Mick Hardin is an Army CID officer home on leave, recovering from an IED attack, when a body is found in the centre of town. It's Barney Kissick, the local heroin dealer, and the city police see his death as an occupational hazard. But when Barney's mother, Shifty, asks Mick to take a look, it seems there's more to the killing than it appears. Mick should be rehabbing his leg, signing his divorce papers and getting out of town - and most of all, staying out of the way of his sister Linda's reelection as Sheriff - but he keeps on looking, and suddenly he's getting shot at himself.

A dark, pacy crime novel about grief and revenge, with surprises hidden below the surface, Shifty's Boys is a tour de force that confirms Chris Offutt's Mick Hardin as one of the most appealing new investigators in fiction.

"The writing is top-notch, shot through with menace and melancholy" - New York Times

"Chris Offutt's mastery of sense of place is still in full bloom" - Times (Thriller Book of the Month)

"Another wonderfully atmospheric slice of Appalachian noir" - Times & Sunday Times Crime Club (Pick of the Week)

"Offutt loves his characters enough to give them life. With them, we can grieve or laugh... Offutt's novel is replete with details that brand the humanity pictured within as real, because you can't make this stuff up" - Reviewing the Evidence