The three men arrived in Morgan on Friday afternoon on the two-thirty train from Memphis. Several people noticed them but didn’t pay them much attention. They might have been salesmen or businessmen of some sort. The only reason they were noticed at all was because there were three of them. But the strangers had come to Morgan to rob the bank on Saturday, the day after payday.

While the town’s citizens spent Friday night according to their custom – some placidly, some passionately, and some in acute distress – the men plotted their attack. Saturday dawned stormy, canceling fishing trips, accentuating hangovers, and changing some plans, but not that of the men. At three in the afternoon, the sleepy town exploded into violence, shattering the patterns of several lives, leaving one man shocked by the look of death, and a hero appalled by the nature of his heroism.

But Violent Saturday is more about the townspeople than the bank robbery itself, illustrating how the ensuing violence touched all their lives. The story focuses on a slice of life in a small town in the 50’s, full of interesting characters whose mundane everyday routines meet in an explosive event that leaves them all re-evaluating their lives. You, too, will remember the people of Morgan and its violent Saturday afternoon long after you’ve finished reading this book.

Originally published in 1955, Violent Saturday was voted “Suspense Novel of the Year” by Cosmopolitan and later that same year 20th Century Fox released a movie based on the novel with an all-star cast including Victor Mature, Richard Egan, Lee Marvin, and Ernest Borgnine.

Praise for Violent Saturday:
“Violent Saturday is a helluva a novel and it will appeal to both the reader of thrillers as well as a more literary set. The best part is it does what literature should. It shines a light on the human condition while telling a terrifically entertaining and vibrant story. It is a violent novel that has all of the assets of a well-crafted thriller, but it adds the deliberate pace, the characters, and the illumination of a well-rendered piece of art.” – Ben Boulden, Gravetapping Book Reviews.

“It is quite an extraordinary effect Mr. Heath has managed in Violent Saturday – like the tick-tick-tick of a time bomb.” – Author and playwright Wilbur Daniel Steele