Three-Fifths

He's on the run from himself...

Pittsburgh, 1995. Twenty-two year old Bobby Saraceno is a biracial black man, passing for white. Bobby has hidden his identity from everyone, even his best friend and fellow comic-book geek, Aaron, who has just returned from prison a newly radicalized white supremacist.

During the night of their reunion, Bobby witnesses Aaron mercilessly assault a young black man with a brick. In the wake of this horrifying act of violence, Bobby must conceal his unwitting involvement in the crime from the police, while battling his own personal demons. This is a harrowing story about racism and brutality that is more urgent now than ever.

'John Vercher takes a timely, yet tragically timeless, cautionary tale and turns it into something so heartfelt, so frightening and dazzling that it sits easily amongst the best crime fiction novels I've read this year. Brutal and powerful, I adored it' - Chris Whitaker

'Vercher's searing first novel is set 25 years ago, but its subject couldn't be more timely... this mesmerising debut doesn't shy away' - Sunday Times' Crime Book of the Month

'John Vercher has such love and compassion for his characters in Three-Fifths that I couldn't help but be sucked into their lives from the very first pages. It's so incredibly suspenseful that I was continually surprised by the story and deeply moved by the time I turned the last page' - Attica Locke

'Short, lucid and harrowing' - Observer, Thrillers of the Month

'Dark, gritty and thrilling' - Daily Mail

John Vercher is a writer currently living in the Philadelphia area with his wife and two sons. He holds a Bachelor's in English from the University of Pittsburgh and an MFA in Creative Writing from the Mountainview Master of Fine Arts program.

His fiction has appeared on Akashic Books' Mondays are Murder and Fri-SciFi. and he is a contributing writer for Cognoscenti, the thoughts and opinions page of WBUR Boston. Two of his essays published there on race, identity, and parenting were picked up by NPR, and he has appeared on WBUR's Weekend Edition. His non-fiction has also appeared in Entropy Magazine. You can find him on his website and on Twitter at @jverch75.

A powerful hardboiled noir of violence and obsession set against the backdrop of the simmering racial tension produced by the LA Riots and the O.J. Simpson trial. He's on the run from himself... Pittsburgh, 1995. Twenty-two year old Bobby Saraceno is a biracial black man, passing for white. Bobby has hidden his identity from everyone, even his best friend and fellow comic-book geek, Aaron, who has just returned from prison a newly radicalized white supremacist. During the night of their reunion, Bobby witnesses Aaron mercilessly assault a young black man with a brick. In the wake of this horrifying act of violence, Bobby must conceal his unwitting involvement in the crime from the police, while battling his own personal demons. This is a harrowing story about racism and brutality that is more urgent now than ever. 'John Vercher takes a timely, yet tragically timeless, cautionary tale and turns it into something so heartfelt, so frightening and dazzling that it sits easily amongst the best crime fiction novels I've read this year. Brutal and powerful, I adored it' - Chris Whitaker

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