No real theme to tie it all together this week, other than the fact that I’ve wanted to cover these books for a while. Two are novels, while the other is a collection of short stories that were originally two separate novels. So let us delve back into the worlds of Ross Thomas, Ross Macdonald and Lawrence Block. No stinkers — just prime crime writing from three major talents.
CHINAMAN’S CHANCE by Ross Thomas — Let the un-PC adventures begin in this 1978 read with the first appearances of characters Artie Wu and Quincy Durant. From the outset, they seem to be to old friends living their lives, but underneath, these two are a lot sharper than you’d expect, since Thomas is very clever in the storytelling.
Artie and Quincy come off as just laissez faire individuals, but as the story progresses, we learn their own motives and deep history. They are hired by a very rich man named Piers, whose sister-in-law Silk has gone missing. She was once part of a popular singing trio with her two sisters, Ivory and Lace. After the group broke up, the girls all went their separate ways. Ivory died of a drug overdose; Lace is married to Piers, living the life of leisure; and Silk became an actress whose last boyfriend, a congressman, was killed.
Why Piers picks these two men to help might seem like a chance encounter, but Thomas has a few cards up his sleeve for the readers. But that is only one little problem for our men. Artie and Quincy are also hot on the trail of $2 million that is thought to have been buried in Saigon as the war was ending. Throw in gangsters, a former CIA spook, plenty of dry humor and a fantastic death-by-camper sequence, and you have a fun ride through the seedy side of life.
I can’t really go into particulars on a larger scale, since it would ruin the various twists along the way. But for those who have read all of Elmore Leonard and need another fix, I’ll highly suggest picking up this one. It has that type of atmosphere. Plus, there is no way a book could be titled CHINAMAN’S CHANCE in this day and age, especially since whole passages could be considered insensitive, which just makes it only better, in my opinion. One little note: As great as the cover is, that never happens in the book.
THE ARCHER FILES by Ross Macdonald — This 2007 collection makes the two previous Lew Archer anthologies obsolete. This one not only has all the short stories from those two books, but a plethora of case notes, which for me, sadly, should be dubbed “What Could Have Been.” That section features the starts of Lew Archer stories that Macdonald never finished — usually the first chapter and that was it. It’s really nice that all these lost works are included, but also frustrating since I would love to have just one more new Archer novel to come out. Guess we’ll just have to make do with the 18 he did write.
The book starts out with a very clever piece by editor Tom Nolan, in which he details the life of Archer using information from the books and stories themselves, building a whole backstory to this complex character, from his time in the military and police department to his eventual life as a P.I. After that, we are treated to 12 stories printed in chronological order. Just like in the novels, you see Macdonald’s style grow as he progresses, breaking free from the comparisons to Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett.
It is really nice is to see how Macdonald took two of his short stories, “Strangers in Town” and “Gone Girl,” and used them as frameworks for one of his novels, THE IVORY GRIN. Not all the stories included originally starred Archer. “Find the Woman” and “Death by Water” had a different lead, but were reworked to feature Archer. The stories are quick bursts of Macdonald’s talent, showing that even with a small page count, Archer was not someone who could easily be fooled.
WHEN THE SACRED GINMILL CLOSES by Lawrence Block — Matthew Scudder looks back at a point in his life when the bottle was his best friend in this booze-soaked adventure from 1986. The story deals with Scudder helping out some of his drinking buddies where he was very much under the influence at all times.
The time is the mid-’70s, before New York City became gentrified, when after-hour bars were the norm, and payoffs to cops were regular business. Scudder gets involved with two cases, one of which is the murder of a friend’s wife by two robbers who claim their innocence. There also is a robbery involving one of the bars he frequents. No one is really sure how much was taken from the cash-only business, but there are plenty of rumors, and these are not the type of guys you should rip off.
GINMILL is unlike previous Scudder novels, since it’s more a hazy walk through his past. There is not a page that goes by where Scudder and his pals are not tipping the bottle just to get through the day. This is not a straight-up crime tale, per se, since most of the actions take a back seat to Scudder’s life in general, especially when the story returns to the present, when he admits that he would have done a lot of things differently if he were sober at that time. This novel actually came out a few years after his last Scudder story. The reader gets the sense that, reportedly like Block, the character struggled in his past and is now better off. Even though the book comes in the middle of the series, it’s actually a great introduction to Scudder, and is considered a fan favorite.
Next time: A brick, a prick and a Dick. —Bruce Grossman
OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF LAWRENCE BLOCK:
• THE BURGLAR IN THE LIBRARY by Lawrence Block
• THE BURGLAR IN THE RYE by Lawrence Block
• THE BURGLAR WHO THOUGHT HE WAS BOGART by Lawrence Block
• THE CANCELED CZECH by Lawrence Block
• A DANCE AT THE SLAUGHTERHOUSE by Lawrence Block
• A DIET OF TREACLE by Lawrence Block
• THE GIRL WITH THE LONG GREEN HEART by Lawrence Block
• GRIFTER’S GAME by Lawrence Block
• HIT AND RUN by Lawrence Block
• HIT PARADE by Lawrence Block
• LUCKY AT CARDS by Lawrence Block
• MANHATTAN NOIR 2: THE CLASSICS edited by Lawrence Block
• ME TANNER, YOU JANE by Lawrence Block
• ONE NIGHT STANDS AND LOST WEEKENDS by Lawrence Block
• THE SCORELESS THAI by Lawrence Block
• TANNER ON ICE by Lawrence Block
• TANNER’S TIGER by Lawrence Block
• TANNER’S TWELVE SWINGERS by Lawrence Block
• TANNER’S VIRGIN by Lawrence Block
• THE THIEF WHO COULDN’T SLEEP by Lawrence Block
OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF ROSS MACDONALD:
• THE ARCHER FILES by Ross Macdonald
• BLACK MONEY by Ross Macdonald
• BLUE CITY by Ross Macdonald
• THE BLUE HAMMER by Ross Macdonald
• THE DARK TUNNEL by Ross Macdonald
• THE DOOMSTERS by Ross Macdonald
• THE GALTON CASE by Ross Macdonald
• THE INSTANT ENEMY by Ross Macdonald
• THE MOVING TARGET by Ross Macdonald
• THE WAY SOME PEOPLE DIE by Ross Macdonald
OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF ROSS THOMAS:
• THE BRASS GO-BETWEEN by Ross Thomas
• THE PROCANE CHRONICLE by Ross Thomas
Related posts:
- BULLETS, BROADS, BLACKMAIL & BOMBS >> Spies I Read in the Cold
- BULLETS, BROADS, BLACKMAIL & BOMBS >> Field Trip
- BULLETS, BROADS, BLACKMAIL & BOMBS >> Shelf-Clearing Shorts
- BULLETS, BROADS, BLACKMAIL & BOMBS >> Shades of Rockford
- BULLETS, BROADS, BLACKMAIL & BOMBS >> Yellow Tag Sale
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
When asked to name my favorite Ross Thomas novel, I usually say CHINAMAN’S CHANCE. A great book, but then I like everything Thomas wrote.
If you like “CHINAMAN’S CHANCE”, you might also want to pick up the other two Artie Wu/Quincy Durant classic unputdownables, “OUT ON THE RIM” (1987) and “VOODOO, LTD.”. Absolutely great stuff.
I only discovered Thomas a few years ago and have been working my way slowly through his novels, pacing myself, since there are no more to come. While I enjoyed both the Durant & Wu and McCorkle & Padillo series greatly, my favorite and the one I intend to reread first after I’ve read all the rest is “The Fools in Town Are on Our Side”. Fabulous.