This book was offered to me by the publisher in hopes I might write a review. It’s apparently a reissue of a book originally published in 1982. Kudos This book was offered to me by the publisher in hopes I might write a review. It’s apparently a reissue of a book originally published in 1982. Kudos to Open Road Media for resurrecting some of these titles. I gave it a couple of pages and was hooked. It was excellent. It could be described as part meditation on friendship, part noir novel a la Jim Thomson or James Cain, part police procedural, but all about obsession.
Alexander McCarthy (“Mac”) grew up in an orphanage so when his patrol stumbled across a shell-shocked kid who had been witness to, and perhaps participated in, the massacre at Tan Pret, “Johnny”, it became difficult to abandon the kid who now obviously had latched onto and needed Mac’s company.
Now out of the army, Johnny can’t survive on his own and is very protective of Mac who has a terrible gambling problem and finds himself owing thousands to the mob. Johnny kills two of the them after they beat up Mac.
But the boss knows who did it and Johnny are forced to become hitmen for the mob. One of the men killed happens to be an undercover cop.
In part two, Simon, the dead cop’s partner, vows to find the killer of his friend. (Simon’s euology for his dead friend is amazing.) He becomes obsessed with it to the point where it starts to destroy his marriage and his life. Everything takes a backseat to his obsession at finding the killer.
The third part brings them all together. But it’s not what you think. One thing to remember: “There are no good guys.” ...more
Roy Cody is a bagman for a mobster in New Orleans. He has terminal lung cancer. He has also dallied with the girl of the boss. For that he suspects heRoy Cody is a bagman for a mobster in New Orleans. He has terminal lung cancer. He has also dallied with the girl of the boss. For that he suspects he was sent to warn off someone but told not to take any guns along. Obviously he did and managed to extricate himself from potentially being hit. Deciding to leave town quickly, he takes along a hooker who happened to be present when the failed hit went down.
They take to the road and complications arise. Soon, Rocky, Roy’s traveling companion has picked up her three-and-a-half-year-old-sister (a gunshot was fired - she says it was just to scare her step-father) and Rob’s better judgment keeps warning him to drop them off somewhere and split. But he’s pulled by the normality of his new situation. He should have kept running.
What follows is classic noir, but it’s also a tale of redemption, with Roy attaining an almost Christ-like status at the end, although if you are looking for a nice feel-good book, look elsewhere. Very well written with some haunting images.
“[Life] doesn’t seem fair, because it’s random. But that’s why it’s fair. You get me? It’s fair like a lottery’s fair."...more
Alvin Morlock is a lonely professor at a fourth rate college. He lets himself be conned into going to Providence to get some girls, and while there haAlvin Morlock is a lonely professor at a fourth rate college. He lets himself be conned into going to Providence to get some girls, and while there happens to meet Louise, a rather desperate schemer; a woman in the fast lane who, realizing she's aging, wants a husband.
Louise, after several evenings of this, was bored with Morlock's company in spite of her fondness for him. On New Year's Eve she sent him away early, letting him guess that she was sick. (He was shyly pleased with the delicate intimacy of the hinted revelation and the close relationship the very revelation itself implied.) He left feeling quite gallant. When he was safely gone, she changed her dress and called a cab. Far enough from Federal Hill she allowed herself to be picked up in a cafe and thereafter surrendered herself to drinking and to her companion with complete abandon. It was the last time, she promised herself. Afterward she would be faithful to Morlock. After they were married. It did not occur to her that he might not ask.
Three months into the marriage Alvin discovers she's running up debts and not paying the bills. Morlock is humiliated and unsure what to do. In his despair he returns to Arby's Rock where he had found comfort as a child with a slightly younger friend whom he had defended at school against some bullies. What happened to her haunts him and the trial resulting in the inevitable outcome.
Daniels alternates between a description of events and testimony in Morlock's trial for first degree murder. It's skillfully done and while hardly literature, the book definitely holds your interest and keeps the pages turning to learn what might actually have happened and what will happen.
Daniels wrote a series of crime novels in the fifties that were well regarded. Except for some anachronisms (fifteen dollars was a lot of money) this one holds up well. We get a nice sense of the characters feelings and the gulf between the trial and reality - if that exists and the demons that haunted them....more
Audiobook: Finally, a book in which the violence serves the story instead of the opposite.This is the first in a series of novels that portray BelfastAudiobook: Finally, a book in which the violence serves the story instead of the opposite.This is the first in a series of novels that portray Belfast and Northern Ireland following the peace accords, which left a lot of violent men with little to do and changing loyalties. Gerry Fegan had been an enforcer for one of the groups of thugs ostensibly battling the British. Now beset by guilt for those he had killed, he’s surrounded by imaginary “followers” representing each of the twelve he had killed and they won’t leave him alone until he kills those who had ordered the killings.
Much as slavery and segregation haunt U.S. history, so do the years of the Troubles for the Irish. Preserving the peace becomes a priority for those in power and they will sacrifice innocents to maintain political stability. That’s one of the underlying themes of Neville’s book. “"Even now [that] the politicians had taken over the movement," Neville writes of the Irish Republican Army paramilitaries, "even though they were shifting away from the rackets, the extortion, the thieving, people still needed to be kept in line." The British still have their undercover agents and one of those is tasked by his handlers with killing Fegan in order to prevent his killings from upsetting the delicate balance.
Note that even though billed as the first in the Jack Lennon Investigations series, Lennon plays a minuscule role unlike the second. It’s all Gerry Fegan.
I read this book after Collusion, the second in the series, and several things became clear in both volumes. I recommend reading the books in order, as knowing what happens in the second destroys any suspense in the first. Very good reading. ...more
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