Stephen J. Golds pens a masterful blend of gritty street prose and lyrical elegance in his latest offering “Love Like Bleeding Out with an Empty Gun in Your Hand” – out April 30 from Close to the Bone Publishing.
While it may feel like a long book title, Love Like Bleeding Out describes the poetry and short stories found within its pages to a tee. There’s love here. And hard times.
You get an idea what you’re in for at the outset when quotes from both Al Capone and Charles Bukowski stand up to let you in the author’s world. You get the feeling Golds may give you a mental scar or two.
The opening yarn provides the first scar and is the book’s namesake. We find two down-on-their luck crooks suffering amongst the beauty of an orange grove, while the narrator laments a life wasted. His only saving grace? A woman named Clarissa who doesn’t give a damn whether he lives or dies.
With poems such as the stark, melancholy “October City” to the dead fish of “Fate,” Golds delivers one blow after another, proving that his worth in the realm of verse is just as deserved as his talent in prose.
Bristol Noir founder and thriller author John Bowie offers a sincere, heartfelt introduction to Stephen’s kick-ass collection. Love Like Bleeding Out with an Empty Gun in Your Hand may very well turn out to be one of crime fiction’s most-talked about short prose collections of 2021.
Follow the author on Twitter @SteveGone58. Preorder the book here.
Patrick Whitehurst 