King Suckerman

Rating:
Summary: Terrible book!
Review: This was my first book by this author, and I don't think I want to read another. I like the genre of "hard-boiled" detective novels, but Pelecanos obviously thinks "scummy" means the same. There's not one likable character in the book, nor is there a believable one. A small potatoes dope dealer and a record store owner who pride themselves on knowing the bass player for Funkadelic do not compelling protagonists make. A real bummer and a chore to read. DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME!

Rating:
Summary: The Tarantino Effect
Review: Why do Americans think violence is so cool? I don't get it...
I love crime novels. Always have. I was weaned on Chandler and Hammett and James M. Cain and Jim Thompson. I've read all the contemprary guys: Pelecanos, Ellroy, Leonard, etc. As a writer, Pelecanos is as good as any of them, but like many today he relies way too often on the cheapest trick in the book: cartoonish, graphic violence to sustain narrative tension. King Suckerman is a classic example, only here, after many incidents of lurid, sadistic killing we get a moral at the end about personal responsibility. Give me a break. Anyway, like I said, the guy can write (though I could do without the pop culture references on every page). But it is was it is: cartoon crime fiction aimed at an adolescent male mentality, a long way from the adult crime fiction of Chandler and Cain and Thompson.