Brut
A Novel
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- Prenotazione
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- Uscita prevista: 22 set 2026
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- 9,99 €
Descrizione dell’editore
A propulsive, electrifying novel about a hitman who is forced to take an impossible job, by the rising literary sensation and comedian Sam Tallent, author of Running The Light
“With his American contract killer in Paris, Sam Tallent has created a protagonist you’ll never forget as the bodies pile up like cordwood. Brut comes on like a freight train and never stops. Violent, chilling, wonderfully well written, as modern as tomorrow—this is a novel for our times.”—Terry Hayes, New York Times bestselling author of I Am Pilgrim
Robert Beaujolais forfeited the last years of his youth to the Marines, watching his friends die. Beaujolais survived, but civilian life made him regret it. Compared to the truth of war, peace fit him like a casket. At least he was in love, even if he was the only one who could admit it. They were together—until they weren't.
Then, out of nothing, something: the architects of the world offer Beaujolais a job in the blood business. They prefer to call it arbitration, but Beauj knows murder—killing is his calling—and as an arbiter, Beauj is the ultimate judge.
But when Beaujolais botches a simple hit in San Francisco, his shadowy employers manifest to remind him that he is, in fact, capable of dying. Beauj is given a choice: kill or be erased. The destination is Paris; the target is Europe’s last remaining godfather, the Archangel of Florence.
A blistering tale of love and violence, Brut is the story of a man measuring the circumference of his soul in bulletholes. Is his or any other life worth saving? Only the arbiter can decide.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Stand-up comic Tallent (Running the Light) blends striking prose and rich characterization in this exceptional thriller centered on an ex-Marine turned hit man. Robert "Beauj" Beaujolais has his own brand of morality and a penchant for extreme violence, making him an easy fit with the private security job his best friend and lover, Benjamin "Benny" Stephenson, puts him up for. Beauj begins as a bodyguard for famous performers, CEOs, and other high-net-worth clients, and it's not long before his work progresses into contract killing. During a botched hit on a lawyer, Beauj is forced to kill the man's receptionist, who turns out to be the daughter of Europe's last remaining Mafia godfather, Massimo Di Giovanni. Hit man protocol demands that Beauj be executed for his error, but he's promised a hefty fee and freedom if he kills Di Giovanni, a man most in the criminal underworld consider untouchable ("Castles were less fortified"). The hunt for Di Giovanni is riveting, and the intense final scenes provide an immensely satisfying payoff to Beauj's character arc, but it's Tallent's ornate sentences ("A confetti of tawny leaves foliated their table"; "He sang along to the choruses, the lyrics flying out of him like locusts unearthing") that stand out most. This is a winner.