Baxter House Editions, a division of DarkWinter Press New Release: One-Eyed Jacks by Brad Smith!

Baxter House Editions, a division of DarkWinter Press, is excited to announce the re-release of the fabulous "1950s Toronto noir" novel One-Eyed Jacks by Brad Smith, available now in paperback and e-version for Kindle. You can buy it here!

About One-Eyed Jacks:

At 35, Tommy Cochrane is a washed-up boxer who missed out on a shot at the heavyweight title and has to hang up his gloves for good when he's diagnosed with an aneurysm. His best friend and former sparring partner, T-Bone Pike, isn't in great shape either as the two of them head to Toronto on a quest for the $5,000 Tommy desperately needs to buy back his grandfather's farm.

In the big city, Tommy and T-Bone encounter an intriguing cast of characters operating on the questionable side of the tracks. Fat Ollie runs the weekly poker game on Queen Street; Buzz Murdoch gives Tommy a job as a doorman at the Bamboo club; Herm Bell is a sharp kid on a run of luck; and Tony Broad is a small-time hood with big-time ambitions and a seedy sidekick named Billy Callahan. There's also Lee Charles, a sharp, cynical, smart-mouthed torch singer, who happens to be Tommy's ex-girlfriend.

In the tradition of James Ellroy, Brad Smith has readers instantly embroiled in a quick-paced plot that involves guns and money, good guys and bad guys, double and triple crosses, and an exciting, suspenseful payoff. An unerring tradition of '50s Ontario, rich in local colour and with the kind of crackling dialogue that drives an Elmore Leonard novel, One-Eyed Jacks is a great read that opens up the underbelly of Toronto the Good.

Praise for One-Eyed Jacks:

““{An} absorbing story of Toronto in the fifties with some good sex, bad beatings, stupid thefts, and senseless killings. But it’s also a good novel about friendship that gets closer to the spirit of Charles Dickens than a lot of mainstream middlebrow doodling … Brad Smith reminds us, as good novelists always do, that two hearts can beat as one.”

—The Globe And Mail

“One-Eyed Jacks is a crime novel set in the last days of the Age of the Fedora...few Canadian writers seem to be able to deal with the subject of the criminal and semi-criminal underclass of our big cities with any authority. Brad Smith does have this authority...his plot is a good one, and has the same suspense as a whodunnit.”

— Toronto Star

“Smith has written tight, fast-paced novels his entire career.”

— The Chronicle Herald

“Rivals Elmore Leonard at his best.”

— Publishers Weekly

“Smith has great reserves of tenderness.”

— The New York Times Book Review

“Smith has marvelous control of his material.”

— Booklist

About Brad Smith:

Award-winning author Brad Smith is a novelist/screenwriter, born and raised in southern Ontario. To date he has published fifteen novels. BILLY CRAWFORD’S DOUBLE PLAY (2025) was long-listed for the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour. THE RETURN OF KID COOPER (2018) won the Spur Award for best western novel from the Western Writers of America. His novels ONE-EYED JACKS and COPPERHEAD ROAD were short-listed for the Dashiell Hammett Award. He adapted his book ALL HAT to feature film, starring Keith Carradine and Luke Kirby. He now lives in a 100-year-old farmhouse near the north shore of Lake Erie, where he tinkers, respectively, on his vintage cars and his golf swing.