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Hell or High Water (St. Martin’s/Thomas Dunne, 2012) is available in hardcover, e-book, or audiobook (Dreamscape, 2012). It was chosen as a Summer 2012 Okra Pick by the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance, as a Summer Beach Read by WorkingMother.com, and as the September 2012 book of the month by Las Comadres and Friends National Latino Book Club.
Kirkus Reviews named Hell or High Water a Best Book of 2012, and the Kansas City Star named it one of the Top 100 Books of 2012. It will appear in German from Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag in 2013, and in 2014 in French from Gallimard’s historic Série Noire line. It has been optioned for film or television by producers Zoe Saldana, Cisely Saldana, Jane Startz, and Aida Bernal.
Reviews
| "Exquisite New Orleans background, intriguing newsroom politics and atmosphere, a flawed but plucky heroine, and skillfully paced suspense make this a stay-up-way-past-your-bedtime read." |
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| "Castro's first mystery is fierce and intense, with both harrowing depictions of New Orleans after Katrina and psychological mayhem for its troubled heroine, who crawls under your skin and lingers there long after you've finished reading." |
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"Nola pursues the story . . . with a soulful affection for her battered yet still beautiful city." |
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| "Hell or High Water is an edge-of-the-seat thriller, a page turner with so many twists and hidden clues and sudden light beaming down that I have already reread the whole thing, eager to find the early indicators of the great surprises launched by Castro at all the key points of the book. History book, sociological study, criminal analysis, love story, thriller, and immigrant epic: Hell or High Water has it all, and Castro does it all so well." |
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"The laborious acts of physical rebuilding and personal recovery become scintillating themes in Joy Castro's compelling mystery fiction debut . . . just the beginning of what should be a long-running series." |
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"A gritty and suspenseful thriller set in post-Katrina New Orleans--damaged yet unbeaten--and told through the eyes of crime reporter Nola Soledad Céspedes."
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| "Memoirist Joy Castro has written a terrific debut novel that blends crime investigation with personal catharsis in post-Katrina New Orleans. . . .
I really enjoyed Nola’s fresh voice, her point of view on the 'real' New Orleans, and her musings on the lingering effects of the violation of a person or of a city." |
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"A new summer thriller is out and this one may scare you into sleeping with the lights on.... [O]nce you start Hell or High Water, it will be hard to put down. It’s a rock and roll ride from start to finish!" |
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"Joy Castro's fiction debut is a captivating story that parallels the rape of a woman to that of New Orleans itself: the destruction, the despair, the death. And the imagery of water, with the conflicting powers to maintain life as well as to annihilate it, weaves its way throughout the tale." |
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