The Permanent Press: 217 books

Toucan Whisper, Toucan Sing is a novel about modern Mexico, the conflicting goals of development versus ecological preservation, and the aspirations and struggles of the indigenous people who service tourists at a beachfront hotel. Central to this tale are two brothers: the ambitious twenty-two-year...

At a young man’s funeral, the undertaker offers his thoughts on lifestyle, along with a hot tip on the big stakes race that afternoon. In another bizarre burial twist, two feuding misfit brothers speed across America in a battered Chevy, trying to fulfill their mother’s dying wish. Meanwhile,...

On Christmas Day, 1987, a brutal murder takes place. The victim? A young, pregnant woman waiting at a bus stop on a deserted street of a southern California town. The assassins? Two cold-blooded, professional hit men. The accomplices? Two San Rodino cops. And the witness? Sarah Calloway, investigative...

On the Mississippi Gulf Coast in 1964, a murderer stalked Bernice Starling, a local blues singer, and killed her by driving a knife into her chest. After the murder, her two teenaged daughters, Jubilee and Charlene, search for the killer, driving their mother’s antique red pick-up truck down sandy...

Townie takes place in Oldon, Massachusetts, a burgeoning New England village that has become the favored residence of the mega-rich, a town whose historic past has been preserved and polished until it gleams with the arrogant intensity of a Colonial theme park. Alan Lowe inhabits a different...

Maggie came to scenic little Lupine, Oregon, to live as a foster child in the Jarrett home. Thirteen years later, she’s a legitimate member of the family, living in the back yard cottage with two children. Her husband, Mo, has moved on to Texas in search of opportunity. He wants Maggie and their...

From the author of Littlejohn: A haunting novel that will “appeal to readers of Southern fiction and to genre fans who favor character-driven crime stories” (Booklist). Littlejohn McCain has been dead eleven years. In that time, his daughter has divorced one husband and buried another....

Don’t torture yourself, Ruth Crowder Flood has always told Harry Stein. Don’t let your life be ruined by what might have been. But he can’t help it. And, in truth, neither can she. In the one short moment that was theirs, Ruth had too much pride and Harry didn’t have enough courage. In the...

The Sorcerer weaves the mystery of the cave paintings into the story of a youth, crippled by a bear’s attack, who had become useless to his hunter society. In his attempt to win respect he apprentices himself to the tribe’s witch doctor in order to learn the secrets of sorcery.

Paula DiPerna’s first novel combines historical and scientific fact with a fictional, behind-the-scenes look at what might have been had there been a woman on Columbus’s voyages. Christopher Columbus’s wife, Felipa Moniz Perestrello, died in approximately 1484. If she had lived, this would be...

Obsession takes over two lives: one brazenly, the other more sneakily in this witty black comedy of lust, academia, and Southern manners. When bachelor history professor, Max Finster, arrives in the university community of Oxford, Mississippi, and moves in next door to Don and Susan Shapiro, all of...

The year is 1955, and the world of Danny Meadoff spins with ease and stability. Eisenhower is president, soul groups are black, NBA teams are white. Fathers do not speak with sons. The Dodgers have jumped out to an early lead and look to meet the Yankees in the Series. And, according to universal...

This finely etched account of the disintegration of morale in an Eighth Air Force squadron in England during World War II when its losses were staggering, is told through the eyes of a young bombardier named Whipple who had been injured before completing his tour of duty. He is relying on his now-healed...

Just turned forty and living alone, Tim Bannon is sliding comfortably into midlife crisis when his orphaned niece and nephew arrive on his doorstep. Though Tim loves these two children, he has his doubts about being in loco parentis. For starters, he is gay and the year is 1990—long before the age...