What do you think?
Rate this book
American Criminal
Colton Ward is the ultimate heist artist who rips off other heist artists. Hey, it’s not really stealing if you’re stealing from other crooks, right? Banks. Casinos. Warehouses. Cargo ships. From Davos to Rome, Bangkok to the Isle of Man, Miami to the Twin Cities, Colton and his brother Denny carry out a succession of dangerous scores. Until their luck runs out. Colton’s pinched by the FBI and faced with a go to prison or work for the world-weary Agent Hoskins, who heads up a unit that specializes in robberies exceeding one million dollars. Hoskins is targeting a notorious crime boss, Magnuson, the kingpin of a Nordic gang called the Vikes, who are readying a casino heist. To take down Magnuson, Hoskins needs Colton to embed himself within the gang as part of a high-stakes sting operation. If Colton is going to make it out of this seemingly impossible predicament alive, he'll have to do what he does beat people at their own game.
“Ben Percy was born to write noir. American Criminal is steeped in the elements of classic hardboiled fiction, but also manages to feel of the moment—pulsing with the power and tempo of a runaway train. This one’s got it all—seedy settings, nasty characters, and a conflicted protagonist you can’t help but root for. If you like dark tales that show you the underbelly of our world, you’ll devour American Criminal in a sitting, just like I did.” - Alex Segura, bestselling author of Secret Identity
About the author
BENJAMIN PERCY is the author of six novels – most recently The Unfamiliar Garden (William Morrow) – three story collections, and a book of essays. He writes Wolverine, X-Force, and Ghost Rider for Marvel Comics. He is currently adapting Urban Cowboy into a series for Paramount Plus and he co-wrote the film Summering (a selection of the 2022 Sundance Film Festival). His fiction and nonfiction have been published in Esquire (where he is a contributing editor), GQ, Time, Outside, Men's Journal, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Paris Review. His honors include the Whiting Award, the Plimpton Prize, two Pushcart Prizes, an NEA fellowship, the iHeartRadio Award for Best Scripted Podcast, and inclusion in Best American Short Stories and Best American Comics.
About the illustrator
MICHAEL GAYDOS has worked in the world of the illustrated word and graphic novel for nearly 30 years. His list of credits include work for Marvel, DC, Random House, Dark Horse, Image, IDW, NBC, White Wolf and Onyx Path among others. With writer Brian Michael Bendis, he is co-creator of Jessica Jones for Marvel, who has her own Disney+ series, and Pearl for Jinxworld. Michael's fine art work has also been the subject of a number of solo exhibitions and his art is in private collections worldwide. In 2015, at Galerie Ardulik in Paris, Michael had a solo exhibition of his original art from both Alias and Jessica Jones.
“Ben Percy was born to write noir. American Criminal is steeped in the elements of classic hardboiled fiction, but also manages to feel of the moment—pulsing with the power and tempo of a runaway train. This one’s got it all—seedy settings, nasty characters, and a conflicted protagonist you can’t help but root for. If you like dark tales that show you the underbelly of our world, you’ll devour American Criminal in a sitting, just like I did.” - Alex Segura, bestselling author of Secret Identity
About the author
BENJAMIN PERCY is the author of six novels – most recently The Unfamiliar Garden (William Morrow) – three story collections, and a book of essays. He writes Wolverine, X-Force, and Ghost Rider for Marvel Comics. He is currently adapting Urban Cowboy into a series for Paramount Plus and he co-wrote the film Summering (a selection of the 2022 Sundance Film Festival). His fiction and nonfiction have been published in Esquire (where he is a contributing editor), GQ, Time, Outside, Men's Journal, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Paris Review. His honors include the Whiting Award, the Plimpton Prize, two Pushcart Prizes, an NEA fellowship, the iHeartRadio Award for Best Scripted Podcast, and inclusion in Best American Short Stories and Best American Comics.
About the illustrator
MICHAEL GAYDOS has worked in the world of the illustrated word and graphic novel for nearly 30 years. His list of credits include work for Marvel, DC, Random House, Dark Horse, Image, IDW, NBC, White Wolf and Onyx Path among others. With writer Brian Michael Bendis, he is co-creator of Jessica Jones for Marvel, who has her own Disney+ series, and Pearl for Jinxworld. Michael's fine art work has also been the subject of a number of solo exhibitions and his art is in private collections worldwide. In 2015, at Galerie Ardulik in Paris, Michael had a solo exhibition of his original art from both Alias and Jessica Jones.
83 pages, Kindle Edition
Published March 28, 2023
About the author
Benjamin Percy
844 books1,234 followersBenjamin Percy is the author of seven novels -- most recently The Sky Vault (William Morrow) -- three short fiction collections, and a book of essays, Thrill Me, that is widely taught in creative writing classrooms. He writes Wolverine, X-Force, and Ghost Rider for Marvel Comics. His fiction and nonfiction have been published in Esquire (where he is a contributing editor), GQ, Time, Men's Journal, Outside, the Wall Street Journal, Tin House, and the Paris Review. His honors include an NEA fellowship, the Whiting Writer's Award, the Plimpton Prize, two Pushcart Prizes, the iHeart Radio Award for Best Scripted Podcast, and inclusion in Best American Short Stories and Best American Comics.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
May 30, 2025
This would work fine as a movie, too! A nicely twisted tale of high-value heists, following the well-worn beats, but doing it in a fine style. Nothing earth-shattering, but then I don't expect all my reads to be groundbreaking experiences.
February 27, 2024
He’s got a brother in a wheelchair who wrote a predictive algorithm called HEIST. He ripped off Irish gangsters and Chinese hackers at the deadliest motorcycle race in the world. He robbed the cartel that robbed the smugglers that stole the artwork off the walls of the Galleria Borghese in Rome. And he's got a girlfriend named Mimi that "sounds like I want everything, and maybe I do."
But now Colton Ward’s stuck in the wastes of Minnesota between a brutal Nordic gang, a crooked reservation-casino operator, and a federal agent who might not share Colton's philosophy of disruptive capitalism. Colton will tell you to “never double-cross a triple-crosser." But you'll never know if he's lying or not.
American Criminal is imagined with a cool sense of detail by the versatile and powerful Benjamin Percy. It’s illustrated by Michael Gaydos with ink and colors that give the book the feel of a graphic novel by the great team of Brubaker and Phillips or the engrossing Lazarus comics by Greg Rucka and Michael Clark.
Percy and Gaydos's American Criminal is a compact, high-velocity thrill ride, packed with characters you can feel for, root for, loathe and fear. It's the first book I've read from a stylish publisher whose name sounds like something out of a William Gibson novel, NeoTextCorp. And so far my neocortex is responding powerfully to the independent publisher’s savvy project to cross-pollinate potent crime and sci-fi stories with visionary artwork. It feels both like an homage to the bygone pulps and a serious stride into a more dynamic future for fans of word and image lovingly dipped in a bulletproof gloss of gleaming noir. If you know NeoTextCorp then you know all this already. If not, then American Criminal is a great place to start getting to know them.
But now Colton Ward’s stuck in the wastes of Minnesota between a brutal Nordic gang, a crooked reservation-casino operator, and a federal agent who might not share Colton's philosophy of disruptive capitalism. Colton will tell you to “never double-cross a triple-crosser." But you'll never know if he's lying or not.
American Criminal is imagined with a cool sense of detail by the versatile and powerful Benjamin Percy. It’s illustrated by Michael Gaydos with ink and colors that give the book the feel of a graphic novel by the great team of Brubaker and Phillips or the engrossing Lazarus comics by Greg Rucka and Michael Clark.
Percy and Gaydos's American Criminal is a compact, high-velocity thrill ride, packed with characters you can feel for, root for, loathe and fear. It's the first book I've read from a stylish publisher whose name sounds like something out of a William Gibson novel, NeoTextCorp. And so far my neocortex is responding powerfully to the independent publisher’s savvy project to cross-pollinate potent crime and sci-fi stories with visionary artwork. It feels both like an homage to the bygone pulps and a serious stride into a more dynamic future for fans of word and image lovingly dipped in a bulletproof gloss of gleaming noir. If you know NeoTextCorp then you know all this already. If not, then American Criminal is a great place to start getting to know them.
May 24, 2026
I’ve read several of Benjamin Percy’s novellas and this one is easily the best.
In fact, seeing it’s been optioned as either a movie or show by Amazon isn’t surprising either as it lends itself to a good heist story. It’s certainly no Don Winslow Crime 101, but if that novella is a 95 this is a solid 81-82? I hope for more stories about the narrator or a novel length book maybe?
In fact, seeing it’s been optioned as either a movie or show by Amazon isn’t surprising either as it lends itself to a good heist story. It’s certainly no Don Winslow Crime 101, but if that novella is a 95 this is a solid 81-82? I hope for more stories about the narrator or a novel length book maybe?
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews