First off I love the new cover! I got the chance to review the cover that has the smiley face on it vs the one that has an overshot of a town! Definitely love the new cover as it is much more eye grabbing and it is what first pulled me into this novel. Next.... OMG..... this had me hooked from page one all the way up to its amazing finish. i know i say in other reviews that I could not put this book down , but seriously on this one I was sop distracted reading I didn't realize it was 3 am and that i had to be up by 5 am. This book is that good! I loved the witty sarcastic humor in this book and enjoyed the characters as they were intelligently written and read well. This is the 2nd book in this series i believe but I didn't feel that only having read this one I missed anything. This book reads as a great stand alone, although I want to read book 1 and hopefully book 3 in this series. Aidan is one of my new favorite characters to follow and I feel  that I will be hooked on this series for a while! 5 stars from me.

VEry intriguing mystery/hard boiled/ detective novel, with excellently drawn characters, that I could easily see on the big screen. Makes me want to read more in this series ASAP

Biting gallows humor and backstabbing deeds. Confidence men, prostitutes, and misanthropic cops who are addicted to the beat, and for some, to the drugs they’re supposed to keep off the street. Aiden Waits is a detective inspector in Manchester, UK, who has been relegated to the night shift because of past sins and thrown-upon political maneuvers. Joseph Knox’s character is akin to the dens of vice that only operate in the dead of night, and The Smiling Man is the perfect vehicle for readers to learn more about his checkered past.

Three cases vie for Waits and his immediate superior/ sometimes partner’s attention during the course of the novel: A sexual bribery case at the local university. Multiple fires set in trash bins throughout the city. An anonymous man found dead in a vacant hotel. Waits and his malcontent partner set out to untangle these barbed wire knots, and maybe get some semblance of stability back in their careers.

There are so many strengths to Knox’s second Waits novel. First and foremost is the outstanding original voice of his main character. While every cop in the novel shares a grimly sardonic view of humanity, Waits fights the tide of the force and can be optimistically sarcastic and almost sanguine, yet most of the time, for the reader’s amusement, only in his own head. Knox’s has quips and one-liners on practically every page that are equally sick and hilarious. The back and forth between the partners and the witnesses is great, and I’m not sure if I’ve ever read a better bad cop/ bad cop routine.

Joseph Knox’s The Smiling Man has an ending that I guarantee you will not guess, and several memorable twists along the way. I particularly liked that Knox revealed much about Waits’s background; I’ve read so many series in which the author pulls his or her readers along for endless pages without fleshing out the main character at all. That isn’t to say we’ve learned all there is about Aiden. I recommend this book to those of you ready to walk into the depths of the Manchester criminal element.

Thank you to NetGalley, Crown Publishing, and Joseph Knox for the advanced copy for review.

See review on blog site

Wow! Wow! Wow!

Thanks fo Netgalley who provides this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Want honesty? This was a fantastic read! Many books claim to be books one can’t put down; The Smiling Man is truly a one-sitting read...you won’t be able to put down.

The novel is a dark cop noir on the gritty streets of Manchester England. It follows detective Aidan Waits (a sort of ne’er-do-well with a shady past) as he is relegated to patrol the night shift with his partner, the sharp-tongued Sutty.

One particular hot night, the pair is called to a hotel report of a break-in. There, Aidan encounters a dead man whose grimace gives way to the title—The smiling man. But finding out who killed the man in the hotel is but one of three plots Joseph Knox deftly weaves into a tense, suspenseful, darkly comedic mystery.

What sets this book apart from others in the genre is: the strong voice—human, and humorous; swift pacing; and superb realistic dialogue.

This book will be (or should be) a hit with many readers!