Pearce is a hard man. He’s an ex-con who’s seen and heard it all. Until two men show up at his door and announce with their fists that they need his help. They tell him they hear he “went soft” when his mum died. This is the Baxter family when they need a favor. May Baxter is pregnant. Wallace, her husband, was displeased to hear that the child is not his. But instead of leaving May, he can’t leave her alone. Her husband is stalking her. The Baxter men haven’t taken kindly to this. They want Pearce to give them a hand. Babysitting May Baxter. Pearce balks. But when his only love in the world, his pooch, three-legged Dandie Dinmont Hilda, is dog-napped, he knows he has to save her. And help the Baxters by dint of saving his girl from whatever fate Wallace holds in store, for who else could it be that would threaten a man’s best friend? Thank God the Baxters let him know what an animal hater the man is. Now it’s to meet fist with fist, face to face and man to man. And whoever is left standing is the real hard man.

Allan Guthrie has followed up his snappy TWO-WAY SPLIT and the so cruel KISS HER GOODBYE with a novel of violence, humor and deeply cynical pathos. Because we all have, somewhere inside of us, a brutal survivor ready to hold court in a dark alleyway, we can all get behind Pearce, a tough guy seeking vengeance for his wee dog. Guthrie keeps his edge sharp and the reader on edge with HARD MAN.

Jennifer Jordan