutshot Straight - Paperback

by Lou Berney (Author)

"Lou Berney's novel is so energetic, so droll, and so wheezingly funny that it accomplished what no book ever has before: it made me forget to eat lunch."
--Stephen Harrigan, New York Times bestselling author of Challenger Park

A fast and funny crime comedy in the tradition of Elmore Leonard, Carl Hiaasen, and the Coen Brothers, Gutshot Straight brings a fresh new talent into the crime fiction fold: Louis Berney. He's already won raves for his short fiction collection The Road to Bobby Joe and Other Stories ("Rivals the work of contemporary hotshots T.C. Boyle and Ralph Lombreglia" --Chicago Tribune). With Gutshot Straight, Berney is "all in"--sure to win a fervent following with the story of "Shake" Bouchon, a skilled getaway driver fresh out of prison and on the straight and narrow path...after maybe just one last job.

Front Jacket

Professional wheel man Charles Shake Bouchon is too nice a guy for the life he's led and not nice enough for any other. Fresh out of prison, he's supposed to deliver a package to Vegas strip-club owner Dick the Whale Moby and pick up a briefcase for Shake's former boss and lover, Alexandra Ilandryan, pakhan of L.A.'s Armenian mob. But when the package turns out to be Gina, a wholesome young housewife, Shake decides to set her free--a move as noble as it is boneheaded.

Now Shake and Gina are on the run in Panama--looking to unload the briefcase's unusual contents while outmaneuvering two angry crime bosses, a heartbroken ex-linebacker, and a sadistic thug plagued by erectile superfunction. And Shake's learning that Gina is less wholesome and more complicated than he initially imagined.

--Ted Griffin, screenwriter of OCEAN'S ELEVEN, MATCHSTICK MEN and BEST LAID PLANS

Back Jacket

Professional wheel man Charles "Shake" Bouchon is too nice a guy for the life he's led and not nice enough for any other. Fresh out of prison, he's supposed to deliver a package to Vegas strip-club owner Dick "the Whale" Moby and pick up a briefcase for Shake's former boss and lover, Alexandra Ilandryan, pakhan of L.A.'s Armenian mob. But when the "package" turns out to be Gina, a wholesome young housewife, Shake decides to set her free--a move as noble as it is boneheaded.

Now Shake and Gina are on the run in Panama--looking to unload the briefcase's unusual contents while outmaneuvering two angry crime bosses, a heartbroken ex-linebacker, and a sadistic thug plagued by erectile superfunction. And Shake's learning that Gina is less wholesome and more complicated than he initially imagined.