Best Selling Books by John Hart

Winner of the 2010 Edgar Award for Best Novel

John Hart's New York Times bestselling debut, The King of Lies, announced the arrival of a major talent. With Down River, he surpassed his earlier success, transcending the barrier between thriller and literature and winning the 2008 Edgar Award for best novel. Now, with The Last Child, he achieves his most significant work to date, an intricate, powerful story of loss, hope, and courage in the face of evil.

Thirteen year-old Johnny Merrimon had the perfect life: a warm home and loving parents; a twin sister, Alyssa, with whom he shared an irreplaceable bond. He knew nothing of loss, until the day Alyssa vanished from the side of a lonely street. Now, a year later, Johnny finds himself isolated and alone, failed by the people he'd been taught since birth to trust. No one else believes that Alyssa is still alive, but Johnny is certain that she is---confident in a way that he can never fully explain.

Determined to find his sister, Johnny risks everything to explore the dark side of his hometown. It is a desperate, terrifying search, but Johnny is not as alone as he might think. Detective Clyde Hunt has never stopped looking for Alyssa either, and he has a soft spot for Johnny. He watches over the boy and tries to keep him safe, but when Johnny uncovers a dangerous lead and vows to follow it, Hunt has no choice but to intervene.

Then a second child goes missing . . .

Undeterred by Hunt's threats or his mother's pleas, Johnny enlists the help of his last friend, and together they plunge into the wild, to a forgotten place with a history of violence that goes back more than a hundred years. There, they meet a giant of a man, an escaped convict on his own tragic quest. What they learn from him will shatter every notion Johnny had about the fate of his sister; it will lead them to another far place, to a truth that will test both boys to the limit.

Traveling the wilderness between innocence and hard wisdom, between hopelessness and faith, The Last Child leaves all categories behind and establishes John Hart as a writer of unique power.

A powerful, heart-pounding thriller from the unparalleled New York Times bestselling and two-time Edgar Award-winning author of The Last Child and The King of Lies, Down River will haunt your thoughts long after the last page is turned.

Adam Chase has a violent streak, and for good reason. As a boy, he saw things no child should witness, suffered wounds that left him misunderstood―a fighter. Even grown, he remains dangerous and unpredictable, so that when he narrowly beats a murder charge, he's hounded out of town, exiled for a sin he did not commit. For five long years, he disappears. But now he's back, and no one knows why - not his family or the cops, not the enemies he left behind. But Adam has his reasons. Attacked within hours of his return, the tone of his homecoming is set. As bodies turn up and the town rises in anger, Adam again finds himself in the fight of his life, not just to prove his innocence, but to reclaim the only life he's ever wanted. Secrets build on secrets, emotions tear, and more than one person crosses the brink as Hart examines the lengths to which people will go for money, family, and revenge.
Praise for John Hart and Down River:

"[Hart] combines gripping plots with a wonderful gift for prose, making his books literary crowd-pleasers that appeal to the brain as well as the emotions. There are few books published that can legitimately be called "a must-read," but this is one of them." --Chicago Sun Times

"If you value Harper Lee, James Lee Burke, Truman Capote, and Michael Malone… it's time to add John Hart to your bookshelves." --Otto Penzler, The New York Sun

"An artist adding layers of paint ... Hart takes his time, snaring the reader with evocative storytelling and lush prose along with the usual quota of conflict and murder." --The Boston Globe

"[A] complex, emotionally charged novel… Down River is a beautifully constructed story of personal redemption, family secrets, and murder…. A truly splendid novel with a deep emotional core." --Booklist (starred)

"The thrills come fast and furious." ―Washington Post

"Nail-biting suspense." –Raleigh News and Observer

"Richly atmospheric… should settle once and for all the question of whether thrillers and mysteries can also be literature." –Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Falls squarely in the league of the best of Southern novels." --South Florida Sun Sentinel

Over 2 million copies of his books in print. The first and only author to win back-to-back Edgars for Best Novel. Every book a New York Times bestseller. After five years, John Hart is back.

Since his debut bestseller, The King of Lies, reviewers across the country have heaped praise on John Hart, comparing his writing to that of Pat Conroy, Cormac McCarthy and Scott Turow. Each novel has taken Hart higher on the New York Times Bestseller list as his masterful writing and assured evocation of place have won readers around the world and earned history's only consecutive Edgar Awards for Best Novel with Down River and The Last Child. Now, Hart delivers his most powerful story yet.
Imagine:

A boy with a gun waits for the man who killed his mother.

A troubled detective confronts her past in the aftermath of a brutal shooting.

After thirteen years in prison, a good cop walks free as deep in the forest, on the altar of an abandoned church, a body cools in pale linen…

This is a town on the brink.

This is Redemption Road.

Brimming with tension, secrets, and betrayal, Redemption Road proves again that John Hart is a master of the literary thriller.