5 young men. 32 destroyed police vehicles. 1 spectacular bank robbery. This “cinematic” true crime story transports readers to the scene of one of the most shocking bank heists in U.S. history—a crime that’s almost too wild to be real (The New York Times Book Review). Norco ’80 tells the story of how five heavily armed young men—led by an apocalyptic born–again Christian—attempted a bank robbery that turned into one of the most violent criminal events in U.S. history, forever changing the face of American law enforcement. Part action thriller and part courtroom drama, this Edgar Award finalist for Best Fact Crime transports the reader back to the Southern California of the 1970s, an era of predatory evangelical gurus, doomsday predictions, megachurches, and soaring crime rates, with the threat of nuclear obliteration looming over it all. In this riveting true story, a group of landscapers transforms into a murderous gang of bank robbers armed to the teeth with military–grade weapons. Their desperate getaway turns the surrounding towns into war zones. And when it’s over, three are dead and close to twenty wounded; a police helicopter has been forced down from the sky, and thirty–two police vehicles have been completely demolished by thousands of rounds of ammo. The resulting trial shakes the community to the core, raising many issues that continue to plague society today: from the epidemic of post–traumatic stress disorder within law enforcement to religious extremism and the militarization of local police forces.

Are you ready for a stroll down memory alley? Can you recall a time when cops arrested rioters who were setting fire to buildings and vandalizing historical monuments? Remember when shoplifters actually went to jail? Imagine an era when violent lunatics weren’t allowed to wander freely through neighborhoods and menace residents. Don’t you wish you lived in a time when the police were allowed to do their jobs? Retired Southern California homicide detective John J. Lamb remembers those days because he was there. Service With a Sneer is the first volume in his entertaining, sardonic, and unremorseful memoirs. The book takes the bold reader on a journey a half-century into the past. It’s an era before computers, automated license plate readers, and body cams. It’s a time when Tasers didn’t exist and the only “less lethal” options open to police officers were nightsticks and fists. Yet those old-time cops did a pretty fair job keeping the streets safe. The tale begins in the early 1960s. Lamb was a little boy with the deck stacked against him. He suffered from a crippling bone disease that forced him to wear a full metal leg brace, was so myopic he was legally blind, and was the victim of brutal and regular child abuse. Yet his improbable dream was to become a police officer. He made that goal a reality. First, in 1974 when he joined the USAF Security Police and five years later when he became a deputy sheriff with the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department, working in the desert and tourist cities near Palm Springs. Lamb’s stories include: How his work with British police detectives on a major and successful drug trafficking investigation led to his being targeted as a troublemaker by his USAF commanding officer. How following shoe impressions in the desert sands led him to a pair of professional cat burglars who were pillaging homes in an exclusive community of millionaires. His surprising observation while working a traffic security detail for then President-elect Ronald Reagan’s motorcade. Some readers might remember Lamb as the author of a series of “cozy” mystery novels set in the warm world of collectible teddy bears. Don't look for anything cute and cuddly in his newest book. Instead, he freely mixes tragedy with absurdity as he shares tales about vicious fights, high-speed fatal traffic crashes, the terrorist attack that wasn’t, and how he convinced a woman that he had the know-how to evict Satan from her apartment. The stories are shocking, infuriating, ironic, heart-rending, and sometimes gruesomely funny. Best of all, they’re all true.

The bestselling author of Norco ’80 returns with a riveting story of mid-1980s San Diego that placed one young Black man at the center of a whirlwind of crime and punishment that profoundly altered Southern California March 31, 1985. Two white patrol officers in search of a gang member followed a pickup truck carrying seven young Black men up a dirt driveway in the Encanto neighborhood of Southeastern San Diego. Minutes later, gunshots rang out, and the truck’s driver, Sagon Penn, fled the scene in an officer’s patrol car. The incident stunned the city. What followed would change it forever. Penn was an idealist who believed in the power of Buddhist chants to bring about the oneness of humanity. The two police officers were rising stars in one of the most progressive police departments in the country, yet one that had suffered more officers killed in the line of duty than any other. While the facts of the case were never in dispute, what remained unresolved was what, if anything, could justify such a violent confrontation? For over two years, a determined prosecutor and a charismatic defense attorney engaged in a sensational courtroom drama that revolved around matters of mental health, racial biases, and the self-image of a once-sleepy beach town grappling with its transformation into a major metropolitan area. The Sagon Penn incident forever altered how San Diego would respond to incidents involving police and communities of color. Based on court transcripts, personal interviews, and archival police reports, Reap the Whirlwind is a gripping true-crime narrative set against the evocative backdrop of Southern California.