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Howard Owen

Goodreads Author

Born

Fayetteville, N.C., The United States

Website

http://www.howardowenbooks.com

Genre

Literature & Fiction, Mystery & Thrillers

Influences

Clyde Edgerton, William Wharton, Richard Russo ...more

Member Since

January 2010

URL

https://www.goodreads.com/howardwowengmailcom

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Howard Owen was born March 1, 1949, in Fayetteville, N.C. He is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1971, journalism) and has a master's degree from Virginia Commonwealth University (1981, English).
He and his wife since 1973, Karen Van Neste Owen (the former publisher of Van Neste Books), live in Richmond, Va. He was a newspaper reporter and editor for 44 years.
Owen won The Dashiell Hammett Prize for crime literature in the United States and Canada for Oregon Hill, his 10th novel.
His first novel, "Littlejohn," was written in 1989, when he was 40. It was bought by The Permanent Press and published in 1992. Random House bought it from The Permanent Press and reissued it as a Villard hardcover in 1993 and a Vintage
Howard Owen was born March 1, 1949, in Fayetteville, N.C. He is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1971, journalism) and has a master's degree from Virginia Commonwealth University (1981, English).
He and his wife since 1973, Karen Van Neste Owen (the former publisher of Van Neste Books), live in Richmond, Va. He was a newspaper reporter and editor for 44 years.
Owen won The Dashiell Hammett Prize for crime literature in the United States and Canada for Oregon Hill, his 10th novel.
His first novel, "Littlejohn," was written in 1989, when he was 40. It was bought by The Permanent Press and published in 1992. Random House bought it from The Permanent Press and reissued it as a Villard hardcover in 1993 and a Vintage Contemporary paperback in 1994. It was nominated for the Abbey Award (American Booksellers) and Discovery (Barnes & Noble) award for best new fiction. It has sold, in all, more than 50,000 copies. It has been printed in Japanese, French and Korean; it has been a Doubleday Book Club selection; audio and large-print editions have been issued, and movie option rights have been sold.
His second novel, "Fat Lightning," came out as a Permanent Press book in 1994. It was bought by HarperCollins and was reissued as a Harper Perennial paperback in 1996. It received a starred review from Publishers' Weekly.
His third novel, "Answers to Lucky," was published by HarperCollins as a hardcover in 1996 and as a paperback in 1997. It received favorable reviews in The New York Times, Southern Living, GW, Publishers' Weekly, the Atlanta Constitution, the Baltimore Sun, the Memphis Commercial Appeal and numerous other publications. It was included in "The Best Novels of the Nineties: A Reader’s Guide."
His fourth novel, "The Measured Man," was published in hardcover by HarperCollins in 1997. It was praised in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Publishers' Weekly, Kirkus Reviews, the Raleigh News & Observer, the Orlando Sentinel, the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel and many other publications. It was one of the LA Times Book Reviews’ "Recommended Titles" for 1997. It was included in "The Best Novels of the Nineties: A Reader’s Guide."
Owen's fifth novel, "Harry and Ruth," was published by The Permanent Press in September of 2000 to critical acclaim from Kirkus, Publisher's Weekly and various weekly publications.
His sixth novel, "The Rail," was published in April of 2002. It is about (among other things) baseball and the parable of the talents. Owen won the 2002 Theresa Pollack Award for Words.
His seventh novel, "Turn Signal," was about a man whose muse drives him either to madness or to the best move he's ever made in his life. It came out in 2004 and was a Booksense selection for July of 2004.
His eighth novel, "Rock of Ages," is something of a sequel to his first novel, "Littlejohn." Georgia McCain returns to her hometown years after her father’s death to sell the family farm and finds herself immersed in baby-boomer guilt and a murder mystery. It was a Booksense pick for July of 2006.

His ninth novel, "The Reckoning," about ghosts of the ’60s, came out in late 2010 and received very positive reviews from, among others, Publishers Weekly and the New York Journal of Books.
His short story, "The Thirteenth Floor," part of "Richmond Noir," came out in early 2010.
The protagonist of “The Thirteenth Floor,” Willie Black, also is at the center of Owen’s 10th novel, “Oregon Hill,” which came in July of 2012 to very positive reviews in The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, Kirkus and elsewhere. It's also an audio book.

Willie starred in future Owen novels: The Philadelphia Quarry (2013), Parker Field (2014), The Bottom (2015), Grace (2016) and The Devil's Triangle (2017). His 16th novel, Annie's Bones, comes out in April of 2018.
...more

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Howard Owen's Blog: A page a day

Oregon Hill's on short list for Hammett Prize

I've just learned that Oregon Hill is one of five finalists for the Hammett Prize for literary excellence in crime writing in 2012. The award is given by the North American branch of the International Association of Crime Writers and is open to all fiction and non-fiction books. The winner will be announced at the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association Fall Conference in Somerset, N.J., Read more of this blog post »

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Published on February 25, 2013 13:12

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Combine Editions
Howard Owen’s books

Average rating: 3.83 · 2,350 ratings · 333 reviews · 32 distinct works • Similar authors

	Oregon Hill (Willie Black #1) 3.54 avg rating — 656 ratings — published 2012 — 13 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Philadelphia Quarry 3.92 avg rating — 269 ratings — published 2013 — 9 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Littlejohn 4.01 avg rating — 212 ratings — published 1992 — 17 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Parker Field 3.96 avg rating — 161 ratings — published 2014 — 9 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Bottom 4.04 avg rating — 121 ratings — published 2015 — 8 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Grace (Willie Black, #5) 4.21 avg rating — 95 ratings — published 2016 — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Devil's Triangle (Willie Black #6) really liked it 4.00 avg rating — 90 ratings — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Monument (Willie Black Mystery Series Book 11) by Howard Owen (Goodreads Author), Judith Shepard (Editor) 4.31 avg rating — 78 ratings — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Belle Isle (Willie Black Mysteries Book 9) 3.92 avg rating — 78 ratings — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Annie's Bones 3.77 avg rating — 69 ratings — published 2018 — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

More books by Howard Owen…

Series by Howard Owen

Willie Black (6 books)
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Howard Owen (Goodreads Author)

3.78 avg rating — 1,392 ratings

Littlejohn (2 books)
by

Howard Owen (Goodreads Author)

3.97 avg rating — 245 ratings

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message 1: by Howard (last edited Sep 27, 2010 02:52PM)

Sep 27, 2010 02:52PM

Nice review of The Reckoning in Publishers Weekly ...
Howard Owen. Permanent, $28 (222p) ISBN 978-1-57962-207-7

Owen (Rock of Ages) offers parallel coming-of-age stories in this hardheaded look at two very different eras. In Richmond, Va., in 2004, 16-year-old Jake James is still dealing with his mother's recent death, his first serious love affair, and his girlfriend's jealous and menacing ex-boyfriend when Freeman Hawk, his father George's iconoclast friend, reappears after decades of exile in Canada. Unfortunately for the Jameses, Hawk's problems are not in the safely distant past but in Montreal's criminal underworld of the present, and those problems have followed him back to Virginia. Owen doesn't overstate the flaws of either period, neither painting the 1960s as an era of misguided dreams nor, despite George's nostalgia, the present as a betrayal of lost ideals. George may be weak and foolish, Hawk self-serving, and Jake inexperienced, but each shows he can rise to the occasion despite his weaknesses. Owen interweaves father's and son's stories skillfully while steering them toward the inevitable violent conclusion. (Dec.)

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