Rock

Rock by David Wagoner

When ROCK was first published in 1958, future Pulitzer Prize winning novelist Larry McMurtry wrote “this novel deserves a wider reading than it will likely get,” and he was right. Now this searing, hard-boiled classic is finally back in print.

 It is 1958. Max Fallon, fleeing the wreckage of his marriage and career, returns to his lakeside home town and a job as a beach lifeguard. He discovers that his old neighborhood, beneath its seemingly unchanged veneer, is seething with violence, ruled by a brutal group of young men, including his own teenage brother, that is led by a hard woman who uses her ruthless sexuality as a deadly weapon.


Books by David Wagoner

The Hanging Garden

The Hanging Garden

"This is a powerful, shocking story, the full pay-off of David Wagoner's astonishing talent." James Dickey, author of terrifying classic Deliverance

Simon Burrows is a divorced, retired politician looking who retires to the country with his new, young girlfriend to raise show dogs. But his simple dream turns into a gruesome nightmare when he discovers that his neighbors, and the verdant, tranquil landscape around him, hide an unspeakable horror...

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The Escape Artist

The Escape Artist

Danny Masters is a teenage magician, pick-pocket and escape artist who learned it all from his late father. All he wants to do is make it in the big city. But along the way he picks the wrong pocket, stealing a wallet full of stolen cash, and finds himself having to use all of his skills just to stay alive… while still chasing his dreams.

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The Man in the Middle

The Man in the Middle

The first book by acclaimed novelist and poet David Wagoner, back in print for the first time in 70 years, hailed by the Los Angeles Times as ”a breathtaking novel filled with terror and pathos.”

Middle-aged Charlie Bell, a crippled watchman at a railroad crossing, sees a woman thrown out of passing train. He takes the injured woman, and the briefcase she was clutching, with him in search of a phone. She’s a reporter, and the briefcase contains papers that could destroy a corrupt Senator. But before Charlie can get her help, a thug attacks them and kills her. Now Charlie is relentlessly pursued through the Chicago underworld by cops who think he’s a murderer…and killers intent on silencing him.

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Money Money Money

Money Money Money

“Bizarre and disturbing.” New York Times

Big, generous Willie Grier is swimming in Lake Michigan one summer night in 1955 when he finds the dead body of a man. The horrifying experience leads him into bed with a ruthlessly seductive woman, pits him against vicious gangsters, and hurls him into a whirlwind of cold cash, hot sex, and bloody violence.

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Reviews For Rock

Rock 5.0

Wagoner makes an ambitious attempt to deal with the children of our present rock-and-roll generation and, in some respects, he is depressingly successful. The book is a testament of lovelessness, the compassionate record of a warping that has touched a whole generation. It is strong, serious writing about a serious subject.

Larry McMurtry, Wichita Falls Times

Rock 5.0

Wagoner surpasses The Blackboard Jungle…written with force and understanding.

Hartford Courant

Rock 5.0

Engrossing, beautifully capturing the tensions beneath the surface of present-day American life. He writes with sincerity and clarity.

Pittsburgh Courier

Rock 5.0

A well-constructed, excellently-written novel of great significance… a vivid picture of a restless segment of modern society.

Los Angeles Mirror

Rock 5.0

The book is beautifully-written. It contains some shrewd and thought-provoking observations.

Greensboro News and Record