The Devil Raises His Own, Scott Phillips
The Devil Raises His Own, Scott Phillips
List: $19.99 | Sale: $13.99
Club: $9.99

The Devil Raises His Own

Author: Scott Phillips

Narrator: L.J. Ganser

Unabridged: 9 hr 22 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 08/06/2024


Synopsis

Los Angeles, 1916: Photographer Bill Ogden has opened a portrait studio in the seedy noir world of early Hollywood, where he is joined by his granddaughter, Flavia—a woman in need of a fresh start after bludgeoning her drunken, abusive husband to death in Wichita. Though his business is mainly legit, Bill finds himself brushing up against the “blue movie” porn industry growing in the shadows of the motion picture mainstream.

When a series of grisly murders take place across the city, Bill and his capable granddaughter are pulled into events as tricky and tangled as anything this side of The Big Sleep. We meet dreamers, opportunists, washed-up former stars and starry-eyed newcomers, a cast of unforgettable characters living on the margins looking to make a quick buck, launch a career, or just keep their family together.

The Devil Raises His Own is at once a stripped-down noir thriller and a panoramic look at Los Angeles at the beginning of motion pictures—a Boogie Nights set in the era of D.W. Griffith and Charlie Chaplin from one of the best crime novelists working today.

About Scott Phillips

Scott Phillips is a screenwriter, photographer, and the author of eight novels and a short story collection. His bestselling debut novel, The Ice Harvest, was a New York Times Notable Book and was adapted as a major motion picture starring John Cusack and Billy Bob Thornton. He is the winner of the California Book Award, as well as being a finalist for the Edgar Award, the Hammett Prize, and the CWA Gold Dagger Award. Scott was born and raised in Wichita, Kansas, and lived for many years in France. He now lives with his wife and daughter in St. Louis, Missouri.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Geonn

Gritty, grimy, graphic, lots of male characters acting like ... well, gritty male characters, but with plenty of women who have their own POVs and are very clearly doing what they have to in order to survive. It was a bit too "hard-boiled crime" for me to regularly read the author, but definitely an......more

Goodreads review by Steve

I'd encountered the character Bill Ogden before, in Phillips Hop Alley, but he was also in Cottonwood, a novel I've somehow not read. At any rate, this isn't a sequel to either, though Bill is a prominent character among quite an ensemble of assorted and sometimes sordid personas. You may have heard......more

Goodreads review by Chris

A very pleasant read. The author does a great job of re-creating the 1916 LA atmosphere, between the characters themselves and the language they use, their mentality, the technologies available at the time, the blue movie industry, etc. He keeps the book fast-paced by moving the action in small touc......more

Goodreads review by Janet

I wasted an audiobook credit on this after seeing a NY Times recommendation. This is not the first time and I doubt I’ll be doing that again. A couple of stars for novelty and the historical aspect. QUITE raunchy which I wouldn’t mind if it was funny. It is not. And I strongly disliked the narrator......more

The title and cover art of THE DEVIL RAISES HIS OWN suggest that the reader is about to embark on another Scott Phillips noir novel. At the bottom of the scene on the cover is a smoking pistol belching a black miasma that envelops a night-time view of a large, perhaps crime-ridden city neighborhood.......more