William Hjortsberg – författare

'When the Devil laughs the whole damn world laughs with Him'A mind-bending thriller blending hard-boiled detective fiction, supernatural horror, and metaphysical noir that takes readers on a macabre journey into the occult, from the East Coast to Paris to the Vatican, as private investigator Harry Angel, seeking both answers about his true identity and revenge, hunts down Satan himself. Here is the stunning sequel to the Edgar-nominated novel Falling Angel, the basis for the classic cult film Angel Heart, which also stands alone as a masterwork of noir suspense fiction.

Edgar Award Finalist: The hunt for a vanished singer leads a detective into the depths of the occult in this “terrific” novel (Stephen King).  Big-band frontman Johnny Favorite was singing for the troops when a Luftwaffe fighter squadron strafed the bandstand, killing the crowd and leaving the singer near death. The army returned him to a private hospital in upstate New York, leaving him to live out his days as a vegetable while the world forgot him. But Louis Cyphre never forgets. Cyphre had a contract with the singer, stipulating payment upon Johnny’s death—payment that will be denied as long as Johnny clings to life. When Cyphre hires private investigator Harry Angel to find Johnny at the hospital, Angel learns that the singer has disappeared. It is no ordinary missing-person’s case. Everyone he questions dies soon after, as Angel’s investigation ensnares him in a bizarre tangle of black magic, carnival freaks, and grisly voodoo. When the sinister Louis Cyphre begins appearing in Angel’s dreams, the detective fears for his life, his sanity, and his soul.Falling Angel was the basis for the Alan Parker film Angel Heart, starring Mickey Rourke, Robert De Niro, and Lisa Bonet.  This ebook features an illustrated biography of William Hjortsberg including rare photos from the author’s personal collection.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini team up to search for a literary-minded killerIt is 1923 and a beautiful young woman has just been found outside a tenement, bones crushed, head ripped from her shoulders. A few stories above, her squalid apartment has been ransacked, and twenty-dollar gold pieces litter the floor. The window frame is smashed. She seems to have been hurled from the building by a beast of impossible strength, and the only witness claims to have seen a long-armed ape fleeing the scene. The police are baffled, but one reporter recognizes the author of the bloody crime: the long-dead Edgar Allan Poe. A psychopath is haunting New York City, imitating the murders that made Poe’s stories so famous. To Harry Houdini and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the killing spree is of purely academic interest. But when Poe’s ghost appears in Doyle’s hotel room, the writer and the magician begin to suspect that the murders may hold a clue to understanding death itself. This ebook features an illustrated biography of William Hjortsberg including rare photos from the author’s personal collection.

Unrest simmers in a dystopian future where disembodied brains are kept alive in tanks, waiting to earn a new body At twelve years old, Skeets Kalbfleischer is returning from a ski vacation when a lightning strike knocks his plane out of the sky, killing everyone else on board. Although his body is destroyed, a radical procedure preserves Skeets’s brain, which spends twenty-five years in a fish tank before mankind realizes the implications of his second life. A key to immortality has been found. Four centuries later, it has become commonplace for the minds of the dead to be preserved. While warehoused in a massive storage facility tended by robots, the brains pass time watching old film clips, learning about bees, and meditating their way to a higher state of being. But for the facility’s overseers, Skeets presents a problem. A twelve-year-old for all eternity, their most famous resident still wants to be a cowboy. To remedy this embarrassment, his handlers concoct a solution that will push humanity even farther past nature’s wildest dreams. This ebook features an illustrated biography of William Hjortsberg including rare photos from the author’s personal collection.

In postapocalyptic America, a solitary man crafts the world’s latest form of escapism: dreamsFor eighty-five years, Par Sondak has crafted dreams. Each night he retires, probes attached to his sleeping body, and builds magnificent worlds for the people of the City to enjoy. His dreams have been bestsellers for decades, and he has more than three hundred still in circulation. Sondak’s niche is escapist fun; his current project is a ten-hour swords-and-sandals epic. More than a month’s sleep has gone into the dream, and when he completes it, his public will clamor for more. But when he isn’t asleep, this rotund, 105-year-old man sits on his terrace and enjoys a view of the American wasteland. Beyond Sondak’s laser-guarded walls, herds of Nomads lurk, scavenging for food and making sacrifices to pagan gods. Lately these savage men have stirred Sondak’s curiosity. But attempting to understand them might just destroy the kingdom his dreams have built. This ebook features an illustrated biography of William Hjortsberg including rare photos from the author’s personal collection.

Hjortsberg’s Edgar Award–nominated classic about the hunt for a vanished singer that leads a detective into the depths of the occultBig-band frontman Johnny Favorite was singing for the troops when a Luftwaffe fighter squadron strafed the bandstand, killing the crowd and leaving the singer near death. The army returned him to a private hospital in upstate New York, leaving him to live out his days as a vegetable while the world forgot him. But Louis Cyphre never forgets. Cyphre had a contract with the singer, stipulating payment upon Johnny’s death—payment that will be denied as long as Johnny clings to life. When Cyphre hires private investigator Harry Angel to find Johnny at the hospital, Angel learns that the singer has disappeared. It is no ordinary missing-person’s case. Everyone he questions dies soon after, as Angel’s investigation ensnares him in a bizarre tangle of black magic, carnival freaks, and grisly voodoo. When the sinister Louis Cyphre begins appearing in Angel’s dreams, the detective fears for his life, his sanity, and his soul. This ebook features an illustrated biography of William Hjortsberg including rare photos from the author’s personal collection.

The life of an American hippie in Mexico is upended by a gang of ex-cons in this thriller full of “wild surprises” (Carl Hiaasen). All Tod remembers when he wakes up next to a dead prostitute is that he had his first shot of heroin the night before. He and his wife, Linda, were partying with their new neighbors, a trio of parole violators who fled to Mexico after robbing a Beverly Hills jewelry store. Now the place is empty, stripped clean except for Tod’s hunting knife, which is covered in blood. Did he kill the woman, or was he left behind as the fall guy? Convinced that his junkie friends abducted Linda to keep her from talking to the police, Tod buys a gun and prepares to do whatever it takes to get his wife back before he makes a run for the border.

The life of an American hippie in Mexico is upended by a gang of ex-cons in this thriller full of “wild surprises” (Carl Hiaasen). All Tod remembers when he wakes up next to a dead prostitute is that he had his first shot of heroin the night before. He and his wife, Linda, were partying with their new neighbors, a trio of parole violators who fled to Mexico after robbing a Beverly Hills jewelry store. Now the place is empty, stripped clean except for Tod’s hunting knife, which is covered in blood. Did he kill the woman, or was he left behind as the fall guy? Convinced that his junkie friends abducted Linda to keep her from talking to the police, Tod buys a gun and prepares to do whatever it takes to get his wife back before he makes a run for the border.