Baby Queen - by Ty Landers (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

"A terrific debut. A taut, wholly unique thriller with great characters told with confidence and flair." ⎯ Dennis Lehane

For lovers of Ozark or Breaking Bad, a page-turning debut involving an Alabama family business, a dead body, a dogged investigator, and three generations of women who are forced to confront the secrets, betrayals, and buried crimes that haunt their family.

When a queen bee can no longer do her job, the worker bees will kill her, producing a new baby queen.

A perfectly preserved but very dead body is found in a barrel of honey, and the town of Noccalula, Alabama, will never be the same.

Natalie Link has inherited the family honey farm from her beloved grandmother Lana, who raised Nat after her mother ran off to Los Angeles chasing stardom. But it turns out Nat has no idea what Lana has been hiding in the hives. Is Nat up to running what turns out to be a business enterprise of questionable repute? Suddenly she is caught between her grandmother's very frightening partners and the ex-cop with a grudge who's been looking into her family since she was a kid.

Bob Sauk torpedoed his once promising law enforcement career chasing a lead he couldn't prove. He has always believed that Lana Link was a murderer. Will he finally get the chance to prove he was right all along? And what happens when Nat's Hollywood star mom returns to town after twenty-five years?

Full of secrets, murder, and Alabama fried frog legs, Baby Queen is a sharp-as-a-blade tale of family crime.

Review Quotes

"A terrific debut. A taut, wholly unique thriller with great characters told with confidence and flair."

- Dennis Lehane

"Baby Queen is rich, funny, and a spectacularly great read. I loved it. If Ty Landers keeps writing this well, he may end up being the next Elmore Leonard." - Robert Crais

"The tension never lets up in this enthusiastically recommended debut from Landers. It's Southern noir at its best: morally ambiguous protagonists engaged in a desperate conflict with chillingly brutish bad guys." - Library Journal, starred review

"A harrowing neo-noir about a fledgling entrepreneur who dredges up family secrets when she returns to Alabama to care for her tyrannical grandmother. . . . Landers balances offbeat humor with dark depictions of traumatic family bonds, turning Natalie's homecoming into a wickedly entertaining fight for survival. It's an auspicious first effort." - Publishers Weekly

"Landers, an Alabama native living in Milwaukee, has crafted a slick southern crime story with 'Justified' vibes." - Minnesota Star Tribune, Best books of fall list

"Riveting...Full-of-surprises set pieces keep the action going at a terrifying clip...Compelling characters and propulsive action drive this highly energetic thriller."

- Kirkus Reviews

"A promising debut...Landers redefines the western honey bee through the story of the Link ladies....family drama plays out in a startling, rich environment inspired by the honey bees....The characters of Loblolly County, Alabama, are keenly fashioned....fans of the epic Breaking Bad will enjoy the read." - Booklist

"Fresh, original suspense with a Southern accent, Baby Queen announces Ty Landers as a highly literate, authentic new voice in crime fiction. The writing is alive, the story gripping, and the irresistible, complicated characters deliver surprises all the way through. There's no way to put this one down until it's over." - James A. McLaughlin, Edgar Award-winning author of Bearskin

"Ty Landers drags you straight into the wreckage--danger humming, humor cutting sharp, beauty flickering where it shouldn't. Baby Queen hits hard, fearless and fully alive." - Ivy Pochoda, author of Sing Her Down and Ecstasy

"Ty Landers has a Daniel Woodrell-like gift for finding beauty in hard places. And make no mistake, Baby Queen is filled with those hard places, but it's also equal parts menace and black humor, each rendered through Landers's bone-deep Southern roots. This is a debut as assured as any you'll ever read and an instant classic. Count me a huge fan." - Tod Goldberg, New York Times bestselling author of Only Way Out