What do you think?
Rate this book
Dig Two Graves
Dig Two Graves alternates between two time periods
1973
In Laos a Secret War has been raging between the United States aided Royal Laotian Government and the communist Pathet Laotian faction. Lan has fled his village due to the war and leads a band of guerrilla fighters against a ruthless, amoral Colonel and a drug trading Air America pilot.
1988
In Charleston, South Carolina follow the exploits of Luke, a bail bondsman, where, eventually, both timelines intersect.
1973
In Laos a Secret War has been raging between the United States aided Royal Laotian Government and the communist Pathet Laotian faction. Lan has fled his village due to the war and leads a band of guerrilla fighters against a ruthless, amoral Colonel and a drug trading Air America pilot.
1988
In Charleston, South Carolina follow the exploits of Luke, a bail bondsman, where, eventually, both timelines intersect.
91 pages, Kindle Edition
Published September 25, 2020
1 person is currently reading
2 people want to read
About the author
Andrew Davie
60 books6 followersAndrew Davie has worked in theater, finance, and education. He taught English in Macau on a Fulbright Grant and has survived a ruptured brain aneurysm and subarachnoid hemorrhage. in January 2022, he'll begin a Clinical Mental Health MA program.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
October 8, 2020
Every so often an author will come along who writes in the exact style that you love and for me Andrew Davie is one of those authors. His slow burn crime novellas have truly captured my imagination and his recently published second bolsters his reputation in my mind. Dig Two Graves is set across two different times and locations, first, the war torn jungles of Laos, where we meet CIA pilot, Earl and to North Carolina in 1988, following Luke, a tough, young bail bondsman.
Davie is able to bring a vivid, visual style to his action scenes while also deliver character beats even down to the tertiary characters in the book. He’s a dab hand of giving a lot from a little bit of page and imbues his characters with just enough personality or history for your mind to fill in the blanks. He even bustles in some film references, which if you’ve read his various short works scattered across the internet (and neatly collected together on Davie’s website), you’ll know that there is often a cinematic bent to these including a memorable story of alternative directors for Back to the Future.
Davie is certainly one of my new favourite writers and this book is an absolute thrill to read. I’ll be looking to re-read Pavement before it’s impending sequel Ouroburos is published in December.
If you are looking for a place to start, I would highly recommend Davie’s short story on the All Due Respect blog, which you can find a link to as well as some others at my Author Spotlight of Davie.
Davie is able to bring a vivid, visual style to his action scenes while also deliver character beats even down to the tertiary characters in the book. He’s a dab hand of giving a lot from a little bit of page and imbues his characters with just enough personality or history for your mind to fill in the blanks. He even bustles in some film references, which if you’ve read his various short works scattered across the internet (and neatly collected together on Davie’s website), you’ll know that there is often a cinematic bent to these including a memorable story of alternative directors for Back to the Future.
Davie is certainly one of my new favourite writers and this book is an absolute thrill to read. I’ll be looking to re-read Pavement before it’s impending sequel Ouroburos is published in December.
If you are looking for a place to start, I would highly recommend Davie’s short story on the All Due Respect blog, which you can find a link to as well as some others at my Author Spotlight of Davie.
December 26, 2020
This is an engaging and suspenseful book that merges two storylines in an exciting and unexpected way.
October 12, 2020
Dig Two Graves by Andrew Davie is a tense, gritty, gruesome rush of a story that is set in two timelines and two places: Laos during the Vietnam War, when the CIA assisted local Hmong natives in their fight against the Communist Pathet Lao, and Charleston, South Carolina in the 1980s, where a bail bondsman goes about his business tracking down criminals. The story bounces between these two locales, and I was waiting to see the relationship between the plotlines, until it became clear in a decently satisfying twist that added momentum to an already kinetic story.
The plot rockets along (the novella is 91 pages) and the chapters are short and punchy with little to no fat. One remarkable impression I got from the book was the level of authentic knowledge that was present, from the paramilitary history of Air America to the ins and outs of opium production -- the book is dripping with tough-guy lore that is 100% believable.
The ending of the novella is like that of a good action movie where, in typical good action movie fashion, you see the perils of a gang of outlaws taking a dangerous person for granted. If I had one criticism of the book it is that the cast of characters at the end became a little bit difficult to nail down and tell apart; not impossibly so, as I could still follow the action, it's just that with slightly more differentiation among the characters it would have been more vivid. But that's a minor issue. Overall I enjoyed the cinematic experience of the entertaining blood-and-guts revenge story and I would read other books by Andrew Davie.
The plot rockets along (the novella is 91 pages) and the chapters are short and punchy with little to no fat. One remarkable impression I got from the book was the level of authentic knowledge that was present, from the paramilitary history of Air America to the ins and outs of opium production -- the book is dripping with tough-guy lore that is 100% believable.
The ending of the novella is like that of a good action movie where, in typical good action movie fashion, you see the perils of a gang of outlaws taking a dangerous person for granted. If I had one criticism of the book it is that the cast of characters at the end became a little bit difficult to nail down and tell apart; not impossibly so, as I could still follow the action, it's just that with slightly more differentiation among the characters it would have been more vivid. But that's a minor issue. Overall I enjoyed the cinematic experience of the entertaining blood-and-guts revenge story and I would read other books by Andrew Davie.
October 8, 2020
Andrew Davie has taught English and writing in New York, Virginia, Macau (on a Fulbright Grant), and Hong Kong. He has roots in New York. Currently, he hosts the podcast A Fistful of Faceful, and you can usually find him on Twitter @adavieauthor His novella, Dig Two Graves, is a short thriller, with a sequel in motion, Ouroboros scheduled to be released by All Due Respect Books in December 2020.
If the sequel is anything like Dig Two Graves, I can’t wait to read it. Dig Two Graves straddles two worlds, yet somehow manages to bring them together before the end this gritty thriller. Davie has a way of pulling you in with the immediacy of the story, as evolving plot kidnaps your senses for ransom. I feel no shame in identifying with Howard. After all, a coin flip is needed to determine if he’s an antagonist or protagonist in this fast-paced, exciting read. Dig Two Graves is fantastic. Bring on the sequel Ouroboros.
If the sequel is anything like Dig Two Graves, I can’t wait to read it. Dig Two Graves straddles two worlds, yet somehow manages to bring them together before the end this gritty thriller. Davie has a way of pulling you in with the immediacy of the story, as evolving plot kidnaps your senses for ransom. I feel no shame in identifying with Howard. After all, a coin flip is needed to determine if he’s an antagonist or protagonist in this fast-paced, exciting read. Dig Two Graves is fantastic. Bring on the sequel Ouroboros.
October 6, 2020
Two intersecting narratives, one in 1973 Laos and the other in 1988 Charleston. Earl is a crooked Air America pilot who flies opium for the sadistic Colonel; Luke is a well-armed bail bondsman paid to find a horrifically scarred man's daughter.
Like the author's novel Pavement, Dig Two Graves is an excellent addition to new hardboiled fiction. The pacing was brisk, the plotting unexpected, and, given that I knew the Golden Triangle from my own research, the details of setting well-chosen and convincing. If anything, DTG is even more hardboiled than Pavement and for a reader like me that can only be welcome.
E-books and Kindle made the crime novella a more feasible option for publishers and in recent years it has had a renaissance. With Dig Two Graves, Davie shows himself to be among the most exciting and least compromising writers on the scene.
Like the author's novel Pavement, Dig Two Graves is an excellent addition to new hardboiled fiction. The pacing was brisk, the plotting unexpected, and, given that I knew the Golden Triangle from my own research, the details of setting well-chosen and convincing. If anything, DTG is even more hardboiled than Pavement and for a reader like me that can only be welcome.
E-books and Kindle made the crime novella a more feasible option for publishers and in recent years it has had a renaissance. With Dig Two Graves, Davie shows himself to be among the most exciting and least compromising writers on the scene.
October 17, 2020
Dig Two Graves starts with two separate stories. One tells the story of Earl, an Air America pilot working for the C.I.A. flying missions in Laos in 1973 during the Vietnam War. The other thread relates the story of Luke, a Bail Bondsman in Charlotte, South Carolina in 1988. About halfway through this short novel the two stories converge and it’s all out action from there on in, as the tale races to a bloody, lethal climax.
I hadn’t heard of Andrew Davie before reading this novel but this is a great but all too short read. He succinctly manages to create believable characters and as the story reveals itself, I found that my empathy shifted between the main protagonists. It’s also packed with violence and some great action sequences which are both thrilling and believable. All round a brilliant short read that can be devoured quite quickly.
I hadn’t heard of Andrew Davie before reading this novel but this is a great but all too short read. He succinctly manages to create believable characters and as the story reveals itself, I found that my empathy shifted between the main protagonists. It’s also packed with violence and some great action sequences which are both thrilling and believable. All round a brilliant short read that can be devoured quite quickly.
September 26, 2020
Brilliant!
I will have two books on my nightstand, the Bible and the next
Andrew Davie opus....hoping that the next book is forthcoming!
I will have two books on my nightstand, the Bible and the next
Andrew Davie opus....hoping that the next book is forthcoming!
November 10, 2020
This action packed thriller is very well written, hard to put down, and absolutely entertaining. Two characters with two time-lines converge and wow, the excitement begins. A great read.
April 29, 2021
Well done, short, but oh so sweet!
Great , quick read! Best served cold is the plot, and our hero gets it done nicely.....Almost a believable fictional tale...
Great , quick read! Best served cold is the plot, and our hero gets it done nicely.....Almost a believable fictional tale...
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews