Vincent Parry had been wrongly convicted for life for murdering his wife. But after executing a daring prison break and getting a face change operation, dead bodies and suspicious characters suddenly began popping up everywhere he went. Who had set him up, and how was he going to get away alive?

The book that gave Goodis his greatest success. James Vanning, artist, suffers through blackouts and hallucinations. He's not sure if he's even committed robbery and murder. A police psychologist says he's there to help, but only wants to entrap Vanning. Meanwhile, a bunch of crooks are after Vanning for the proceeds of that robbery he might have done. First published 1947 as "Nightfall." Also published as "Convicted," and "Missing: Believed-Murdered."

They say that a man needs a woman to go to hell with. Cassidy had two. One was Mildred, the wife who kept him chained with ties of fear and jealousy and paralyzing sexual need. The other was Doris, a frail angel with a 100-proof halo and a bottle instead of a harp. With those two, Cassidy found that the ride to hell could be twice as fast. Cassidy's Girl has all the traits that made its author a virtuoso of the hard-boiled: a fiercely compelling ploy; characters who self-destruct in spectacularly unpredictable ways; and an insider's knowledge of all the routes to the bottom.

They Gave Him Back His Badge, and Sent Him Down Into the Brutal Throbbing Heart of the Slums. Crooked ex-cop Corey Bradford turns out to be an ideal candidate for an underground police unit known as the Night Squad. First published 1961.

"David Goodis is the mystery man of hardboiled fiction."--Geoffrey O'Brien In Street of No Return, we meet the pathetic figure of Whitey. Once upon a time Whitey was a crooner with a million-dollar voice and a standing invitation from any woman who heard him use it. Until he had the bad luck to fall for Celia. And then nothing would ever be the same. In Street of No Return, David Goodis works the magic that made him one of the most distinctive voices in hard-boiled fiction, creating a claustrophobic universe in which wounded men and women collide with cataclysmic force.

SOMEBODY'S DONE FOR Calvin Jander is just about done for when his boat capsizes and he's forced to tread water, hoping for a sight of land. When he does find the shore, he's just barely alive. And that's when Vera finds him. She takes him to her shack, gets him some clothes and food. Then Jander's real trouble starts, because Vera is Hebden's daughter. Hebden and his two partners are holed up in a deserted house on a lonely stretch of New Jersey coastline, and they aren't welcoming visitors. When they discover Jander, it's all he can do to keep them from killing him. But as Vera gradually begins to get under his skin, death by shotgun begins to look like the easy way out.