A Bunch of Fives

Danny Bradigan survived brutal fighting in Afghanistan and fought as a professional boxer, but a bullet finally puts him in a coma. Part of his recovery involves heading to a small Appalachian town where he’s inherited a property and a car mechanic business. He knows nothing about repairing cars and needs to understand who gave him this chance at another life. He begins mentoring Ryan, the young man who used to help the previous owner, falls in love with Amy, the boy’s older sister, and when he’s not stuck in his memories, spends his free time searching the town records. As he gets closer to discovering the town’s violent secrets, the threats against him and his new friends start festering. A Bunch of Fives (Falling Up Publishing, 2026) is a stunning, literary crime thriller that portrays a town simmering with hate, violence, and racism while Danny Bradigan struggles to overcome violent memories of war and a life built on violence and destruction.

William Kely McClung is a novelist, screenwriter, and filmmaker whose work is defined by its visceral pacing, atmospheric depth, and raw physical reality. Named as one of the “Top 100 Indie Filmmakers in the World,” McClung has written more than thirty feature screenplays and directed three award-winning feature films, cutting and mixing projects in legendary spaces from London to Berlin. McClung has spent decades learning and teaching martial arts across the United States, Southeast Asia, and Europe—a lifetime of elite combat discipline that directly infuses his prose with authentic, high-velocity stakes and action. He was twice inducted into the Martial Arts Hall of Honours for his contributions to martial arts and action cinema.

In A Bunch of Fives, as in his three previous thrillers, Loop, Super Ninja, and Black Fire, McClung strives to strip away traditional artifice to create an immersive non-linear experience where the presentation of words on the page becomes an active character. Besides spending seemingly endless time on the computer hammering out stories, McClung travels, trains, and teaches martial arts, and studies graphic design, writing, and photography.