Murder Slim Review: The Best Ballsy Books Of All Time

All the writers were limited to books and comics in the outsider, crime and confessional genres.
They could also only pick two works by the same writer. That screwed me with Bukowski and the Fantes...

Steve Hussy
The author of Academic, Narcoleptic, Alcoholic and Womanoholic.

"As ever, the list just seems to show my obsession with isolated characters.
I self-banned (to avoid coming across as an MSP egotist) Drug Story. But it's brilliant..."

1. Wait Until Spring, Bandini (J. Fante) 2. Journey To The End Of The Night (L.F. Celine) 3. Factotum (C. Bukowski) 4. The Captain Is Out To Lunch... (C. Bukowski) 5. This Is Not Fame (D. Stanhope) 6. Saguaro (C. Mell) 7. The Free (W. Vlautin) 8. Hangover Square (P. Hamilton) 9. The Day of the Locust (N. West) 10. Hunger (K. Hamsun)

11. Voyage In The Dark (J. Rhys) 12. Mooch (D. Fante) 13. The Criminal (J. Thompson) 14. The Rum Diary (H.S. Thompson) 15. Notes From Underground (F. Dostoevsky) 16. The Bomb Inside My Brain (J. Goad) 17. Voices (S. Shubin) 18. Cherry On Top (C. Mell) 19. A Rage In Harlem (C. Himes) 20. I Am David (A. Holm)

David Noone
The author of Saint of the City.

Pitch black noir and gothic horror marks David Noone's choices.
If you want to take an eye-opening trip to the dark side, these can guide you...

1. In A Lonely Place (D.B. Hughes) 2. A Hell of a Woman (J. Thompson) 3. The Plague (A. Camus) 4. High Rise (J.G. Ballard) 5. Kicks (J. Reed) 6. Dr. Haggard's Disease (P. McGrath) 7. The Fall of the House of Usher (E.A. Poe) 8. The Singer (C. Unsworth) 9. Bye Bye Blondie (V. Despentes) 10.Hangover Square (P. Hamilton)

11. The Flowers of Evil (C. Baudelaire) 12. Blue of Noon (G. Bataille) 13. Mygale (T. Jonquet) 14. A Rebour (J-K. Huysmans) 15. Wise Blood (F. O'Connor) 16. The Picture of Dorian Gray (O. Wilde) 17. Ice (A. Kavan) 18. Memoirs of a Gnostic Dwarf (D. Madsen) 19. No Strings (M. SaFranko) 20. The Furnished Room (L. Del Rivo)

Ally North
The author of Schizophrenic.

"This seems like mostly female orientated character studies, but I DO love a lot more than that.
I hate lists, but the key with this is that ALL of the stories are about survival."

1. Voyage In The Dark (J. Rhys) 2. Daddy's Girl (D. Drechsler) 3. Ham On Rye (C. Bukowski) 4. Northline (W. Vlautin) 5. The Handmaid's Tale (M. Attwood, adaption by R. Nault) 6. One Hundred Demons (Lynda Barry) 7. Dirty Havana Trilogy (P-J. Gutierrez) 8. Did You See Me? (S. Calle) 9. Drug Story (u.v.ray) 10.Fahrenheit 451 (R. Bradbury)

11. The Secret Diary Of Laura Palmer (J. Lynch) 12. Nausea (J-P. Sartre) 13. Calvin & Hobbes (B. Watterson) 14. Alcoholic (S. Hussy) 15. Steppenwolf (H. Hesse) 16. Hangover Square (P. Hamilton) 17. Wide Sargasso Sea (J. Rhys) 18. Dead End (T. Ott) 19. The Motel Life (W. Vlautin) 20. Jimmy Corrigan (C. Ware)

u.v. ray
The author of We Are Glass, Black Cradle, The Migrant, Spiral Out and Drug Story.

Drugs, obsession, and individualism are the primary themes of u.v. ray's picks...

1. The Outsider (A. Camus) 2. Atomised (M. Houellebecq) 3. Less Than Zero (B. Easton Ellis) 4. Joe Gould's Secret (J. Mitchell) 5. The Motel Life (W. Vlautin) 6. Betty Blue (P. Dijan) 7. 1984 (G. Orwell) 8. Slaughterhouse 5 (K. Vonnegut) 9. Of Mice And Men (J. Steinbeck) 10. The Catcher In The Rye (J.D. Salinger)

11. Survivor (C. Palahniuk) 12. Last Exit To Brooklyn (H. Selby Jr.) 13. The Fuck Up (A. Nersesian) 14. Junky (W. Burroughs) 15. Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas (H.S. Thompson) 16. The Big Sleep (R. Chandler) 17. Fireball (T. Keevil) 18. Factotum (C. Bukowski) 19. The Sea Wolf (J. London) 20. Lock The Lock (T. Trantino)

Another 150 Must-Reads Not Mentioned Before
Adapted from the Savage Kick Reading List

--- Ryunosuke Akutagawa Rashomon --- Kingsley Amis Everyday Drinking --- Lynda Barry Syllabus What It Is --- Jeffrey Bernard Low Life More Low Life --- Amy Bingaman Let Me Out --- Ivan Brunetti Schizo --- Charles Bukowski Post Office Women Hollywood Mockingbird Wish Me Luck Love Is A Dog From Hell Last Night of the Earth Poems South of No North Septuagenarian Stew Shakespeare Never Did This Hot Water Music The Most Beautiful Woman In Town Tales of Ordinary Madness Notes of A Dirty Old Man ---Larry Brown Dirty Work On Fire --- Charles Burns Black Hole --- William Burroughs Queer --- Eddie Bunker Dog Eat Dog Animal Factory No Beast So Fierce --- Truman Capote In Cold Blood --- Louis-Ferdinard Celine Death On The Installment Plan Castle To Castle --- Raymond Chandler Farewell, My Lovely --- Anton Chekhov Ward Number Six and Other Stories --- Harry Crews Feast Of Snakes A Childhood Classic Crews --- Fyodor Dostoevsky House Of The Dead Crime and Punishment The Gambler --- Debbie Drechsler The Summer Of Love --- Will Eisner The Spirit A Contract With God Invisible People Life On Another Planet To The Heart Of The Storm --- Dan Fante Chump Change Corksucker / Short Dog A Gin Pissing Raw Meat... Fante --- John Fante 1933 Was A Bad Year Ask The Dust The Road To Los Angeles Dreams From Bunker Hill West Of Rome The Brotherhood of the Grape The Big Hunger The Wine Of Youth --- Jeffrey P. Frye Bank Blogger Bank Robber: Stories From The Life One Crazy Day --- Barry Gifford The Wild Life of Sailor & Lula --- Jim Goad The Redneck Manifesto Answer Me #1-4 Shit Magnet Church Ladies --- William Lindsay Gresham Nightmare Alley --- Dashiell Hammett The Maltese Falcon The Thin Man Red Harvest --- J.R. Helton Below The Line --- Chester Himes If He Hollers Let Him Go Blindman With A Pistol The Real Cool Killers Big Gold Dream All Shot Up Heats On Cotton Comes To Harlem Plan B --- Herbert Huncke Herbert Huncke Reader --- Franz Kafka The Trial Metamophosis Amerika --- Jack Kerouac On The Road Big Sur --- Joe R. Lansdale Savage Season By Bizarre Hands The Drive-In Mucho Mojo Cold in July The Bottoms Freezer Burn Rumble Tumble A Fine Dark Line

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--- David Lapham Stray Bullets Stray Bullets: Sunshine and Roses Murder Me Dead --- Jeff Lemire Essex County Lost Dogs The Underwater Welder Frogcatchers Roughneck --- Michael Lesy Wisconsin Death Trip --- Eddie Little Another Day In Paradise --- Malcolm Lowry Under The Volcano --- Norm Macdonald Based On A True Story --- Joe Matt Peepshow --- Norman Mailer Naked And The Dead Advertisements For Myself --- Richard Matheson I Am Legend --- Horace McCoy Kiss Tommorow Goodbye --- Carson Mell The Blue Bourbon Orchestra The Purple Egg Game --- Robert McGowan NAM A Long Perambulation South Main Stories --- Yukio Mishima Spring Snow Runaway Horses The Temple Of Dawn The Decay Of An Angel Temple Of The Golden Pavilion ---Seth Morgan Homeboy --- Walter Mosley Devil In A Blue Dress --- Mohammad Mrabet The Lemon --- Friedrich Neitzsche Thus Spake Zarathustra --- David Noone Saint of the City --- Kem Nunn Dogs of Winter --- Flannery O'Connor A Good Man Is Hard To Find Wise Blood --- Tony O'Neill Black Neon --- Thomas Ott Cinema Panopticum Greetings from Hellville The Number 73304-23-4153-6-96-8 The Forest Tales Of Error --- Harvey Pekar American Splendor --- Donald Ray Pollock Knockemstiff --- Erich Maria Remarque All Quiet On The Western Front --- Robert Sabbag Snowblind --- Seth It's a Good Life, If You Don't Weaken --- Seymour Shubin The Hunch The Captain Witness To Myself Anyone's My Name The Man From Yesterday Never Quite Dead Lonely No More Why Me? The Good and the Dead Remember Me Always --- Iceberg Slim Pimp Trick Baby --- Doug Stanhope Digging Up Mother --- Italo Svevo Confessions Of Zeno --- Jun'ichiro Tanizaki Diary of a Mad Old Man The Key --- Studs Terkel Working --- Wallace Terry Bloods --- Jim Thompson A Hell Of A Woman A Swell Looking Babe Killer Inside Me The Getaway POP. 1280 After Dark My Sweet --- Tommy Trantino Captain Delicious and the Kid from "SK#4" The Angel Perseverence --- Dalton Trumbo Johnny Got His Gun --- Willy Vlautin Don't Skip Out On Me --- Charles Willeford The Woman Chaser --- u.v. ray We Are Glass Spiral Out The Migrant A Cigarette Burn In The Sky