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The Gunman by Jean-Patrick Manchette
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The Gunman

$12.56

Retail price: $13.95

Discount: 9%

This title is not eligible for purchase with membership credits. Why?

Narrator Ralph Lister
Translator James Brook
Length 4 hours 45 minutes
Language English
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A gripping noir masterpiece and New York Times Notable Book, The Gunman is now a major motion picture starring Sean Penn.

Martin Terrier is a hired killer who wants out of the game so he can settle down and marry his childhood sweetheart. But the organization won’t let him go—they have other plans for him. In a violent tale that shatters as many illusions as bodies, Jean-Patrick Manchette subjects his characters and listeners alike to a fierce exercise in style. This tightly plotted, corrosive parody of “the success story” is widely considered to be Manchette’s masterpiece—a classic of modern noir.

Jean-Parick Manchette (1942–1995) rescued the French crime novel from the grip of stodgy police procedurals, restoring the noir edge by virtue of his post-1968 leftism. Today, Manchette is a totem to a generation of French mystery writers, and his stories have inspired several films, including Claude Chabrol’s The Nada Gang.

Ralph Lister is an actor, voice actor, and AudioFile Earphones Award–winning narrator. He spent fifteen years in London theater before moving to the United States to focus on film and television. He has held numerous roles in Shakespeare and modern dramas, as well as starring roles in independent films. His voice and character work can be heard in Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearland 13 Going On 30. He lives in Los Angeles.

James Brook is a poet, translator, and editor. He is an editor for City Lights Books, where he concentrates on political nonfiction and world literature. He has translated works by Guy Debord, Henri Michaux, Gellu Naum, Benjamin Péret, Alberto Savinio, and Sebastian Reichmann. His poems and essays have appeared in numerous publications.

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Reviews

“There’s not a superfluous word or overdone effect in [The Gunman], one of the last cool, compact, and shockingly original crime novels Manchette left as his legacy to modern noir fiction.”

“[The Gunman] is an unrelentingly grim story that proves impossible to put down.”

“This is lean, mean noir fiction that cleverly sends up the tough guy genre while incarnating it perfectly.”

“For Manchette…the crime novel is no mere entertainment but a means to strip bare the failures of society.”

“For the first time readers can experience in English translation the masterful thriller considered Manchette’s finest…noir.”

“Manchette is a master of both economy and irony. Brutal and bracing: Terrier’s tale fascinates even as it chills.”

“This taut, fast-paced novel flexes with all the standard noir elements: mysterious motives, a gritty hero, detailed technical descriptions of firearms, and a high corpse-to-page ratio.”

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