About the Author

Andrew Vachss’s many books include the Burke novels and two previous collections of short stories. His books have been translated into twenty languages, and his work has appeared in Parade, Antaeus, Esquire, Playboy, and The New York Times, among other publications. He died in 2021.

Reviews

"Gripping. . . . It begins in the clipped, tough-guy manner of Dashiell Hammett . . . but by the end it enters a strange . . . twilight zone all its own." --The Wall Street Journal“Ambitious, expansive. . . . Walker Dett [is] a superb creation.” --Entertainment Weekly"A sprawling epic. . . . A raw portrait of a volatile era." --Philadelphia City Paper"If you're craving a midsummer mystery . . . Andrew Vachss has something special for youÉa dark, violent and even weird tale. . . . The plot . . . zips ahead with the speed of one of those dangerously overpowered late-1950s Oldsmobile 88s. . . . The bits and pieces cut back and forth among the characters, like a fast-paced movie." --St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Vachss's latest, set in 1959, leaves recurring character Burke behind to explore the teeming, clannish, race-driven underside of American politics. The Southern town of Locke City, at the mountainous foot of the rust belt, has become the vice-driven fief of one Royal Beaumont, a wheelchair-bound "hillbilly" who indulges in casual incest and rules the town by force. When the New York mafia tries to cut in on the action, Beaumont fights back, determined to protect his stake-and the town's racial composition, especially with a stealthy local black militant cell gaining in strength. Michael Shalare's Irish mob arrives and proposes a truce on the grounds that once "our man" Kennedy gets in, the Italians will be "told" to leave, and racial as well as monetary order will be preserved. The book is broken by episodic bursts of dialogue with time-stamp headings ("1959 October 04 Sunday 20:46"); the dialogue itself doesn't feel differentiated enough from tough guy to tough guy, and smacks of faux periodisms. Some of what Greil Marcus called the "old, weird America" surfaces, but any scene with a woman in it yields awkward results. The pace is good and the plot is riveting, though the telescoped sociopolitics feel rigged from the start, as does a bloody climax. 15-city author tour. (On sale June 14) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

"Gripping. . . . It begins in the clipped, tough-guy manner of Dashiell Hammett . . . but by the end it enters a strange . . . twilight zone all its own." --The Wall Street Journal"Ambitious, expansive. . . . Walker Dett [is] a superb creation." --Entertainment Weekly"A sprawling epic. . . . A raw portrait of a volatile era." --Philadelphia City Paper"If you're craving a midsummer mystery . . . Andrew Vachss has something special for youEa dark, violent and even weird tale. . . . The plot . . . zips ahead with the speed of one of those dangerously overpowered late-1950s Oldsmobile 88s. . . . The bits and pieces cut back and forth among the characters, like a fast-paced movie." --St. Louis Post-Dispatch