Quando Hap e Leonard vengono contattati da un loro vecchio amico, Marvin Hanson, non immaginano lontanamente cosa gli sta per succedere. Gadget, la nipote di Hanson, si è innamorata di uno spacciatore che la sfrutta per i suoi loschi scopi e la picchia senza pietà. Un'occasione per Hap e Leonard di menare le mani, dare una bella lezione, fare un po' di pulizia e riportare la dolce e fragile fanciulla tra le braccia del nonno: insomma, un gioco da ragazzi. Ma come al solito, la situazione precipita, e ci scappa un cane lanciato lalla finestra di un camper, un bel po' di teste rotte e un proiettile conficcato nella coscia del pusher. Per di più Hap decide di buttare nel cesso tutta la cocaina che c'è in giro, per un valore di migliaia di dollari. Un errore che porterà i nostri eroi a una lotta senza limiti, tra inseguimenti e colpi di scena, voltafaccia e tradimenti, e che li costringerà ad affrontare un gioco più grande di loro.
E per finire, si troveranno faccia a faccia con un killer spietato e leggendario, chiamato Vanilla Ride, e dopo quell'incontro le loro vite non saranno più le stesse.

Tornano in libreria Hap e Leonard, gli esilaranti protagonisti della serie più amata di Joe R. Lansdale, in un romanzo tumultuoso e coinvolgente, che trascina il lettore fino all'ultima pagina.

Che ci fa Buffalo Bill (o meglio, la sua testa) a bordo di uno Zeppelin diretto verso il Giappone? Ovvio, porta in tournée il suo spettacolo viaggiante, il Wild West Show. Ma che fine ha fatto il resto del suo corpo? E soprattutto, la sua è una missione così innocua come sembra? O nasconde qualcosa?
Solo Joe R. Lansdale poteva scrivere un romanzo tanto imprevedibile e bizzarro, mescolando i generi come nessun altro sa fare. Solo lui poteva mettere insieme tanti personaggi eterogenei usciti dalla penna dei grandi scrittori popolari. Solo lui poteva gestire questo rutilante carosello di avventure nel quale non c’è mai limite alla fantasia. E se pensate che l’Uomo di Latta di Frank Baum o il Capitano Nemo di Verne non possano più riservare sorprese, vi sbagliate. Leggere per credere.

Un nuovo viaggio nella selvaggia immaginazione di Joe R. Lansdale, una delle opere più istrioniche dello scrittore texano, irriverente e imprevedibile rivisitazione delle leggende del vecchio West.

Dove sono le stelle? Perché chi si avvicina ai confini del drive-in muore orribilmente? E chi può avere interesse a tenere in ostaggio una folla istupidita, imbarbarita, inferocita, costretta oltretutto a vedere ininterrottamente "La notte dei morti viventi"? E la paura dilaga, anche al di qua degli schermi giganti su cui scorrono le immagini. Mentre in un primo momento a coloro che tentavano la fuga dal drive-in era riservata una fine orrenda, ora le cose sembrano andare diversamente: pare ci sia qualche temerario che possa varcare la soglia impenetrabile oltre la quale si vede solo il buio assoluto...

Introduction by Joe Hill

In this career horror retrospective, World Horror Grandmaster Joe R. Lansdale (Bubba Ho-tep; Hap and Leonard) tackles racism and human cruelty as de­ftly as he conjures demon nuns and Elder Gods. Featuring an original introduction from Joe Hill, this much-anticipated volume showcases the best of Lansdale’s terrifying short stories—menacing, astute, and wildly inappropriate.

Bestselling author Joe R. Lansdale is known for his gritty mysteries and his eccentric horror. As an eleven-time Bram Stoker Award winner, Joe Lansdale cooks up an inimitable recipe of Southern Gothic and Southern fried chicken that continues to delight his many fans and influence generations of horror legends.

Lansdale mashes up crime, Gothic, mystery, fantasy, and science-fiction, filtered through a raw, violent world of dark humor and unique characters. Lansdale is one of the early American horror writers to portray racism not as abstract but as realistic, intimate, and impossible to ignore.

In Lansdale’s nightmarish visions, you’ll discover psychotic demon nuns, a psychopathic preacher, cannibals, 80-year-old Elvis, undead strippers, ­ flying ghost fish, Elder Gods, possessed cars, and the worst evil of all: mankind.

Contents

Introduction by Joe Hill
“The Folding Man”
“Hoodoo Man and the Midnight Train”
“God of the Razor”
“My Dead Dog Bobby”
“Tight Little Stitches in a Deadman’s Back”
“By Bizarre Hands”
On the Far Side of the Cadillac Desert with Dead Folk
“Love Doll: A Fable”
“Mister Weed-Eater”
“The Bleeding Shadow”
“Not From Detroit”
“The Hungry Snow”
“Dog, Cat, and Baby”
Bubba Ho-tep
“Fish Night”
“Night They Missed the Horror Show”

From pulp adventures such as Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Carson of Venus to classic short stories such as Ray Bradbury’s “The Long Rain”, the planet Venus has loomed large in the imaginations of science fiction writers. Here, that steamy, swampy jungle world with strange creatures lurking amidst the dripping vegetation is explored in sixteen all-new stories collected by bestselling author George R. R. Martin and editor Gardner Dozois.

Harvey Dent - former friend of Bruce Wayne, now the deadly, duality-obsessed villain Two-Face - hatches a plot of horrifying proportions. As a series of plastic surgeons are killed, a real-estate agent is seduced into a plot of blackmail and murder, all to steal an island from Bruce Wayne.

Hap Collins and Leonard Pine are in for an action-packed adventure when they cross paths with a towering Pentecostal preacher, a midget with a giant attitude, and a gang of bikers turned soldiers of fortune. Even though a midlife crisis just hit Hap Collins like a runaway pickup truck, he's still got his job, he knows his best friend, Leonard Pine, will always be there for him, and of course he's got his main squeeze, Brett Sawyer. Things hit a new low, however, when Brett's daughter, Tillie, who has been walking on the wrong side of the law suddenly stands in need of a rescue. It's won't be easy—it never is—but nothing is going to stop Hap and Leonard as they hit the road destined for Hootie Hoot, Oklahoma to shake things up. And with Hap and Leonard at the wheel this promises to be a wild ride.

Hap Collins and Leonard Pine return in a red-hot, mayhem-fueled thriller to face a vampire cult, the Dixie Mafia, and the deadliest assassin they’ve ever encountered—Devil Red.
When their friend Marvin asks Hap and Leonard to look into a cold-case double murder, they’re more than happy to play private investigators: they like trouble, and they especially like getting paid to find it. It turns out that both of the victims were set to inherit serious money, and one of them ran with a vampire cult. The more closely Hap and Leonard look over the crime-scene photos, the more they see, including the image of a red devil’s head painted on a tree. A little research turns up a slew of murders with that same fiendish signature. And if that’s not enough, Leonard has taken to wearing a deerstalker cap . . . Will this be the case that finally sends Hap over the edge?
Full up with Lansdale’s trademark—whip-smart dialogue, relentless pacing, and unorthodox-to-say-the-least characters— Devil Red is one rambunctious thrill ride by one hell of a writer.

"There's no bullshit in a Joe Lansdale book. There's everything a good story needs, and nothing it doesn't.
Joe pulls up the truck, says, 'Get in the back, we're going for a ride.'You know it might get a little
scary and it might get a little crazy, but you get in, because you know in the end, it's going to
be a fun ride."--Christopher Moore, New York Times Bestselling Author of A Dirty Job and Fool
In this Texas-sized thriller, Hap Collins and Leonard Pine—best friends, freelance troublemakers, and tough guys with good intentions—find themselves in the crosshairs of the Dixie Mafia.
Hap is an East Texas smart mouth with a weakness for southern women. Leonard is a gay, black veteran pining for a lost love. They’re not the makings of your typical dynamic duo, but never underestimate the power of a shared affinity for stirring up trouble and causing mayhem. When an old friend asks Leonard to rescue his daughter from an abusive, no-good drug dealer, he gladly agrees and, of course, invites Hap along for the fun. Even though the dealer may be lowly, he is on the bottom rung of the Dixie Mafia, and when Hap and Leonard come calling, the Mafia feels a little payback is in order. Cars crash, shotguns blast, and people die, but Hap and Leonard come out on top. Unfortunately for them, now they’re facing not only jail time but also the legendary—and lethal—Vanilla Ride, who is still out to claim the price on their heads. Full of twists and turns, gunfire and gaffes, this hilarious, rip-roaring novel will have readers turning the pages faster than a Texas tornado.

Hap Collins and Leonard Pine find mucho trouble, this time in Mexico, when they come face to face with a nudist mobster, his seven-foot strong-arm, a octogenarian knife-touting fisherman, and, somehow, an armadillo. When Hap Collins saves the life of his employer's daughter, he is rewarded with a Caribbean Cruise, and he convinces his best friend Leonard Pine to come along. However, when the cruise sails on without them, stranding them in Playa del Carmen with nothing but their misfortune and Leonard's new ridiculous hat, the two quickly find themselves drawn into a vicious web of sordid violence. When they return to East Texas, they find that trouble has beaten them back, and when trouble's around it doesn't take long for Hap and Leonard to find it.

With his trademark knack for gut-busting laughter and head-splitting action, Joe R. Lansdale serves up a bubbling cauldron of murder and mayhem that only he could create. Hap Collins has just returned home from a gig working on an off shore oil rig. With a new perspective on life, Hap wants to change the way he's living, and shoot the straight and narrow. That is until the man who stole Leonard Pine's boyfriend turns up headless in a ditch and Leonard gets fingered for the murder. Hap vows to clear Leonard's name, but things only get more complicated when Leonard's ex shows up dead. To the police it is just a matter of gay-biker infighting, but to Hap and Leonard murder is always serious business, and these hit a little to close to home.

Hap and Leonard return in this incredible, mad-dash thriller, loaded with crack addicts, a serial killer, and a body count. Leonard is still nursing the injuries he sustained in the duo's last wild undertaking when he learns that his Uncle Chester has passed. Hap is of course going to be there for his best friend, and when the two are cleaning up Uncle Chester's dilapidated house, they uncover a dark little secret beneath the house's rotting floor boards—a small skeleton buried in a trunk. Hap wants to call the police. Leonard, being a black man in east Texas, persuades him this is not a good idea, and together they set out to clear Chester's name on their own. The only things standing in their way is a houseful of felons, a vicious killer, and possibly themselves.

Friday night at the Orbit Drive-in: a circus of noise, sex, teenage hormones, B-movie blood, and popcorn. On a cool, crisp summer night, with the Texas stars shining down like rattlesnake eyes, movie-goers for the All-Night Horror Show are trapped in the drive-in by a demonic-looking comet. Then the fun begins. If the movie-goers try to leave, their bodies dissolve into goo. Cowboys are reduced to tears. Lovers quarrel. Bikini-clad women let their stomachs’ sag, having lost the ambition to hold them in. The world outside the six monstrous screens fades to black while the movie-goers spiral into base humanity, resorting to fighting, murdering, crucifying, and cannibalizing to survive. Part dark comedy part horror show, Lansdale's cult Drive-In books are as shocking and entertaining today as they were 20 years ago.