Everybody Knows

A Novel

De: Jordan Harper

Narrado por: Megan Tusing, William DeMeritt

In this thrilling mystery from an Edgar Award winning author, a fearless black-bag publicist exposes the belly of the L.A. beast.

“The best mystery novel I've read in years.” —James Patterson, #1 bestselling author

Welcome to Mae Pruett’s Los Angeles, where “Nobody talks. But everybody whispers.” As a “black-bag” publicist tasked not with letting the good news out but keeping the bad news in, Mae works for one of LA’s most powerful and sought-after crisis PR firms, at the center of a sprawling web of lawyers, PR flaks, and private security firms she calls “The Beast.” They protect the rich and powerful and depraved by any means necessary.

After her boss is gunned down in front of the Beverly Hills Hotel in a random attack, Mae takes it upon herself to investigate and runs headfirst into The Beast’s lawless machinations and the twisted systems it exists to perpetuate. It takes her on a roving neon joyride through a Los Angeles full of influencers pumped full of pills and fillers; sprawling mansions footsteps away from sprawling homeless encampments; crooked cops and mysterious wrecking crews in the middle of the night.

Jordan Harper’s Everybody Knows is addicting and alarming tour de force of a novel. It is what the crime novel can achieve in the modern age: portray the human lives at the center of vast American landscapes, and make us thrill at their attempts to face impossible odds.

“The book everybody's been waiting for.” —Michael Connelly, New York Times bestselling author

“An absolute tour de force.” —S. A. Cosby, New York Times bestselling author

A New York Times Best Crime Book of the Year • A NYTBR Editors' Choice Selection • An Anthony Award Nominee • A Barry Award Nominee • An ABA January 2023 Indie Next List Pick

Recommended by New York Times Book Review, NPR/Fresh Air, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, LA Times, CrimeReads, The Boston Globe, South Florida Sun Sentinel, Alta Online, Lit Hub, Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, NBC/TODAY and many more!

Reseñas de la Crítica

“EVERYBODY KNOWS rages through the City of Angels like a broken-dam flood. It’s got it all, but most of all it’s got deep insight. It’s the book everybody’s been waiting for.”
—Michael Connelly

“Good lord, this book is fantastic. EVERYBODY KNOWS is one of the best LA noir novels I've ever read. The writing is astonishingly good. It's a wild, honest, sharp, and suspenseful ride, full of wry observations about the nature of power and the cost of being good in a bad, bad world."
—Attica Locke, Edgar Award-winning and bestselling author of HEAVEN, MY HOME and BLUEBIRD, BLUEBIRD

“Everybody Knows is the best mystery novel I’ve read in years…Jordan Harper writes sentences, and in this case an entire book, that is both terrifying and exhilarating.”—James Patterson

“What a ride! If it were possible for James Ellroy and James M. Cain to produce a bastard love child, it would be EVERYBODY KNOWS by Jordan Harper. Awash in substance abuse, sex and demented violence, this is the LA of a good drug trip turned very bad.”—Dennis Lehane

"Searing, timely, sprawling, EVERYBODY KNOWS pulls back Hollywood’s velvet curtain, exposing the sordid machinations on which the industry runs and the seamy complicity which keeps it humming. This is L.A. noir at its most incendiary."—Megan Abbott, bestselling author of THE TURNOUT

"Just as Ellory mastered the atavistic heart of 1950's corruption, so Jordan Harper has mastered articulating the Day-Glo Technicolor nightmare that is postmodern Los Angeles. Everybody Knows is filled with ballsy movers and shakers, of course, but also plastic social media influencers, high-rent hoods, nihilistic cops, and the sorts of lost souls you’ll never forget. Everybody Knows is an absolute tour de force, a trip through an exclusive alluring Hell where everyone gets what they want and just what they deserve.”—S.A. Cosby, bestselling and LA Times Book Prize-winning author of RAZORBLADE TEARS and BLACKTOP WASTELAND

"With Everybody Knows, Jordan Harper takes on the Beast—the monstrous, corrupt, insatiable mass of organs that eats the losers and feeds the winners in capitalist America, with Hollywood as its base of operations. Our guides to this world (our world) are two of its own dirty players, a celebrity publicist with killer instincts and an ex-cop goon for hire, looking for survival and money and maybe, if it's in the cards, a little bit of redemption. It's a juggernaut of a novel, fast and high-impact, with a sense of doomed humor and bright, sharp teeth."
—Steph Cha, LA Times Book Prize-winning author of YOUR HOUSE WILL PAY

“Jordan Harper writes like he’s L.A.’s avenging angel. EVERYBODY KNOWS is timely. It’s timeless. It’s a knockout punch.”
—James Kestrel, author of the Edgar Award-winning FIVE DECEMBERS

Masterful -- I Had to Keep Listening

It’s not often I read a really great new novel, so I have to tell you about this one, "Everybody Knows," by Jordan Harper. The publisher calls it an L.A. Noir mystery, but it goes beyond that. It’s really our world and how we live it in. It’s about how we get the news that we do, including on social media.

I have a friend who feels that our popular “reliable” mass media such as NPR, The New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times, often reflect what the powers that be want them to reflect. He prefers reading Consortium News and news from the Southern Poverty Law Center. Otherwise, what we hear is what the billionaires want us to hear through various manipulations.

"Everybody Knows" takes in such a theme from the point of view of a public relations agency in Los Angeles. Its many clients include the studios, stars, and politicians. The novel points out that the information that gets to us is often a narrative spun by a publicist, and the publicist protagonist, Mae Pruett, specializes in turning what might be a scandal into a benefit. She uses the notion that "give the public horror or heartstrings." Thus, a popular actress who is about to start a movie but who has come away from a weekend of debauchery with sex and drugs, injuring her face, will likely lose the movie and her career. Instead, Mae gets out that the star's loveable dog, overzealous, nipped her face out of love. Social media loves it.

I mention this because the book gets darker and darker, where we see that the PR agency as well as a Blackwater-like security company, a network, newspapers, and so much more are owned by a billionaire who really controls everything, and people die with impunity.

Mae's boss Dan, who gets killed early on and inspires Mae to find out why, has the saying, "Don't worry about the truth. It's not that the truth isn't important. It just doesn't matter. A lie that isn't believed by anyone can still have power if it gives permission to people to do what they want to do anyway.” A bloody glove that doesn’t fit is all you need. “Give them horror or give them heartstrings. Nothing else sticks."

I found the book as powerful as the 1974 movie The Parallax View with Warren Beatty, yet it doesn't have as bleak an ending. This book has one last great twist.

I listened to the book on Audible, and there are two voice actors, Megan Tusing and William DeMeritt, both amazing. I usually listen only to books in my car, but this one put me on edge so much, I had to keep listening at home on my AirPods. I recommend this especially for book clubs as there’s plenty to discuss in terms of theme and society, yet it’s also gripping with twist after twist.

A mindless escape if that’s what you’re looking for.

This is the kind of book that you would pick up at the airport when your flight is delayed and then just throw it in the trash afterwards. Pretty generic/cliché story with a couple attempts at being clever to hide its mediocrity. The author brings up that the primary female character prefers mezcal over tequila multiple times as if this is her interesting character trait.

Some of the modern references and uses of slang come off like your parents asking you if you still have a MySpace account. This book is entertaining enough if you have nothing else to occupy your time or you’re looking for something just interesting enough to keep you awake.

Couldn’t hit the pause button

Wow, this was fantastic! Gripping, thoughtful, and perfectly, tautly paced, this story untangles a narratively brilliant web with characters and imagery that leap off the “pages.” The main characters, including Los Angeles, (perhaps the chief protagonist) are fully realized early on; supporting “cast” members likewise standout, fully fleshed, even in minor roles. Paired with pitch perfect narration, listening to this book felt like watching a movie, and for me it was unputdownable. Eagerly jumping into Harper’s first novel next, and excited for more.

The seedy underbelly of LA.

Wow, I have to take a shower. May & Chris are great characters navigating horrible people and fixing things for them. Minus one star for shoddy recording that skipped quite a few places.

Gripping

Great story, well told. Harper reveals a lot of truth by both shining a light on dark crevices and holding up a mirror. The narrators voices were pretty easy on the ears. My only criticism is of the male narrator’s voicing of the teenage girl. The accent was off. There also seemed to be a few technical issues with words getting shapely cut off. Happened on average about once a chapter.