Serious As a Heart Attack: A Novel

In a gritty thriller from the acclaimed author whom William Vollmann called "a real storyteller," a street-smart young woman takes what looks like an easy job and ends up having to solve a murder case -- before the next body that turns up is her own.

Queenie Sells is having what she thinks is a good day. After getting fired from her job at a calendar company for botching Daylight Savings, she is informally hired by a wealthy acquaintance to track down his girlfriend,… (more)

In a gritty thriller from the acclaimed author whom William Vollmann called "a real storyteller," a street-smart young woman takes what looks like an easy job and ends up having to solve a murder case -- before the next body that turns up is her own.

Queenie Sells is having what she thinks is a good day. After getting fired from her job at a calendar company for botching Daylight Savings, she is informally hired by a wealthy acquaintance to track down his girlfriend, a stripper named Trigger Happy. But Queenie's seemingly good luck turns hard when she finds Trigger dead in her apartment.

Now Queenie's daily routine of being a drunk smart-ass is put on hold as she becomes both a suspect for the murder and the target for an unknown predator. Hopping from bar to bar, from Coney Island clam stands to the Waldorf-Astoria, she inadvertently lands on the trail of Trigger's killer and puts herself in the line of fire.

Along the way she meets Rey, a private eye with a soft spot for tough-talking ladies; Detective Olds, the stuttering cop who thinks Queenie's the culprit; and a dozen New York denizens, among them a cult recruiter, a hit man, a thief, and even Rip Torn -- some strange, some sad, some sweet, and some deadly, every one dropping in and out of Queenie's life as she searches for each fragile piece of the puzzle that may eventually lead her to the truth.

With danger closing in on her, Queenie can't help but realize the precariousness of her own mortality. As she stares out of the window at an old lady on the corner, she thinks, "There is nothing separating you from that old lady right now -- maybe something, maybe time is all, but that's really nothing when you think about it." After all, thinks Queenie, it's just days. But unless she can find the killer before the killer finds her, Queenie's days are seriously numbered.