Carny Kill — Robert Edmond Alter

A masterpiece of lurid menace from the underbelly of the South.

On his first day working for Cochrane's carny, Thaxton found that his new boss was married to his ex-wife.  On the second day he found his boss's body--with one of May's throwing knives planted firmly in its chest.

With its impeccably rendered carnival setting and its deliriously crooked array of spielers, luck-boys, and dancing girls with indecent hips and sub-zero hearts, Carny Kill is crime fiction at its most devious and pungent.