Lionel WhiteRecensioni

L'únic bo d'aquesta novel·la és la història. L'argument és sòlid i manté la tensió fins al final.

Ara bé, com a exercici artístic, el text no val res. L'autor es perd en una infinitat de detalls que no aporten res. Només són palla que serveix per a farcir el mínim de pàgines que l'autor devia pensar que feien falta per a fer una novel·la i no un conte.

Pel que fa a la traducció de Josep Vallverdú, és mecànica, un català absolutament artificiós. Els personatges pareix que s'han empassat una gramàtica per dinar. Uns diàlegs que no te'ls creus ni fart de vi. La tria va ser molt adequada: un traductor mediocre per a un escriptor mediocre.

The other books I have read by White have been of a pattern. A crime is planned out in detail, then carried out, then something unravels. This book, published in 1968, is much different. A young wife, while her husband is out of town, has a car breakdown in the black part of town and is raped. It takes place in Delaware, in a town described as being like the Deep South. In fact, it seems most of the leading citizens, with the exception of the Chief of Police and the Jewish Department Store Owner are members of the Ku Klux Klan. This book is full of some of the most disgusting characters--and incidents--you will ever read. The woman was badly beaten--attempted murder--and can't identify her attacker. So White takes us through the Chief of Police's investigation. We are constantly reminded that he is a decent man, but he does so many stupid things that result in horrible things happening that never should happen, that the story becomes almost maddening. Of course, as readers we don't expect the obvious solution, and in the end, we don't get it. But there is just so much stupidity going on here, it is hard to take. For instance, despite threats, the recovering wife doesn't want to leave town and return to the safety of their former home. Also, White doesn't seem to understand the geography of Delaware. He says, for instance, that the Chief of Police has to drive the prisoner a couple of hundred miles. But Delaware is only 96 miles long and at most 35 miles wide. I guess the Chief is trying to avoid all the toll booths! (That's a joke; maybe that hadn't learned how to build them in 1968.) In any case, this is a definite sub-par book by White, whose earlier novels are some of the best of their type. I'm sure he was trying to be topical, but it just doesn't quite work. The book is not badly written--just badly plotted and reasoned.

Hostage For A Hood is a top-notch pulp era novel which featured a Ozzie and Harriet type couple accidentally getting mixed up with a crew of armored car robbers. White does a great job of describing everyone involved in the caper which feels like one of the crews from Westlake's Richard Stark novels with each member of the crew playing a vital part. Juxtaposed against the backdrop of this violent professional crew is the newlyweds and their little French poodle who are as straight and innocent as they come. Well-written, succinct, not a wasted paragraph. Precisely what I look for in crime fiction from that era.

"The Big Caper" by Lionel White is first-class hardboiled crime fiction. Make no mistake about that. Like White's novel, "The Killing" (aka "Clean Break"), "The Big Caper" is the story of how a criminal mastermind plots a crime by bringing together a team of individuals. Here, it's a bank robbery in a small Florida town. Flood, the ringleader, pulls together a crew of characters from all walks of life in order to pull of a well-planned down to the most minute detail. As such and because of the sparse, stripped-down prose, it has a similar feel to many of Donald Westlake's Parker novels, although White published "The Big Caper" in 1955, a decade before many any of the Parker novels came out.

In this book, White's writing is not flowery. His writing is detailed, but is written in such a stark manner that the details flow through the writing naturally, not as an added enhancement. It is told in a matter- of-fact manner. And, this style of writing, at least in White's hands, is top-notch and establishes his place as one of the top crime fiction writers of the fifties and sixties.

The heart of this book is not the plot, which is not terribly complex or hard to understand. Rather, the meat of the book is about the characters that Flood brings together to pull off this caper. Flood is the ringleader and he has been gathering people for quite some time just because he might need them for such a caper. Unfortunately for Flood, these people are characters and they act and interact in ways that are sometimes detrimental to the caper that he planned.

Kosta was the explosives man. He had unusually large eyes of "an odd russet brown and they bulged out from their sockets." They reminded one "somewhat of the eyes of a very sick person or a sick animal." He was short and obese. Frank Gerald Harper and Kay were assigned the task of establishing themselves in a rented house, pretending to be a married, square couple, blending into the town and casing the bank and the police department. Harper had leased a gas station and made friends with everyone in town.

Kay "looked exactly like what everyone that they knew in Indio Beach believed she was - - the young, extremely attractive wife of a nice- looking ex-Marine." She was only supposed to play a part with Harper since Kay had been Flood's mistress for the last four years. Despite her connection to Flood, she never knew whether he was married or where he spent his time when he was away from her. The safecracker was Hans Paulmeyer, an old man "well past seventy" and "set in his ways." This was going to be his last job and, when it was done, he would take the train home and sit on the porch and wait for death.

Rounding out the group pulling off this caper was Roy Cluney, who had the "round, half-formed face of a baby" and small ears set close to his head. Cluney's buddy, Wally, barely has any more sense than Cluney. While waiting for the caper to start, Cluney read comic books with his lips moving laboriously as he spelled out each word. There was also Candle, who was a big man with a hard face, and Shorty.

Of course, none of these people are as interesting as Flood himself, James Xavier Flood to be precise.
Lionel White knows how to spin a yarn. That much is true.

Johnny Clay had spent four long years in the joint, four long years plotting the best crime ever imagined. It was going to be foolproof. He wasn't going to recruit a bunch of hoods who would turn on him and
squeal. No. he was going to get a bunch of ordinary guys who had every reason to pull the caper off and get away clean. "They all have jobs, they all live seemingly decent, normal lives. But they all have money problems and they all have larceny in them."

Johnny was but one of a crew of absolutely unforgettable characters
White created in this book. Four years hadn't changed Johnny much. There was now the slightest of gray over his ears, but his gray eyes were as clear and untroubled
as they had always been. The time behind bars hadn't soured him, but he now had a "serious undercurrent to him which hadn't been there before" and "a sort of grim purposefulness which he had always
lacked."

Marvin Unger was a court stenographer. He had connections and information. He had a bank account. Johnny had found him when he was looking around for a guy with a respectable front, "who had a little
larceny in his heart and who might back the play."

Big Mike Henty was a bartender at the track. "He was an inveterate gambler and in spite of endless years of consistently losing more than half of his weekly pay check on the horses, he still had a great deal of difficulty where he stood at the close of the last race. He had no mind
for figures at all."

"Big Mike was a moral and straight-laced man, in spite of a weakness for playing the horses and an even greater weakness for over excess in eating." He wanted desperately to get his family out of the crappy neighborhood they lived in and have his daughter safely ensconsed in a suburban school district.

George Peatty was thirty-eight, gaunt, nervous, and looked his age. He had crooked, squirrel-like teeth and long fingered hands of a pianist. "His clothes were conservative both as to line and as to price." "After two years of marriage, he still spent most of his idle time thinking of
his wife." He did know, however, that she was bored and disenchanted and that somewhere along the way he had failed as a husband and as a man. But, that was because of luck and fate which consigned him to his limited earning capacity as a cashier at the racetrack.

Officer Randy Kennan was heavily indebted to Leo Steiner, to the tune of nearly three grand and he didn't have the dough to pay even the vig on the loan.

Johnny also figured to hire three guys who weren't in on the deal as distractions at the track while the hold-up went on. What could go wrong? What indeed? If you are at all familiar with hardboiled pulp from the fifties, you know that there is always a woman to blame (or quite often, at least).

Sherry Peatty had "long, theatrical lashes half closed over her smoldering eyes" and her body was "small, beautifully molded,
deceptively soft" and she moved "with the grace of a cat." "At twenty-four, Sherry Peatty was a woman who positively exuded - . There was a velvet texture to her dark olive skin her face was almost Slavic in contour and she affected a tight, short hair cut which went far to set
off the loveliness of her small, pert face." She was tired of the dump they lived in and not having any money. When Johnny got a load of her, he wondered how Peatty had rated anything this pretty. But, he
soon realized that she was a tramp, that she was wide open and anybody could take a crack at her. "A tramp. A goddamned tramp. A pushover." "That was the trouble. She was beautiful. She was a bum."

And, Sherry had someone on the side: a bad guy, Val Cannon, who intrigued her because he dressed expensively, but never told her what he did for a living. "She took it for granted that he was mixed up in
some sort of racket or other." Hopefully, George didn't blab to Sherry
and Sherry didn't blab to Val cause then there would be more trouble.

White writes like a consummate professional. The story is compelling
as it unfolds piece by piece. Johnny has this job planned out to the "T"
and nothing could possibly go wrong.
This is one terrific, top-notch piece of hardboiled fiction. There are few
who can write as well as White and do it so effortlessly, creating such
unforgettable characters and such a tightly woven plot. Five stars,

My original The Killing audiobook review and many others can be found at Audiobook Reviewer.

Listening to The Killing (originally titled Clean Break) is like listening to a fantastic crime noir movie from the 1940’s. It was written in 1955 by Lionel White and made into a film titled The Killing by Stanley Kubrick in 1956. I have never seen the film and probably will not. It cannot possibly top the audiobook.

The Killing takes place in New York City and on Long Island. It is a heist novel, meaning a huge robbery is central to the story. There are several characters who could be considered the main character because of the parts they play but I feel Johnny Clay is it. Johnny has spent the last four years in jail planning the perfect heist. Not only does he have the perfect plan but he has the perfect crew to pull it off. Johnny’s crew is made up of non-criminals. The beauty of his plan is that no one should be an immediate suspect by the police. Even Johnny himself has not a record that would make him a usual suspect for that type of crime.

The heist is to rob the cashier’s office at the track immediately after the start of the biggest race of the year but right before the armoured truck shows up to collect the expected 1.5 to 2 millions dollars. Everything must go off exactly at the time planned and every man must do his job exactly as planned. This is Mission Impossible with a clock and silencer on a rifle as the high tech. If it works, they split the money, each about a half million each. If it doesn’t, Johnny is probably the only one caught and sent to jail.

Johnny’s gang consists of:
Big Mike a bartender at the track clubhouse
George Peatty a cashier at track
Randy Kennan, a cop with a need for cash to pay off loan sharks
Marvin Unger, a court stenographer
Marvin is the respectable man who has never done anything wrong. He gives Johnny a place to live and hold the planning meetings. He also fronts the money needed to pay off individuals and buy weapons. Johnny’s motivation is his girlfriend Fay. Fay waited for him while he was in prison. His plan is to pull this one job and then for he and Fay to leave the country and start living the good life.

All of this is going great until Sherry Peatty, George’s wife finds a ticket stub with an address and time written on it in his jacket pocket. She suspects he is up to something based on his recent behavior. George is a poor soul who thinks he has somehow won the luck lottery by convincing beautiful Sherry to marry him two years ago. Actually, in the vernacular of the time, Sherry is a tramp looking for the easy life and lots of money. George keeps a roof over her head and all she has to do is be “nice” to him when it suits her. She uses her hold over him to find out the minimal details on the heist. She then goes to visit Val, her boyfriend. Val is a gangster who drives a Cadillac and has a real gang of hardened criminals at his disposal. He and Sherry plan to get the details of the heist, let Johnny do the work, and then rob the robbers.

Mike Dennis’s narration is first rate. He has a wonderful voice in just doing the descriptions. When it gets to the characters speaking, his talent really shines. Listen to the gravely voice of Randy the cop which conveys his large size. Marvin truly sounds like a fussy little man who alternates drooling over the thought of the money and regretting he ever got involved. Mr. Dennis brings all of those emotions out in his narration. The accents are fantastic. His command of the different shades of a New York City accent is incredible.

The novel does a great job of introducing each character and their motivation to join the heist or try to get it for themselves. The language is full of 1950’s slang. It really is addictive. I found myself listening every chance I got. Would they get away with it? Who would end up with the money?

Audiobook was provided for review by the narrator.

This story features two seemingly unconnected cases that are in fact entwined.

By pure ill luck, Joyce takes her eyes off the road and collides into two criminals that are on their way to play their part in a robbery - a robbery that's been timed to the minute and their partners in crime are waiting for them to turn up in the get-away car. Trouble is, Joyce has written it off, yet her car's okay, meaning the criminals need it and she's now their hostage.

This was first published in 1957 and is well-plotted and features some interesting characters.

White is a very reliable writer of compelling pulp fiction. Like some of his other books, this concerns the planning and aftermath of a large crime. Here, however, the focus is different. The well-drawn cast of characters, rather than the caper, is at the center of this book. The protagonist owes the planner of the heist a lot and feels personal loyalty even while disliking him. The fact that he has fallen in love with the boss's mistress isn't helping matters. The boss himself is very interesting--intelligent, but also ruthless. The other characters range from rather admirable professional criminals who know their jobs and do them well to borderline (both sides of the border!) psychopaths. White brings them all together, along with the local townspeople in a small community on Florida's Atlantic coast, for a very compelling, page-turning, quick read that doesn't fall into the kind of predictability some tales like this have. As a writer, White only occasionally overdoes it. Most of his prose is clean, well-written, and to the point. Highly recommended. (Please see my reviews of some of his other books--all are recommended.)

Classic claustrophobic story of bus passengers caught in the middle of a murderer's attempt to escape from a journey back to Death Row. Once you get past the unlikelihood of a notorious murderer, who has already escaped from death row being taken back--from California to Texas--on a bus (!) guarded only by a 71-year-old deputy being forced into retirement, you can settle back and enjoy the interactions of the well-drawn cast of characters. The story is exceedingly brutal and graphic in a couple of places, but delivers a very satisfying conclusion. A strong sense of justice, whatever the price that must be paid, runs through all three of White's books that I have read thus far. He is a very sure-handed author whose prose only occasionally goes overboard. This is an economical 124 pages, although in small type, but that is all White needs to tell his tale. Modern authors should take note.½

Well done, meticulous tale of a robbery at a horse track, made into a classic Kubrick movie. White doesn't show much sentiment in this one as it moves to an ironic conclusion.

Another good book by White. Well written but somewhat predictable.

This is another one of those books whose cover and front inside page tells you a bunch of stuff about the book that they just made up because they thought it would sell. Sort of like movie trailers that include scenes and music that aren't even in the movie.

Hardboiled, pulpy noir caper novel from 1955. Fast, fun read - nothing subtle about this one. Maybe not as artfully constructed as say, a Raymond Chandler novel, but glorious in its trashiness. Stanley Kubrick made the film, which is also good, but significantly different plot-wise if I recall.½