On this page

This page lists novels that feature the Pennsylvania based police chief Mario Balzic.

Cover images are, when possible, of the US first edition and a more recent digital or paperback edition.

The Rocksburg Railroad Murders

K.C. Constantine

1972

A Mario Balzic novel.

"A hardworking, inoffensive family man is murdered while waiting at the train depot, and so begins another case for Mario Balzic, the police chief of Rocksburg, a small coal-mining town in Pennsylvania."

The Man Who Liked To Look at Himself

K.C. Constantine

1973

A Mario Balzic novel.

"Balzic and Lt. Harry Minyon of the state police are hunting pheasant at the Rocksburg Rod and Gun Club when, after Minyon's dog bites Balzic, the dog uncovers a piece of human bone that shows signs of having been hacked apart."

The Blank Page

K.C. Constantine

1974

A Mario Balzic novel.

"It is a record-hot Memorial Day when Miss Cynthia Summer calls Police Chief Mario Balzic to say that she hadn't seen one of her student roomers. Balzic discovers Janet Pisula's body on the floor of her room, a blank sheet of typing paper on her stomach....."

A Fix Like This

K.C. Constantine

1975

A Mario Balzic novel.

"Armand 'Fat Manny' Manditti has been stabbed and is brought into the emergency room by his brother Tullio the Tub, who refuses to tell Chief Balzic what happened. Balzic suspects the men will take take revenge, and he works to prevent the death of a citizen or two of Rocksburg."

The Man Who Liked Slow Tomatoes

K.C. Constantine

1982

A Mario Balzic novel.

"Balzic finds himself caught up in both union contract negotiations and a web of lies and disappearances that begins when Jimmy Romanelli sells the bartender at Muscotti's Bar several baskets of tomatoes, and ends amid multiple deaths and disappearances. In the aftermath, Balzic is forced to come to terms with his past, his drinking, and his late father's best friend."

Always a Body To Trade

K.C. Constantine

1983

A Mario Balzic novel.

"There's a new mayor in Rocksburg, PA, one of those simplifying, self-righteous amateurs bent on law and order who can't leave anything alone. His calls never stop, even trapping Balzic in his refuge at Muscotti's Bar. And this case is ugly, including a double robbery, a professional hit, drugs, and racial tensions. As usual, it is a case populated by unforgettable characters, the most unforgettable of whom is Balzic, the tough-talking, golden-hearted police chief of a Pennsylvania mining town where the coal has run out."

Upon Some Midnights Clear

K.C. Constantine

1985

A Mario Balzic novel.

"During the Christmas season in Rocksburg, Pennsylvania, Mario Belzac's investigation into the alleged mugging of Mrs. Garbin by Billy Lum leads to a confrontation with the bigoted fire chief, a powerful local columnist, and an alienated Vietnam vet."

Joey's Case

K.C. Constantine

1988

A Mario Balzic novel.

"Police Chief Mario Balzic has got one hot Italian on his heels. Albert Castelucci wants to straighten some things out about his son's murder. It seems that the investigator Balzic appointed to Castelucci's case made such a mess no jury could convict the killer. Pushing Balzic into losing his temper may just provide the answers Castelucci needs."

Sunshine Enemies

K.C. Constantine

1990

A Mario Balzic novel.

"Rocksburg Police Chief Mario Balzic must probe a tangle of reluctant witnesses, local mob figures, and a not-so-holy minister when a brutal murder occurs in the parking lot of a controversial pornography shop."

Bottom Liner Blues

K.C. Constantine

1993

A Mario Balzic novel.

"With its shut-down mines, with its scarred and restive blue-collar descendants of Eastern European and Italian immigrants, Rocksburg, Pennsylvania, is in the midst of tough times. And no one has it tougher than its own police chief, Mario Balzic. Working harder and longer hours than he ever did in his long-ago rookie days, Balzic again pilots a black-and-white through the town's brooding streets. The recent death of his mother, whose warm presence is especially missed by his wife Ruth, doesn't make it easier. Balzic answers a call: a strange woman, Valery, mother of a young daughter named Coo, warns that her violent husband may exact a brutal form of revenge on a truck-driver with a shady past. She wants Balzic to head off the attack, but supplies few details. Balzic senses worse trouble ahead than suggested by Valery - and events prove Balzic's instincts apocalyptically correct. Meanwhile, at the local tavern, Balzic encounters Myushkin, a wild, deceptively eccentric Russian-American writer, with nine novels to his credit, no visible means of support, and an alarming facility with a .22 revolver. It's Myushkin who becomes Balzic's spiritual guide through the case - and a peculiarly American, distinctly personal brand of hell."

Cranks and Shadows

K.C. Constantine

1995

A Mario Balzic novel.

"When Balzic gets a summons from the mayor, the last thing on his mind is police layoffs. The chief finds himself forced to eliminate five officers, leaving him twenty-five members to police a city of fifteen thousand. Yet Balzic - profane, arrogant, occasionally dangerous, and up until now, a survivor - is losing more than his policing capability. He's also losing his imagination. From somewhere inside his own department, a new and even more unexpected menace has surfaced. Witnesses report a small number of heavily armed, camouflaged commandos rappelling out of blue-and-white helicopters. Rocksburg may not have much left, but someone is willing to outfit and deploy a small private army to get it. They call it privatization. They say it works better than government. But Balzic's job is to protect his city. And Balzic's city is not for sale. It's all been happening under Balzic's chin, and he never saw it. The cop who never voted, who always pretended he was above power plays and politics, now has to perform the easiest and the hardest act of his career."

Good Sons

K.C. Constantine

1996

A Mario Balzic novel.

"The twelfth Rocksburg novel boldly and brilliantly passes the torch from retired police chief Mario Balzic to Detective Ruggiero Carlucci. When a local businesswoman is raped and horribly battered, Rugs faces an unexpected, gruelling test of character - an investigation that will tell him what he's truly made of, both as a cop and as a man."

Family Values

K.C. Constantine

1997

A Mario Balzic novel.

"Balzic's haunting Muscotti's, driving Vinnie the bartender crazy. He's at the tavern, a man whose single greatest asset is time on his hands, when Deputy Attorney General Warren Livingood, the well-dressed refugee from Philadelphia's Main Line, walks in - and makes his case to western Pennsylvania's crankiest and canniest ex-cop. Seventeen years before, a drug deal went sour in a mountain log cabin, yielding two corpses and an ensuing history of mistrials, appeals, and verdict reversals. Now a variety of cons from a variety of prisons are spilling several variations on this single sorry tale. The stench of police misconduct and coerced perjury is in the air. High political reputations are on the line. As a former professional with no debts to settle, Balzic is the man for the job. Livingood gives him the title of special investigator, state credentials, and thirty-five dollars an hour. It seems like the answer to everyone's prayers. Then Balzic's jailhouse interviews lead him into a jurisdiction that could be the devil's own. There he confronts his counterpart, but hardly his brother: a small-town police chief, now paralyzed by stroke, who in his prime ruled his borough by blood and terror. In uncovering the history of one monster in human form, Balzic will enter his personal heart of darkness - and shoulder a staggering debt that will be hell to pay."

Brushback

K.C. Constantine

1998

Mario Balzic may not feature in this book.

"The best days of Rocksburg, Pennsylvania, are behind it. The mills are closed, the mines shut down, and the townsfolk while the days away in the local bars and somehow manage to get along. Yet every once in a while something or someone strikes a spark that lifts everyone up and puts Rocksburg back on the map. Decades before, Bobby Blasco went north to pitch for the Boston Red Sox. Known as the Brushback Kid, he set records in every league he played - including most hit batmen. During spring training in 1959 he even threw square to the head of the great Ted Williams. Later a mysterious accident landed him a permanent place on the disabled list, and he came home to run an illegal gambling club in Rocksburg's Flats. Now Detective Sergeant Rugs Carlucci, the acting chief of the Rocksburg PD, is at Conemaugh General Hospital: Mom is having either a heart or an anxiety attack. While they're in the ER, Rugs gets the call. Someone has murdered the Brushback Kid. Running the plays in a major-league murder investigation - and trying to ensure his own domestic tranquility - Carlucci must find out why the pitching phenom went wrong. Interviews of a parade of Blasco's ex-wives and former friends show a man out of control, a man who took domestic abuse to its farthest limits and who made an enemy of virtually everyone who crossed his line of sight. Carlucci's question: Which of these, in an ironic fit of sportsman's logic, was enemy enough to take a Louisville Slugger to Blasco's head in a pitch-black, frozen alley?."

Blood Mud

K.C. Constantine

1999

A Mario Balzic novel.

"Once public detective, now turned private, Mario Balzic is hired to track down the missing guns from the local gun shop for the insurance company. But no one knows better than this seasoned officer that stolen guns can only point to bigger trouble. It's not long before Balzic's dogged sleuthing points to a wide variety of suspects; a corrupt married politico cheating with a stripper; a police chief hungry for the influence a little improved firepower can buy; a dell owner who mixes racketeering with the cold cuts; and the gangster's hapless nephew, framed for selling porn and drugs. As if that weren't enough to handle, Balzic is soon brought low by a sudden cardiac episode. Now an intimately personal crisis combines with an equally sudden murder to turn a solitary job into a singular mission: stay alive, at least long enough to crack one more case."

The Rocksburg Railroad Murders / The Blank Page

K.C. Constantine

1982

A Mario Balzic omnibus.

An omnibus edition that brings together the first and third Balzic novels The Rocksburg Railroad Murders and The Blank Page.

The Man Who Like to Look at Himself / A Fix Like This

K.C. Constantine

1983

A Mario Balzic omnibus.

An omnibus edition that brings together the second and fourth Balzic novels The Man Who Like to Look at Himself and A Fix Like This.