Gutshot Straight: A Novel [Paperback]

“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 Timesbestselling author ofChallenger Park

A fast and funny caper in the tradition of Elmore Leonard, Carl Hiaasen, and the Coen Brothers,Gutshot Straightbrings a fresh new talent into the crime fiction fold: Louis Berney. He’s already won raves for his short fiction collectionThe Road to Bobby Joe and Other Stories(“Rivals the work of contemporary hotshots T.C. Boyle and Ralph Lombreglia” —Chicago Tribune). WithGutshot Straight,Berney is “all in”—sure to win a fervent following with the story of “Shake” Bouchon, fresh out of prison and on the straight and narrow path…after maybe justonelast job.

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,pakhanof 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.