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Shaker
Meet Roy Cooper, stoic, unassuming “errand runner” for various New York criminals. Roy arrives in Los Angeles to shoot a man named Martin Shine a week after a powerful earthquake has knocked out cell service, buckled the freeways, and thrown L.A. into chaos. Roy doesn’t know who Shine is or why he has to die, but he does his job and does it well. Except for one after the hit, Roy can’t find where he parked his car. Wandering the streets of North Hollywood, he stumbles upon a jogger getting mugged and beaten by four young gangbangers. Despite his attempt to simply put his head down and walk away, Roy winds up in the middle of another killing. Things get more complicated when the murdered jogger turns out to be a controversial mayoral candidate. Roy himself is shot twice, hospitalized in critical condition, and mistaken for a hero when a local resident leaks a video that goes viral.
Now meet the rest of the cast of characters, including Kelly Maguire, a disgraced LAPD detective with an anger management problem and strange feelings about L.A.’s newest hero; Science, the teenage gangbanger/shooter, who needs to keep Roy quiet about what he’s seen; Mayor Miguel Santiago, who finds himself facing accusations that he’s just had his opponent whacked; Albert Budin, Roy’s onetime mentor and one of the scariest, creepiest characters in recent crime fiction; and myriad criminals, politicians, and cops who all need Roy to disappear—preferably forever.
Finally, meet Scott Frank, who has created not just one of the most entertaining novels of the year but also one of the most surprising. This first novel is fun and funny as well as moving and textured, nuanced and powerful. Shaker is the debut work of fiction by a major new storyteller.
From the Hardcover edition.
Now meet the rest of the cast of characters, including Kelly Maguire, a disgraced LAPD detective with an anger management problem and strange feelings about L.A.’s newest hero; Science, the teenage gangbanger/shooter, who needs to keep Roy quiet about what he’s seen; Mayor Miguel Santiago, who finds himself facing accusations that he’s just had his opponent whacked; Albert Budin, Roy’s onetime mentor and one of the scariest, creepiest characters in recent crime fiction; and myriad criminals, politicians, and cops who all need Roy to disappear—preferably forever.
Finally, meet Scott Frank, who has created not just one of the most entertaining novels of the year but also one of the most surprising. This first novel is fun and funny as well as moving and textured, nuanced and powerful. Shaker is the debut work of fiction by a major new storyteller.
From the Hardcover edition.
335 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 1, 2015
187 people are currently reading
1870 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 185 reviews
February 19, 2016
Traveling for work can be a real headache, but it’s especially bad when the city you’re going to is still recovering from a natural disaster.
That’s what hit man Roy Cooper encounters when he flies into Los Angeles for his latest job because the area was hit with a round of serious earthquakes that have disrupted utilities and traffic, and the city is still experiencing random aftershocks. Roy manages to take care of his business quickly, but he hits a snag when he stumbles into a group of young gang members assaulting a jogger in an alley. Wacky hijinks ensue during which get Roy shot, and the jogger is killed by a banger with the gun Roy just used to murder his own target. As he recovers in the hospital Roy learns that the jogger was a mayoral candidate, the incident was recorded by a witness, cable news is running the footage repeatedly, and the kid who killed the jogger got away with Roy’s gun.
Everyone mistakenly thinks he’s a hero who tried to help the jogger, but Roy knows that his employers won’t be happy that his face is all over TV. Plus, he’s still got a murder weapon in the hands of a gang member that needs to be retrieved. Roy has other problems in the form of a Kelly Maguire and Science. Kelly is a tough cop on the verge of losing her job for excess force and racist statements who thinks that his story is fishy, and Science, the kid with his gun, is desperate to save face because the video shows Roy punking him so he’s looking for a rematch. Meanwhile, the mayor of LA tries to cope with the political fallout of his rival being murdered as well as find the best way to spin events for the media. Roy just wants to get out of the hospital so he can try to clean up the mess and maybe see his favorite baseball pitcher try to break a record.
This is a debut novel, but Scott Frank is hardly new to the writing game. He’s a veteran screenwriter whose credits include two of my favorite film adaptations of books, Get Shorty and Out of Sight. He’s also written and directed The Lookout, a very good heist movie with a twist starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt as well as another respectable adaptation of Lawrence Block’s A Walk Among the Tombstones featuring Liam Neeson.
So Frank knows a thing or two about crime stories, and the experience pays off here. The idea of a hit man getting waylaid by a gang in the midst of an earthquake ravaged LA is the kind of high concept that could make for a pretty good thriller in book or movie form. Frank actually digs a lot deeper into the history and personalities of Roy, Kelly, and Science so that all of them are fully formed characters, and he has more than a few things to say about the gaps between government and police policies versus the reality of life in a poor community dominated by drugs and gangs. This often seemed less like the crime thriller it appears to be and more like something that Richard Price or Dennis Lehane would do.
Roy in particular was compelling to me because he starts as this kind of blank slate that many hit man characters are often written as, but then we get a detailed history that turns into a parallel story that explains how he arrived at this particular moment. This turns into the sad and touching heart of the book.
Also, as a Kansas City area resident I enjoyed that Roy’s backstory is set here, but Frank does make a few errors. For example, you can’t be in Missouri and head east to Kansas City since it’s at the western edge of the state. Two characters committing crimes in Missouri are jailed in Kansas for some reason. A road is referred to as Route 435, but it’s actually an interstate highway, and referred to as I-435 or just 435 by locals, not Route 435. These are all minor nitpicks that didn’t hurt my enjoyment of the book, and I did appreciate that he got a lot right like naming a popular bar downtown and the Royals are always losing any game that Roy watches back in the day. (That’s a situation that has greatly improved though.)
Overall, this is a great crime novel that makes the most of its characters and their settings to tell a compelling story, and it builds to a climactic moment that manages to seem like the ending of a Hollywood blockbuster while simultaneously subverting a reader’s expectations as to how it all plays out. Whether it’s another movie or another book, I’ll be willing to check out more of Scott Frank’s work.
That’s what hit man Roy Cooper encounters when he flies into Los Angeles for his latest job because the area was hit with a round of serious earthquakes that have disrupted utilities and traffic, and the city is still experiencing random aftershocks. Roy manages to take care of his business quickly, but he hits a snag when he stumbles into a group of young gang members assaulting a jogger in an alley. Wacky hijinks ensue during which get Roy shot, and the jogger is killed by a banger with the gun Roy just used to murder his own target. As he recovers in the hospital Roy learns that the jogger was a mayoral candidate, the incident was recorded by a witness, cable news is running the footage repeatedly, and the kid who killed the jogger got away with Roy’s gun.
Everyone mistakenly thinks he’s a hero who tried to help the jogger, but Roy knows that his employers won’t be happy that his face is all over TV. Plus, he’s still got a murder weapon in the hands of a gang member that needs to be retrieved. Roy has other problems in the form of a Kelly Maguire and Science. Kelly is a tough cop on the verge of losing her job for excess force and racist statements who thinks that his story is fishy, and Science, the kid with his gun, is desperate to save face because the video shows Roy punking him so he’s looking for a rematch. Meanwhile, the mayor of LA tries to cope with the political fallout of his rival being murdered as well as find the best way to spin events for the media. Roy just wants to get out of the hospital so he can try to clean up the mess and maybe see his favorite baseball pitcher try to break a record.
This is a debut novel, but Scott Frank is hardly new to the writing game. He’s a veteran screenwriter whose credits include two of my favorite film adaptations of books, Get Shorty and Out of Sight. He’s also written and directed The Lookout, a very good heist movie with a twist starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt as well as another respectable adaptation of Lawrence Block’s A Walk Among the Tombstones featuring Liam Neeson.
So Frank knows a thing or two about crime stories, and the experience pays off here. The idea of a hit man getting waylaid by a gang in the midst of an earthquake ravaged LA is the kind of high concept that could make for a pretty good thriller in book or movie form. Frank actually digs a lot deeper into the history and personalities of Roy, Kelly, and Science so that all of them are fully formed characters, and he has more than a few things to say about the gaps between government and police policies versus the reality of life in a poor community dominated by drugs and gangs. This often seemed less like the crime thriller it appears to be and more like something that Richard Price or Dennis Lehane would do.
Roy in particular was compelling to me because he starts as this kind of blank slate that many hit man characters are often written as, but then we get a detailed history that turns into a parallel story that explains how he arrived at this particular moment. This turns into the sad and touching heart of the book.
Also, as a Kansas City area resident I enjoyed that Roy’s backstory is set here, but Frank does make a few errors. For example, you can’t be in Missouri and head east to Kansas City since it’s at the western edge of the state. Two characters committing crimes in Missouri are jailed in Kansas for some reason. A road is referred to as Route 435, but it’s actually an interstate highway, and referred to as I-435 or just 435 by locals, not Route 435. These are all minor nitpicks that didn’t hurt my enjoyment of the book, and I did appreciate that he got a lot right like naming a popular bar downtown and the Royals are always losing any game that Roy watches back in the day. (That’s a situation that has greatly improved though.)
Overall, this is a great crime novel that makes the most of its characters and their settings to tell a compelling story, and it builds to a climactic moment that manages to seem like the ending of a Hollywood blockbuster while simultaneously subverting a reader’s expectations as to how it all plays out. Whether it’s another movie or another book, I’ll be willing to check out more of Scott Frank’s work.
January 7, 2017
This is a very good first novel from screenwriter Scott Frank who wrote the scripts for "Get Shorty," "Out of Sight," and a number of other very entertaining movies. It's at times bloody, amusing, and heart-breaking, and it features a great cast of memorable characters.
Principal among them is a New York hit man named Roy Cooper who flies to L.A. to carry out an assignment but who then gets caught up in an earthquake and any number of other potential disasters before he can safely get out of town after completing his mission.
Roy sensibly parks his rental car a couple of blocks away from the home of his target, but once the job is done, he gets turned around and can't find the car. As he's searching for it, he stumbles onto a group of young gangbangers who are robbing an elderly jogger. Frank intervenes, but disaster ensues and Frank winds up shot.
A witness sees it all go down from his window above but, not surprisingly in this day and age, instead of calling the cops, the idiot films the whole thing with his phone and then sells the video. The video goes viral, and Roy is mistaken for a hero, which leaves him hospitalized and in deep trouble. Roy had been off the grid for a very long time and now suddenly he's on everyone's radar, including that of several people who would very much like to see him removed from the scene altogether.
In fairly short order, Roy has both the cops and a lot of bad guys hunting him down. One cop in particular, Kelly Maguire, has problems of her own that are almost at least as bad as Roy's, but nevertheless, she will soon be hot on his trail. Also in (more or less) hot pursuit are a couple of the young gangbangers who feel dissed by Roy's interruption of their crime and who are determined to build their own reps, in part at Roy's expense.
Meanwhile, the damned city is still shaking from aftershocks and it's almost impossible to get anywhere, at least very quickly, because of the damage to the roads and bridges. This complicates matters for all concerned. This is a very well-told tale with crisp dialog, great plotting and very well-drawn characters. All in all, a story that seems to end a lot sooner than the reader might wish.
Principal among them is a New York hit man named Roy Cooper who flies to L.A. to carry out an assignment but who then gets caught up in an earthquake and any number of other potential disasters before he can safely get out of town after completing his mission.
Roy sensibly parks his rental car a couple of blocks away from the home of his target, but once the job is done, he gets turned around and can't find the car. As he's searching for it, he stumbles onto a group of young gangbangers who are robbing an elderly jogger. Frank intervenes, but disaster ensues and Frank winds up shot.
A witness sees it all go down from his window above but, not surprisingly in this day and age, instead of calling the cops, the idiot films the whole thing with his phone and then sells the video. The video goes viral, and Roy is mistaken for a hero, which leaves him hospitalized and in deep trouble. Roy had been off the grid for a very long time and now suddenly he's on everyone's radar, including that of several people who would very much like to see him removed from the scene altogether.
In fairly short order, Roy has both the cops and a lot of bad guys hunting him down. One cop in particular, Kelly Maguire, has problems of her own that are almost at least as bad as Roy's, but nevertheless, she will soon be hot on his trail. Also in (more or less) hot pursuit are a couple of the young gangbangers who feel dissed by Roy's interruption of their crime and who are determined to build their own reps, in part at Roy's expense.
Meanwhile, the damned city is still shaking from aftershocks and it's almost impossible to get anywhere, at least very quickly, because of the damage to the roads and bridges. This complicates matters for all concerned. This is a very well-told tale with crisp dialog, great plotting and very well-drawn characters. All in all, a story that seems to end a lot sooner than the reader might wish.
December 23, 2022
What is this?: The debut novel from screenwriter Scott Frank, who wrote the original screenplay Dead Again, which Kenneth Branagh directed and starred in. Frank added adaptations of the Elmore Leonard novels Get Shorty and Out of Sight. He recently adapted and directed The Queen's Gambit as a mini-series for Netflix.
When was it published?: 2016
When did I abandon it?: 17% mark
Why?: In this poor man's Elmore Leonard, we have a hitman from back East, a female LAPD detective and a gangbanger who cross paths while L.A. is swarmed with aftershocks of a major earthquake. The earthquake prologue grabbed me--who doesn't want to see L.A. shaken by a major earthquake--but when it comes to characters, it felt like only Robin Hood, Maid Marian and the Sheriff of Nottingham have been around longer. I've seen these characters time and time and time again and while Frank attempts to color them in--the hitman is a schlub, the gangbanger is a math and science wizard--I was bored all to hell.
There is an extremely incredibly very long scene in which the hitman loses his car after a job and while wandering around North Hollywood after dark, comes across the gangbanger and his partners terrorizing a male jogger at gunpoint. Ultimately, the hoodlums catch the hitman watching and begin to threaten him too. In reality, a mugging incident like this would be over in what would feel like 15 seconds, but Frank just goes on and on and on with it. There's nothing fresh or exciting about it at all. I didn't care what was going to happen next or whether the female cop was going to piece anything together.
Give me a break with these archetypes: the hitman going on a job, the female detective proving herself, the hoodlum outwitting the others with uncommon intelligence. With this type of book--and Elmore Leonard wrote his share of mediocre ones--I want to be tickled from the start, thrilled from the start, or puzzled from the start. Anything that fails all of those criteria is just shooting for lukewarm junk. The earthquake swarm was fresh. Why not make the protagonist a public safety expert, or structural engineer, or seismologist? What if the earthquake concealed a crime? I'm not suggesting those would make a better book, but it would've been one I haven't seen already.
Credit where credit is due: Frank also co-adapted Minority Report for Steven Spielberg, which is a movie that never got its due, perhaps because its climax is pretty low wattage compared to most science fiction or spy movies, but I marvel at finding something new each time I watch it. I love a good alien, robot or time traveler in science fiction and Samantha Morton's empath is one of the best.
When was it published?: 2016
When did I abandon it?: 17% mark
Why?: In this poor man's Elmore Leonard, we have a hitman from back East, a female LAPD detective and a gangbanger who cross paths while L.A. is swarmed with aftershocks of a major earthquake. The earthquake prologue grabbed me--who doesn't want to see L.A. shaken by a major earthquake--but when it comes to characters, it felt like only Robin Hood, Maid Marian and the Sheriff of Nottingham have been around longer. I've seen these characters time and time and time again and while Frank attempts to color them in--the hitman is a schlub, the gangbanger is a math and science wizard--I was bored all to hell.
There is an extremely incredibly very long scene in which the hitman loses his car after a job and while wandering around North Hollywood after dark, comes across the gangbanger and his partners terrorizing a male jogger at gunpoint. Ultimately, the hoodlums catch the hitman watching and begin to threaten him too. In reality, a mugging incident like this would be over in what would feel like 15 seconds, but Frank just goes on and on and on with it. There's nothing fresh or exciting about it at all. I didn't care what was going to happen next or whether the female cop was going to piece anything together.
Give me a break with these archetypes: the hitman going on a job, the female detective proving herself, the hoodlum outwitting the others with uncommon intelligence. With this type of book--and Elmore Leonard wrote his share of mediocre ones--I want to be tickled from the start, thrilled from the start, or puzzled from the start. Anything that fails all of those criteria is just shooting for lukewarm junk. The earthquake swarm was fresh. Why not make the protagonist a public safety expert, or structural engineer, or seismologist? What if the earthquake concealed a crime? I'm not suggesting those would make a better book, but it would've been one I haven't seen already.
Credit where credit is due: Frank also co-adapted Minority Report for Steven Spielberg, which is a movie that never got its due, perhaps because its climax is pretty low wattage compared to most science fiction or spy movies, but I marvel at finding something new each time I watch it. I love a good alien, robot or time traveler in science fiction and Samantha Morton's empath is one of the best.
July 2, 2020
It was a fairly simple assignment for hitman Roy Cooper: fly out to LA, kill a guy, then fly back. BUT . . . there was an earthquake, a missing car, and gang-bangers, and a stolen gun, and yet another corpse. Pretty soon, there are a lot of people looking for Roy. All Roy wants is to watch a baseball game, and disappear, but we know you can't always get what you want . . . and therein lies the fun.
The author throws up a lot of characters and flashbacks to keep straight, and that kept this from being a perfect read for me, but he keeps things interesting with some twists and turns along the way. In all, it's a pretty entertaining read with an explosive ending.
The author throws up a lot of characters and flashbacks to keep straight, and that kept this from being a perfect read for me, but he keeps things interesting with some twists and turns along the way. In all, it's a pretty entertaining read with an explosive ending.
February 14, 2016
I'd rate this maybe 4.25 stars...
Shaker reads like a movie, and that's not a bad thing. You can totally see the film version of this book playing out before your eyes.
This isn't too surprising once you learn that Scott Frank, the author, is an Academy Award-nominated screenwriter who also wrote and directed a film adaptation of a classic Lawrence Block crime novel. And while the film version of Shaker might help alleviate some of the confusion caused by a few characters too many, the book is an addictive, suspenseful, and surprisingly sensitive read worth savoring.
Los Angeles has just been hit by a pretty powerful earthquake which has damaged a lot of the major highways, left many buildings in disarray, and knocked out major cell service throughout the city. Aftershocks keep the city's residents on edge, and sometimes cause more damage. A few days after the big quake, Roy Cooper, erstwhile "errand man" for his New York criminal employers, is dispatched to LA to murder a shady accountant named Martin Shine. Roy isn't told what Shine did to incur his employers' wrath (if anything), but knows his job is to follow orders, not to question details.
Roy arrives in the city and does what he needs to. But he encounters a slight problem after the hit is complete: he can't find his rental car. He has apparently gotten himself confused wandering in the few blocks around Shine's apartment. Then his problems get worse, as Roy stumbles upon another crime in progress, as four young gang members are mugging an elderly jogger. Rather than do what he should, that is, get the hell out of there, Roy gets involved, and the next thing he knows, the jogger is dead and Roy is in the hospital.
It turns out the elderly jogger was a leading mayoral candidate, bent on solving the gang problem. The mugging, and subsequent murder/shooting, was captured on a bystander's cell phone video, so the media has branded Roy a hero. This doesn't sit well with a lot of people, including his employers, the gang members who feel Roy disrespected them, and a figure from Roy's past, who has a score to settle. And as the cops, including disgraced police detective Kelly Maguire (who has a bit of an anger management problem), try to figure out exactly who Roy is, he needs to get out of the public eye and finish what he inadvertently started.
Frank juggles a lot of different narrative threads in the book, and all but one ultimately are relevant to the plot. (There's even some flashbacks to explain what brought Roy to this point in his life, and they're pretty fascinating on their own.) There's some great action, some creepy violence, and some pertinent social commentary on what drives gang members to live lives of unrelenting violence, lives they know may ultimately lead to their own demise. While I found Roy and Kelly's characters really fascinating (and would have loved it if the book focused more on both of them), Shaker drifts from time to time, juggling too many different narratives, and I just looked forward to the plot returning to the story at the book's heart.
As you'd expect from a talented screenwriter, Frank is a pretty strong storyteller, and while the book may meander occasionally, it's tremendously captivating. A great addition to the thriller/crime genre, and hopefully Frank will continue writing books in addition to films.
See all of my reviews at http://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blo....
Shaker reads like a movie, and that's not a bad thing. You can totally see the film version of this book playing out before your eyes.
This isn't too surprising once you learn that Scott Frank, the author, is an Academy Award-nominated screenwriter who also wrote and directed a film adaptation of a classic Lawrence Block crime novel. And while the film version of Shaker might help alleviate some of the confusion caused by a few characters too many, the book is an addictive, suspenseful, and surprisingly sensitive read worth savoring.
Los Angeles has just been hit by a pretty powerful earthquake which has damaged a lot of the major highways, left many buildings in disarray, and knocked out major cell service throughout the city. Aftershocks keep the city's residents on edge, and sometimes cause more damage. A few days after the big quake, Roy Cooper, erstwhile "errand man" for his New York criminal employers, is dispatched to LA to murder a shady accountant named Martin Shine. Roy isn't told what Shine did to incur his employers' wrath (if anything), but knows his job is to follow orders, not to question details.
Roy arrives in the city and does what he needs to. But he encounters a slight problem after the hit is complete: he can't find his rental car. He has apparently gotten himself confused wandering in the few blocks around Shine's apartment. Then his problems get worse, as Roy stumbles upon another crime in progress, as four young gang members are mugging an elderly jogger. Rather than do what he should, that is, get the hell out of there, Roy gets involved, and the next thing he knows, the jogger is dead and Roy is in the hospital.
It turns out the elderly jogger was a leading mayoral candidate, bent on solving the gang problem. The mugging, and subsequent murder/shooting, was captured on a bystander's cell phone video, so the media has branded Roy a hero. This doesn't sit well with a lot of people, including his employers, the gang members who feel Roy disrespected them, and a figure from Roy's past, who has a score to settle. And as the cops, including disgraced police detective Kelly Maguire (who has a bit of an anger management problem), try to figure out exactly who Roy is, he needs to get out of the public eye and finish what he inadvertently started.
Frank juggles a lot of different narrative threads in the book, and all but one ultimately are relevant to the plot. (There's even some flashbacks to explain what brought Roy to this point in his life, and they're pretty fascinating on their own.) There's some great action, some creepy violence, and some pertinent social commentary on what drives gang members to live lives of unrelenting violence, lives they know may ultimately lead to their own demise. While I found Roy and Kelly's characters really fascinating (and would have loved it if the book focused more on both of them), Shaker drifts from time to time, juggling too many different narratives, and I just looked forward to the plot returning to the story at the book's heart.
As you'd expect from a talented screenwriter, Frank is a pretty strong storyteller, and while the book may meander occasionally, it's tremendously captivating. A great addition to the thriller/crime genre, and hopefully Frank will continue writing books in addition to films.
See all of my reviews at http://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blo....
September 3, 2025
Excellent thriller. Might be the most enjoyable reading experience I’ve had in months.
Reminded me at times of Richard Price’s Clockers and one of Thomas Perry’s standalones.
Highest Recommendation
Reminded me at times of Richard Price’s Clockers and one of Thomas Perry’s standalones.
Highest Recommendation
Update:
When I wrote the above I felt I���d provided enough information about the novel.
This novel is far more engaging than indicated above.
When the main character arrives from New York to Los Angeles, the West Coast is experiencing the strongest earthquake in modern history. He’s an odd, childlike man -possibly in his late 30s, maybe early 40s. But his quiet mannerisms are reminiscent of a child to those who encounter him as they go about their day.
No one ever entertains for a second that this unassuming, quiet man with a waif’s eyes is a stone killer for hire.
He completes his assignment and all his going well when, in the process of calmly walking away from the scene of his latest hit for hire he stumbles upon a street gang of Black youths busy terrorizing a middle-aged gentleman jogger in an alley. He watches for a bit, casually interested with no intention of intervening when he’s noticed by one of the gang members. They search him and find the gun he used minutes earlier and one of the punks pockets it. Then our lead character is shot by one of the gangstas and mistakenly left for dead. But he’s not dead. And he has to retrieve the murder weapon from the gangbangers before the cops bust the members and trace the gun back to him and the outfit that hired him.
And that situation leads to one of the most entertaining crime thrillers I’ve enjoyed in a very long time.
February 20, 2016
I don't recall how I discovered this book. The premise, which you can read for yourself, sounded interesting.
The writing flowed well. The dialogue was believable. I liked Ray's story, and I liked Kelly Maguire. However...
There is so much violence in this book that you'd think a blood bank exploded. There are enough characters left uninjured and alive that you could staff a self-serve gas station. The ending was abrupt and stupid.
In keeping with the earthquake theme of this book, and borrowing from Steely Dan. "California tumbles into the sea. That'll be the day" I recommend this book.
The writing flowed well. The dialogue was believable. I liked Ray's story, and I liked Kelly Maguire. However...
There is so much violence in this book that you'd think a blood bank exploded. There are enough characters left uninjured and alive that you could staff a self-serve gas station. The ending was abrupt and stupid.
In keeping with the earthquake theme of this book, and borrowing from Steely Dan. "California tumbles into the sea. That'll be the day" I recommend this book.
October 31, 2025
Los Angeles, Hollywood, suffers a horrible earthquake and aftershocks. Meanwhile a sort of mobster from New York arrives to do a job and finds himself involved in a gang shooting. There are other characters and a central female police officer.
May 9, 2016
Absolutely brilliant urban pulp fiction of 2016. This one is the antithesis for all that could be the essence of human appreciation of a Mother's Day. So I could not do this review on that May weekend. Some Mothers do feature in this book. One has a lot in common with Norman Bates' Mom.
So here goes some of my reaction. The parts I can post about, anyway. And first a warning. For all of you out there who dislike foul language, psychotic characters, urban worst, and generally the lowest level of USA reality- do NOT read this book. The gang bangers in this book were the closest to the real deal I've ever read.
It's pure pulp fiction with deep characterizations for all of nearly a dozen primaries. Like the movie with that title, you know who these individuals in this novel ARE. They are NOT like the misunderstood current modern novel character of quirky neurotics for entitled sensibilities and venting wussie mouthing habits. These characters have had cause and are feral.
The prime core component is the life story of Roy Cooper. We know his work and his present day "just about 40 year old life", his extreme following for a baseball player and his present assigned work task which is in L.A.- we know those in every particular. His apartment is in New York, so the first sections detail his plane flight and CA arrival tasks.
Telling you much more about plot would be spoilers. Several times during the course of events we get flashed back in long chapters to Roy's boyhood. And the whys and wherefores for some of the "now". Who is his family? The ones of DNA or the others of his 12-18 year long current association? Who is his brother? What is a "brother"?
But Roy is similar to a sun in this novel, and there are planets all around him in their spheres. None of them are friendly or "normal" planets. All have him as a target for different reasons. Superb, superb plotting. And at least 10-12 characters in this novel you will not easily forget. Kelly the cop, for one, who is the troubled and evicted for violence against a perp "badge holder for now" who is on the edge of a suicidal attempt for some answers- and not in the mood to take any more BS on the way there in the traffic either.
All is shaking. All of their set-ups. All of their jobs and chosen plans. L.A. is shaking from quakes. Some of the roads closed or 1 lane and the moods in the drivers pressure cooker high.
And then there are our boys. Science, Truck, L and the little G's. Albert, Bob, Harvey, Rita and the big G's. Also mixed in is a Ruth Turner looking for a decades old kidnapped baby. Everything is mixed, everyone a SHAKER.
Will Roy get to the Dodger game? Will he see the KID fulfill his never before broken record? Will the body count go above 40 in the book? Will Ruby ever get Kelly to dry out and pick a life not centered in a self fulfilled punishment dynamic? Guns galore, but knives feature in every scale of measure. And cars and trampling crowds take their toll, as well.
Really, this made me think I was at 26th & California, listening to the real deal gang banger cases.
Be warned, that it is dialect, sometimes Ebonics, sometimes vile. The book also "plays you". And don't for a minute forget that there are cell phone cameras and windows with eyes everywhere.
The underage reform prison for juvie murderers and those chapters within the midst of the book are some of the most realistic prison copy I've ever read. This book is not for those who think all can be rehabilitated. Or with a strong belief that talking and education with understanding and love of purposed instruction and role model placements will or can induce change for those who live by violence = power.
The only other gang related tale in film or in print that I've personally experienced that comes as close to the reality right now in our 60 or 80 or 90 different gangs cities, was The Wire.
Scott Frank has been a screen writer/player for some of the best films in this tough genre. REALLY hope he continues to write another book like this one. There are thousands of 12 and 13 year old non-children, exactly like Science, out there. And cops just like Ruby and Kelly too.
All of which, often, have similar conclusions.
So here goes some of my reaction. The parts I can post about, anyway. And first a warning. For all of you out there who dislike foul language, psychotic characters, urban worst, and generally the lowest level of USA reality- do NOT read this book. The gang bangers in this book were the closest to the real deal I've ever read.
It's pure pulp fiction with deep characterizations for all of nearly a dozen primaries. Like the movie with that title, you know who these individuals in this novel ARE. They are NOT like the misunderstood current modern novel character of quirky neurotics for entitled sensibilities and venting wussie mouthing habits. These characters have had cause and are feral.
The prime core component is the life story of Roy Cooper. We know his work and his present day "just about 40 year old life", his extreme following for a baseball player and his present assigned work task which is in L.A.- we know those in every particular. His apartment is in New York, so the first sections detail his plane flight and CA arrival tasks.
Telling you much more about plot would be spoilers. Several times during the course of events we get flashed back in long chapters to Roy's boyhood. And the whys and wherefores for some of the "now". Who is his family? The ones of DNA or the others of his 12-18 year long current association? Who is his brother? What is a "brother"?
But Roy is similar to a sun in this novel, and there are planets all around him in their spheres. None of them are friendly or "normal" planets. All have him as a target for different reasons. Superb, superb plotting. And at least 10-12 characters in this novel you will not easily forget. Kelly the cop, for one, who is the troubled and evicted for violence against a perp "badge holder for now" who is on the edge of a suicidal attempt for some answers- and not in the mood to take any more BS on the way there in the traffic either.
All is shaking. All of their set-ups. All of their jobs and chosen plans. L.A. is shaking from quakes. Some of the roads closed or 1 lane and the moods in the drivers pressure cooker high.
And then there are our boys. Science, Truck, L and the little G's. Albert, Bob, Harvey, Rita and the big G's. Also mixed in is a Ruth Turner looking for a decades old kidnapped baby. Everything is mixed, everyone a SHAKER.
Will Roy get to the Dodger game? Will he see the KID fulfill his never before broken record? Will the body count go above 40 in the book? Will Ruby ever get Kelly to dry out and pick a life not centered in a self fulfilled punishment dynamic? Guns galore, but knives feature in every scale of measure. And cars and trampling crowds take their toll, as well.
Really, this made me think I was at 26th & California, listening to the real deal gang banger cases.
Be warned, that it is dialect, sometimes Ebonics, sometimes vile. The book also "plays you". And don't for a minute forget that there are cell phone cameras and windows with eyes everywhere.
The underage reform prison for juvie murderers and those chapters within the midst of the book are some of the most realistic prison copy I've ever read. This book is not for those who think all can be rehabilitated. Or with a strong belief that talking and education with understanding and love of purposed instruction and role model placements will or can induce change for those who live by violence = power.
The only other gang related tale in film or in print that I've personally experienced that comes as close to the reality right now in our 60 or 80 or 90 different gangs cities, was The Wire.
Scott Frank has been a screen writer/player for some of the best films in this tough genre. REALLY hope he continues to write another book like this one. There are thousands of 12 and 13 year old non-children, exactly like Science, out there. And cops just like Ruby and Kelly too.
All of which, often, have similar conclusions.
May 2, 2023
Scott Frank’s 2016 crime thriller Shaker is a dark comedic riff on fiction and the stare of the world. The first character we are introduced to in this book is that tarnished City of the Angels, here suffering through a major quake and a series of brutal aftershocks. The politicians are more interested in getting the right headlines than restoring power or, more importantly, cell service. Roy Cooper strolls into this mess from LAX like a man on a mission. That’s cause he’s on a mission dealing out death for clients he never met and the rationale behind it is unimportant to Roy. Just so he gets the job done. But Roy screws up and loses his rental car, wandering into the middle of four gangster wannabes trying to prove their balls by kicking an elderly man. Roy can’t afford to be seen but in a strange twist of events he is hailed citywide as a hero fit taking in four gangbangers all caught on video and broadcast on CNN.
The dark gallows humor shows itself in just so many ways here as Roy tries to extricate himself from this mess as the gangbangers realize he’s a witness and show up to the hospital at the same time as a hapless mayor, all in their way to meet Roy. Meanwhile, Detective Kelly Maguire, whose loud out front mouth has gotten her in hot water with the brass, I’d on the case and slowly putting the pieces together.
As all this goes on we are given Roy’s unbelievable backstory from his childhood filled with a father with migraines and anger issues, an accident that leaves dear old dad near a vegetative state, and Roy doing hard time at a young age for “killing” dad. We see how Roy learned how to toughen up and survive juvie. But we also see that under his calm professional demeanor, there’s still someone in there who is vulnerable and wants to do the right thing.
The story brilliantly juxtaposes the crime fiction story with sardonic commentary about politics, about the media, and about the Internet age. Scratch the surface and all that Hollywood glitter barely masks the decaying cesspool that Los Angeles has become. With neighborhoods gifted to street gangs and the rich up in their mansions blind to what goes on in the streets.
In the end, Roy is forced to confront his past whether he wants to or not.
The dark gallows humor shows itself in just so many ways here as Roy tries to extricate himself from this mess as the gangbangers realize he’s a witness and show up to the hospital at the same time as a hapless mayor, all in their way to meet Roy. Meanwhile, Detective Kelly Maguire, whose loud out front mouth has gotten her in hot water with the brass, I’d on the case and slowly putting the pieces together.
As all this goes on we are given Roy’s unbelievable backstory from his childhood filled with a father with migraines and anger issues, an accident that leaves dear old dad near a vegetative state, and Roy doing hard time at a young age for “killing” dad. We see how Roy learned how to toughen up and survive juvie. But we also see that under his calm professional demeanor, there’s still someone in there who is vulnerable and wants to do the right thing.
The story brilliantly juxtaposes the crime fiction story with sardonic commentary about politics, about the media, and about the Internet age. Scratch the surface and all that Hollywood glitter barely masks the decaying cesspool that Los Angeles has become. With neighborhoods gifted to street gangs and the rich up in their mansions blind to what goes on in the streets.
In the end, Roy is forced to confront his past whether he wants to or not.
April 4, 2016
In the wake of a monster LA earthquake, unassuming East Coast button man Roy Cooper arrives in town on a wet work assignment. After pulling the hit and leaving the scene, Roy wanders into the middle of a robbery between a gang of young black bangers and a popular Latino mayoral candidate. The would-be mayor is killed; Roy shot and hospitalized; the bangers scram with Roy’s gun.
When a video surfaces of Roy’s confrontation with the bangers, the press, and the current mayor, a feckless Antonio Banderas lookalike, mistakenly hail Roy as a hero. Not great for a hitman trying to keep a low profile – as Roy’s East Coast mob associates ominously warn him. Knowing it’s just a matter of time before the cops uncover his true identity, Roy discharges himself from hospital and starts hunting down the bangers to eliminate the witnesses.
Problem is: The punks are thinking the same thing, and green-light Roy. The bangers are led by the intelligent and ambitious Science, who sees the media circus resulting from the would-be mayor’s death, as an opportunity to claw back control from the Mexican gangs, and assume legendary OG status for himself.
Complicating matters further is the cop investigating the murder of the mayoral candidate – the current mayor’s critics suspect foul play, that the robbery-homicide was in fact a political assassination. Kelly Maguire is a former gang division cop, busted down to shit work after crippling an African-American rapist-murderer in her custody. (The rapist-murderer’s colour being more important to the press than his heinous crimes.)
Plus there’s the vengeful ghost from Roy’s past: Albert Boudin, the psycho leader of Roy’s old murder-for-hire crew, who believes Roy is dead – at least until he sees the video of Roy vs. the bangers. Now Albert comes to town to settle scores with Roy, and kill anyone in his way.
Scott Frank is the veteran Hollywood screenwriter of Out of Sight, Get Shorty, A Walk Among the Tombstones, among others. As a screenwriter myself – who has enjoyed nothing even close to Frank’s success – I’m always curious to see how others make the jump to prose fiction. (I’m still holding out hope for a Shane Black novel; and the long-threatened Tarantino novel could be interesting, if only because QT may finally be forced to learn how to edit/rewrite.) Frank makes it seem effortless.
His style is laidback, cool, often funny; reminiscent of Elmore Leonard, whose work Frank has adapted successfully for the screen. Structurally, this is excellent stuff, as I’d expect from a veteran screenwriter. Roy’s backstory is revealed in flashback scenes as compelling as the active narrative; by the time the story ends, as his motivation becomes clear, Roy is an enormously sympathetic, even tragic figure. Characterization overall is equally tight. The scenes of Science and his crew of fucked-at-birth bangers recall Richard Price’s Clockers, and the kids from The Wire.
Shaker is an engrossing crime thriller veined with sly black humour, political satire, and social commentary. It reads like a movie, but no mistake, this isn’t just a screenwriter dusting off an old script for prose; Shaker is very much a novel, and for me, the book of the year so far.
When a video surfaces of Roy’s confrontation with the bangers, the press, and the current mayor, a feckless Antonio Banderas lookalike, mistakenly hail Roy as a hero. Not great for a hitman trying to keep a low profile – as Roy’s East Coast mob associates ominously warn him. Knowing it’s just a matter of time before the cops uncover his true identity, Roy discharges himself from hospital and starts hunting down the bangers to eliminate the witnesses.
Problem is: The punks are thinking the same thing, and green-light Roy. The bangers are led by the intelligent and ambitious Science, who sees the media circus resulting from the would-be mayor’s death, as an opportunity to claw back control from the Mexican gangs, and assume legendary OG status for himself.
Complicating matters further is the cop investigating the murder of the mayoral candidate – the current mayor’s critics suspect foul play, that the robbery-homicide was in fact a political assassination. Kelly Maguire is a former gang division cop, busted down to shit work after crippling an African-American rapist-murderer in her custody. (The rapist-murderer’s colour being more important to the press than his heinous crimes.)
Plus there’s the vengeful ghost from Roy’s past: Albert Boudin, the psycho leader of Roy’s old murder-for-hire crew, who believes Roy is dead – at least until he sees the video of Roy vs. the bangers. Now Albert comes to town to settle scores with Roy, and kill anyone in his way.
Scott Frank is the veteran Hollywood screenwriter of Out of Sight, Get Shorty, A Walk Among the Tombstones, among others. As a screenwriter myself – who has enjoyed nothing even close to Frank’s success – I’m always curious to see how others make the jump to prose fiction. (I’m still holding out hope for a Shane Black novel; and the long-threatened Tarantino novel could be interesting, if only because QT may finally be forced to learn how to edit/rewrite.) Frank makes it seem effortless.
His style is laidback, cool, often funny; reminiscent of Elmore Leonard, whose work Frank has adapted successfully for the screen. Structurally, this is excellent stuff, as I’d expect from a veteran screenwriter. Roy’s backstory is revealed in flashback scenes as compelling as the active narrative; by the time the story ends, as his motivation becomes clear, Roy is an enormously sympathetic, even tragic figure. Characterization overall is equally tight. The scenes of Science and his crew of fucked-at-birth bangers recall Richard Price’s Clockers, and the kids from The Wire.
Shaker is an engrossing crime thriller veined with sly black humour, political satire, and social commentary. It reads like a movie, but no mistake, this isn’t just a screenwriter dusting off an old script for prose; Shaker is very much a novel, and for me, the book of the year so far.
August 28, 2023
A summer blockbuster of a thriller, to be expected from a new writer for me who turns out to be one of the better Hollywood scriptwriters. Scott Frank puts his movie experience to good use here, with an elaborate plot that twists and turns in surprising directions, with punchy characters and with a lot of dark, bloody humour.
All of the action takes place against a colourful Los Angeles backdrop, from the slums and gang infested streets to the high-rise offices of political and law enforcement agents. The author shakes things up literally, blockbuster fashion, with a deadly series of earthquakes, culminating in a superbowl threeway grand finale between the main actors in the unfolding drama.
Roy Cooper starts the proceedings by coming from an anonymous life in New York to settle some scores for the East Coast mob. He is a prized enforcer / terminator who kills people on contract as a freelance agent. Most of all, Roy prizes his anonymity, working through a clearing house of trusted intermediaries and using fake identities.
His job in L. A. is routine, and goes smoothly for the well prepared killer, except for a slight hitch: he can’t find his getaway car, and gets lost on the dark streets of an unfamiliar neighbourhood.
Roy witnesses an assault against an elderly jogger by four young punks and, after he confronts them, becomes an instant city hero when his intervention is captured on a phone camera. With his cover blown, Roy becomes a target for several crime bosses on both Coasts.
“Sergeant Maguire sees and experiences things that she can’t process, horrible things, feels bad for the victims, then goes and exacts revenge on their behalf.”
Kelly Maguire is a disgraced local detective who smells a rat in the newsreel about Roy, but she is sidelined by her superiors who like the publicity of the civic-minded vigilante image. Kelly tries to overcome her anger-management problems and to work with her contacts in the local gangs, but Roy proves to be an elusive target.
A later addition to the plot is Albert, a former prison colleague and partner in crime for Roy, who nurtures a decades long vendetta against his former pupil.
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Scott Frank is a competent writer who provided me with an entertaining beach read in Rhodes, but I found myself struggling to remember the salient points a few weeks after my vacation. Indeed, my impression is that Hollywood today is saturated with well written, well acted crime thrillers. Frank’s hooks in this particular story [the earthquakes, the quirks of the main characters like baseball and old movies, the black humour, the well handled flashbacks, the fact that he landed the end scene well] probably deserve an extra star in my final verdict. I might even go to watch it in cinema if the story will be adapted into a movie.
Considering how similar to other crime thrillers and ultimately forgettable the plot is, I believe three stars are more appropriate.
June 11, 2020
Very much enjoyed most of the characters (esp Kelly and Roy), the story and clever dialogue.
February 29, 2016
Hollywood screenwriter, Scott Frank’s debut novel, Shaker, is a fun and exciting thriller. Frank, who adapted Lawrence Block’s A Walk Among the Tombstones for the big screen (and who bludgeoned out all of that novel’s nuance and depth as if he was hammering out dents in a ’96 Honda at a collision auto body shop) shows a much more sensitive and complex side in this book.
Shaker is a crime story told from multiple perspectives including a hitman, a violent cop struggling to control her anger, gang-bangers, and city politicians. The main point of view is from hired gun, Roy Cooper. He is in Los Angeles shortly after a major earthquake, he has just dispatched a man he had a contract on when he loses his rental. Where could it have gone? While wandering around in search of his getaway vehicle, he stumbles onto another crime. Some young wanna-be gang members are mugging a jogger. More gunplay follows, and Roy who’s trade values secrecy and concealment above all else is now a media celebrity thanks to some cell phone video sold to the press. People get chased, guns get lost, and menacing folks from the past with irreconcilable grudges show up with sharp knives and firearms.
The characters are colorful and on more than one occasion I was reminded of Elmore Leonard’s novels (not surprisingly as Frank was the screen writer for both Get Shorty and Out of Sight). But like Leonard, Frank grounds these characters firmly in reality. The chapters exploring Roy’s past shine light on his behavior and life choices. All characters are fleshed out and while you may not like many of them, they stay with you like chewing gum stuck to the bottom of your shoe.
Shaker was a delightful white knuckler, a quick yet substantive (like a warm beef stew on a chilly February evening) read from a writer who will hopefully return to writing more novels in the future.
Shaker is a crime story told from multiple perspectives including a hitman, a violent cop struggling to control her anger, gang-bangers, and city politicians. The main point of view is from hired gun, Roy Cooper. He is in Los Angeles shortly after a major earthquake, he has just dispatched a man he had a contract on when he loses his rental. Where could it have gone? While wandering around in search of his getaway vehicle, he stumbles onto another crime. Some young wanna-be gang members are mugging a jogger. More gunplay follows, and Roy who’s trade values secrecy and concealment above all else is now a media celebrity thanks to some cell phone video sold to the press. People get chased, guns get lost, and menacing folks from the past with irreconcilable grudges show up with sharp knives and firearms.
The characters are colorful and on more than one occasion I was reminded of Elmore Leonard’s novels (not surprisingly as Frank was the screen writer for both Get Shorty and Out of Sight). But like Leonard, Frank grounds these characters firmly in reality. The chapters exploring Roy’s past shine light on his behavior and life choices. All characters are fleshed out and while you may not like many of them, they stay with you like chewing gum stuck to the bottom of your shoe.
Shaker was a delightful white knuckler, a quick yet substantive (like a warm beef stew on a chilly February evening) read from a writer who will hopefully return to writing more novels in the future.
December 31, 2016
There's a lot going on in this tremendous novel from Scott Frank. Set in LA just after a major earthquake, and amidst the aftershocks, this is a story of gangland violence and baseball.
It is crime noir at its very best, and deserves comparison to the other great novel in this genre in 2016, Bill Beverly's 'Dodgers'. Frank's cast of characters are the real strength. Roy Cooper is a hitman on a job from New York, but it is his background that is key to the story. LAPD detective Kelly Maguire has her own troubled background, but is central to the investigation centering around 'the hit' and an unrelated attack from five gang youths.
I have read quite a few dark and violent crime novels in the last three years or so, and this is certainly not for the feint-hearted. Some sections could even justifiably come with a warning. Yet Frank does what only the best writers in this genre manage, there is dark humour. It's not 'laugh out loud' humour, but it helps give the novel it's great appeal, that the violence on its own could not do.
This is great stuff.
It is crime noir at its very best, and deserves comparison to the other great novel in this genre in 2016, Bill Beverly's 'Dodgers'. Frank's cast of characters are the real strength. Roy Cooper is a hitman on a job from New York, but it is his background that is key to the story. LAPD detective Kelly Maguire has her own troubled background, but is central to the investigation centering around 'the hit' and an unrelated attack from five gang youths.
I have read quite a few dark and violent crime novels in the last three years or so, and this is certainly not for the feint-hearted. Some sections could even justifiably come with a warning. Yet Frank does what only the best writers in this genre manage, there is dark humour. It's not 'laugh out loud' humour, but it helps give the novel it's great appeal, that the violence on its own could not do.
This is great stuff.
April 3, 2016
Maintaining a low profile, baseball fan and part time NY hit man Roy Cooper gets tasked with a job in Los Angeles one week after a major earthquake. All goes according to plan until Roy interrupts the mugging of a high profile mayoral candidate, gets video clipped and becomes an instant media celebrity. His identity exposed, Roy searches the broken streets of Los Angeles for the surviving muggers who have the gun he used in the hit while pursuing an alternate, personal agenda. Meanwhile, due to the unwanted publicity, an incredibly sadistic old enemy is hot on Roy's trail and a very tough LAPD female detective hunts Roy and the muggers still at large.
The relentless page turning action in a city undergoing earthquake aftershocks is only part of what makes this novel so extraordinarily original. The backstories of the characters are so vividly drawn, they come alive on the pages in ways other characters in crime fiction do not. This is the first novel published by the talented and successful screenwriter Scott Frank and I very much hope it will not be his last. An original and unforgettable debut crime fiction/thriller that I encourage all my GR friends to read. You most assuredly will not be disappointed.
The relentless page turning action in a city undergoing earthquake aftershocks is only part of what makes this novel so extraordinarily original. The backstories of the characters are so vividly drawn, they come alive on the pages in ways other characters in crime fiction do not. This is the first novel published by the talented and successful screenwriter Scott Frank and I very much hope it will not be his last. An original and unforgettable debut crime fiction/thriller that I encourage all my GR friends to read. You most assuredly will not be disappointed.
July 23, 2016
4-1/2 Stars.
May 10, 2016
Before singing the praises of “Shaker,” I want to point out that I “read” this on audio and the narration is by the one and only Dion Graham. When I loaded it up and heard his voice, I knew I was in for a good story. Graham’s work here is impeccable and perfect for the gritty urban flavor of this sometimes brutal crime novel.
“Shaker” is good. And supremely memorable. It starts with a big-picture Hollywood-esque prologue recounting the damage done to southern California by a swarm of nearly 700 small earthquakes followed by a big jolt, a 7.1 “shaker” that topples buildings and “grabbed the city of Los Angeles by the throat, and throttled it like a wolf on a weasel for a full twenty-two seconds.”
Five days into the clean-up comes Roy Cooper, flying in from the east coast to “pay a visit” to a man named Martin Shine. Cooper, we soon find out, is an errand boy who handles everything from moving furniture to tending bar to shooting people in the head. He’s good at what he does. “Shaker” would be a short story if Roy Cooper, after dispatching Shine, remembered where he had parked his car.
Instead, Roy Cooper’s life grows increasingly complicated. Roy a group of young black boys, “none older than fourteen, fifteen tops.” They surround a jogger, who is down on all fours, and he’s bleeding from a gash in the head. What happens in the next few minutes, recounted in detail, happens almost at a slow-motion pace worthy of Tom Wolfe (“Bonfire of the Vanities”). It’s quite the cinematic scene and I have no problem imagining the movie version of “Shaker,” but no movie will ever be able to pack in the backstory and detail that Scott Frank manages in these 335 pages (yes, I had to get a hard copy to see how his prose looked on the page).
Without giving too much away, the last thing Roy Cooper wants is attention. What he most wants is to slip back to the airport and return to his home on the east coast with every expectation that his work as an errand boy will go unnoticed. Instead, he becomes thrust smack into the middle of the limelight and is mistaken as a hero.
Just when we think that this might be a Roy Cooper novel, Frank starts throwing the curveballs. “Shaker” is a rotating-perspective story and everybody gets equal play—LAPD detective Kelly Maguire, a punk named Science, buffoonish mayor Miguel Santiago, and Roy Cooper’s onetime mentor, Albert Budin. Is Roy Cooper a hero? The mayor could use one. The victim in the attack that Cooper witnessed—and disrupted—was a candidate for mayor. Detective Maguire isn’t so sure about Cooper's story. But her reputation and credibility are low. And the group of punks know full well that Roy Cooper is no saint—and they wouldn’t mind slipping into the hospital and taking care of business.
Frank does a number of things in “Shaker” that I liked—a lot. First, he lets the scenes breathe. He’s not afraid of extended dialogue—look no further than the conversation between Roy Cooper and Martin Shine before Shine is dispatched. To these ears, it all rang true. It’s Tarantino-esque. (Again, I give you Dion Graham. He injects veracity and weight into every conversation).
Frank also embraces extended passages of straight-up telling the story; the cinematic and omniscient camera at work. And he’s organized the backstories of some of these characters in a way that, by novel’s end, you have fully formed characters across the board. In fact, "back story" suggests something slight or minor. Hardly. If Roy Cooper seems like just another hit man at first, just wait a few chapters.
The story unspools in sometimes non-linear fashion. Toward the end, Frank yanks us back in time to give us an in-depth look at the relationship between Budin and Cooper. Once we know more, the story unlocks in magical fashion. Slow in spots? Yes. (And I liked the non-rush.) Heart pounding at others? Of course. Violent? Yes. The story builds to a fine climax and, rest assured, Frank takes full advantage of the earthquakes he set in motion way back in the beginning, on page one.
“Shaker” is good. And supremely memorable. It starts with a big-picture Hollywood-esque prologue recounting the damage done to southern California by a swarm of nearly 700 small earthquakes followed by a big jolt, a 7.1 “shaker” that topples buildings and “grabbed the city of Los Angeles by the throat, and throttled it like a wolf on a weasel for a full twenty-two seconds.”
Five days into the clean-up comes Roy Cooper, flying in from the east coast to “pay a visit” to a man named Martin Shine. Cooper, we soon find out, is an errand boy who handles everything from moving furniture to tending bar to shooting people in the head. He’s good at what he does. “Shaker” would be a short story if Roy Cooper, after dispatching Shine, remembered where he had parked his car.
Instead, Roy Cooper’s life grows increasingly complicated. Roy a group of young black boys, “none older than fourteen, fifteen tops.” They surround a jogger, who is down on all fours, and he’s bleeding from a gash in the head. What happens in the next few minutes, recounted in detail, happens almost at a slow-motion pace worthy of Tom Wolfe (“Bonfire of the Vanities”). It’s quite the cinematic scene and I have no problem imagining the movie version of “Shaker,” but no movie will ever be able to pack in the backstory and detail that Scott Frank manages in these 335 pages (yes, I had to get a hard copy to see how his prose looked on the page).
Without giving too much away, the last thing Roy Cooper wants is attention. What he most wants is to slip back to the airport and return to his home on the east coast with every expectation that his work as an errand boy will go unnoticed. Instead, he becomes thrust smack into the middle of the limelight and is mistaken as a hero.
Just when we think that this might be a Roy Cooper novel, Frank starts throwing the curveballs. “Shaker” is a rotating-perspective story and everybody gets equal play—LAPD detective Kelly Maguire, a punk named Science, buffoonish mayor Miguel Santiago, and Roy Cooper’s onetime mentor, Albert Budin. Is Roy Cooper a hero? The mayor could use one. The victim in the attack that Cooper witnessed—and disrupted—was a candidate for mayor. Detective Maguire isn’t so sure about Cooper's story. But her reputation and credibility are low. And the group of punks know full well that Roy Cooper is no saint—and they wouldn’t mind slipping into the hospital and taking care of business.
Frank does a number of things in “Shaker” that I liked—a lot. First, he lets the scenes breathe. He’s not afraid of extended dialogue—look no further than the conversation between Roy Cooper and Martin Shine before Shine is dispatched. To these ears, it all rang true. It’s Tarantino-esque. (Again, I give you Dion Graham. He injects veracity and weight into every conversation).
Frank also embraces extended passages of straight-up telling the story; the cinematic and omniscient camera at work. And he’s organized the backstories of some of these characters in a way that, by novel’s end, you have fully formed characters across the board. In fact, "back story" suggests something slight or minor. Hardly. If Roy Cooper seems like just another hit man at first, just wait a few chapters.
The story unspools in sometimes non-linear fashion. Toward the end, Frank yanks us back in time to give us an in-depth look at the relationship between Budin and Cooper. Once we know more, the story unlocks in magical fashion. Slow in spots? Yes. (And I liked the non-rush.) Heart pounding at others? Of course. Violent? Yes. The story builds to a fine climax and, rest assured, Frank takes full advantage of the earthquakes he set in motion way back in the beginning, on page one.
March 15, 2016
Who decided this was "tense, darkly funny, unputdownable"? I'll give you unputdownable but I didn't find it particularly tense and it was in no way funny. I found it interesting and readable but it was more sad than anything. The main character was basically tragic. Half of the story was told in a flashback to his childhood which was just heartbreaking. Most of the other important characters in the book were pretty broken too. There was a lot about gang life and what drives people to take it up. There was quite a bit of coincidence but I still felt the need to keep reading to see how it was all going to play out. The current setting of the story is in LA where earthquakes are happening. The flashbacks are in Missouri. It was fun to see the Royals and the Cardinals playing part in the story however peripherally.
The book is pretty bloody. I was catching glimpses of Kill Bill I think. I didn't like how it ended. There were several story lines that just seemed to be dropped. Plus So basically I liked? it. I guess but I will not be recommending it at the bookstore. "Here, read this sad but interesting ish book?"
The book is pretty bloody. I was catching glimpses of Kill Bill I think. I didn't like how it ended. There were several story lines that just seemed to be dropped. Plus So basically I liked? it. I guess but I will not be recommending it at the bookstore. "Here, read this sad but interesting ish book?"
October 27, 2015
I was crushed, CRUSHED, when my Kindle ran out of juice while reading "Shaker" on a plane. It's that good. I was reminded of Elmore Leonard in the pacing, plot, and the depth of the characters. I was squirmy all the way home, aching to plug the thing in again.
I would like to see these characters return; well, the ones who can, anyway. I was blown away by this novel and so, so sorry when it was over, but completely satisfied with the resolution.
I would like to see these characters return; well, the ones who can, anyway. I was blown away by this novel and so, so sorry when it was over, but completely satisfied with the resolution.
February 10, 2017
4.5 stars, really. A wonderfully engaging tale, beautifully paced for the most part, and sufficiently complex to keep one engaged beginning to end.
Occasionally the author abruptly transports the reader back in time to flesh out the protagonist's (Roy) backstory, which I found mildly confusing. On the whole, however, I really enjoyed Roy's character, flawed and damaged by his narcissistic mother as it was. The cast of characters involved either directly or tangentially, with Roy's activities as a hit-man, are suitably loathsome but so provocative as to compel you to think about them even after you close the book for the night.
This is a very well done book, and even more impressive as a first novel (albeit from a very successful screenwriter). A hard boiled novel worth your time.
Occasionally the author abruptly transports the reader back in time to flesh out the protagonist's (Roy) backstory, which I found mildly confusing. On the whole, however, I really enjoyed Roy's character, flawed and damaged by his narcissistic mother as it was. The cast of characters involved either directly or tangentially, with Roy's activities as a hit-man, are suitably loathsome but so provocative as to compel you to think about them even after you close the book for the night.
This is a very well done book, and even more impressive as a first novel (albeit from a very successful screenwriter). A hard boiled novel worth your time.
February 7, 2016
4.5 Stars.
This book - written by the screenwriter who gave us "Out of Sight" and "Get Shorty" - is all kinds of awesome. The story centers on Roy Cooper, an unassuming hit man who, while looking for his lost car on the streets of LA, stumbles into a crime he has nothing to do with. When a video of the crime goes viral and the whole world is able to see Roy's face, he winds up in the crosshairs of everyone from the surviving criminals to his creepy former boss to a cop with anger issues and a scandalous past.
The story moves along at a breakneck pace and, unsurprisingly, has the feel of a really smart action movie. Some scenes are disturbing (Roy's backstory is NO joke), others are funny, and there are a few moments of genuine, heart-pounding suspense the likes of which I haven't felt in awhile. Readers should know that this book is super profane and very violent (I had no idea there were so many ways to describe someone being shot in the head), so it won't be everyone's cup of tea. But if you like your thrillers gritty and cinematic, this should absolutely be your next read.
This book - written by the screenwriter who gave us "Out of Sight" and "Get Shorty" - is all kinds of awesome. The story centers on Roy Cooper, an unassuming hit man who, while looking for his lost car on the streets of LA, stumbles into a crime he has nothing to do with. When a video of the crime goes viral and the whole world is able to see Roy's face, he winds up in the crosshairs of everyone from the surviving criminals to his creepy former boss to a cop with anger issues and a scandalous past.
The story moves along at a breakneck pace and, unsurprisingly, has the feel of a really smart action movie. Some scenes are disturbing (Roy's backstory is NO joke), others are funny, and there are a few moments of genuine, heart-pounding suspense the likes of which I haven't felt in awhile. Readers should know that this book is super profane and very violent (I had no idea there were so many ways to describe someone being shot in the head), so it won't be everyone's cup of tea. But if you like your thrillers gritty and cinematic, this should absolutely be your next read.
March 3, 2016
Dark humor in the vein of Pulp Fiction.
January 4, 2017
Intense till the very end. I loved all of his screenplays to. I hope he does another book.
November 14, 2019
This is an absolutely fascinating novel. I was literally spellbound from the beginning, and spent my day wanting to get back to the audiobook and find out what happened next. Every single part of the novel rang true, also. From the gang bangers, to the damage control that famous people have to use to get thru the ‘rough spots’, to the language used.
Dion Graham is a phenomenal narrator. Not only were the accents spot-on, but the way he made the characters speak was perfection. I literally thought I was back in that huge city I used to live in, downtown, listening to the people on the street. It’s that real.
The pacing in this novel is wonderful, the flashbacks were every bit as compelling as the main narrative, and the characterizations were brilliant. Frank’s style is so laid back and cool, that I’m really sorry he doesn’t have more novels out for me to peruse. And while this novel may read like a movie script, it works for me. Shaker is very much a novel in its own right, and it’s that damn good. (Scott Frank is the veteran Hollywood screenwriter of Out of Sight, Get Shorty, A Walk Among the Tombstones, and Elmore Leonard’s work, that Frank has adapted successfully for the screen, among others).
Do yourself a huge favor and read this novel now. Just be warned there is language (😱😱😱😂), it’s violent and a little gory, there is a near-rape scene, and some of those more.... pearl-clutching types have given this novel bad reviews or won’t finish it because of these issues. For once, the blurb saying this novel was “unputdownable” was correct.
4.5 stars, and recommended to those who don’t wear pearls.
Dion Graham is a phenomenal narrator. Not only were the accents spot-on, but the way he made the characters speak was perfection. I literally thought I was back in that huge city I used to live in, downtown, listening to the people on the street. It’s that real.
The pacing in this novel is wonderful, the flashbacks were every bit as compelling as the main narrative, and the characterizations were brilliant. Frank’s style is so laid back and cool, that I’m really sorry he doesn’t have more novels out for me to peruse. And while this novel may read like a movie script, it works for me. Shaker is very much a novel in its own right, and it’s that damn good. (Scott Frank is the veteran Hollywood screenwriter of Out of Sight, Get Shorty, A Walk Among the Tombstones, and Elmore Leonard’s work, that Frank has adapted successfully for the screen, among others).
Do yourself a huge favor and read this novel now. Just be warned there is language (😱😱😱😂), it’s violent and a little gory, there is a near-rape scene, and some of those more.... pearl-clutching types have given this novel bad reviews or won’t finish it because of these issues. For once, the blurb saying this novel was “unputdownable” was correct.
4.5 stars, and recommended to those who don’t wear pearls.
October 29, 2017
This is a debut novel and I've given it 4 stars; I hope that subsequent novels are at least as good.
Shaker is a reference to earthquakes in L.A. Well, maybe it has to do with how lives can be shook up as well because that happens with frequency in this book. We have a mix of protagonists and antagonists. Well, now that I think about it, the protagonists ARE the antagonists. There is violence, angst, ignorance, hubris, disgust and many more emotions. There are bad guys and not so bad guys and maybe at least one good guy. There are cops and hit men and gang bangers and psychopaths.
The book started out slow, then I turned to page 2. After that, even with flashbacks there was action galore.
Frank has a long and successful history in the film industry and he is able to make pictures with his words. He makes me want to see his next endeavor. If you like crime novels, you're not worried that there is no clear cut hero then grab this book and enjoy.
Shaker is a reference to earthquakes in L.A. Well, maybe it has to do with how lives can be shook up as well because that happens with frequency in this book. We have a mix of protagonists and antagonists. Well, now that I think about it, the protagonists ARE the antagonists. There is violence, angst, ignorance, hubris, disgust and many more emotions. There are bad guys and not so bad guys and maybe at least one good guy. There are cops and hit men and gang bangers and psychopaths.
The book started out slow, then I turned to page 2. After that, even with flashbacks there was action galore.
Frank has a long and successful history in the film industry and he is able to make pictures with his words. He makes me want to see his next endeavor. If you like crime novels, you're not worried that there is no clear cut hero then grab this book and enjoy.
November 8, 2021
A pretty good book with a pretty good story and some great characters, but the constant shifting of the point of view within chapters or even paragraphs, makes it a tough read sometimes.
February 2, 2017
SHAKER begins with a strong earthquake in Los Angeles. There are several strong aftershocks that disrupt life in the area but earthquakes are not the only cause of those disruptions.
Roy Cooper, the central character is a hired killer from New York, sent to LA a week after the first quake. His assignment is to kill a man he doesn’t know for reasons which he also doesn’t know. But that’s his job and he’d done it before. The hit goes as plan, but his plans change very quickly afterwards. While he is walking back to his rental car, parked a few streets away, he realizes he doesn’t remember where he parked it. While wandering around looking for it, he sees four gangbangers mugging and beating a jogger in an alley. He watches for a short time, then decides he should just leave the scene. It was not as easy as he thought and he got shot in the process. The jogger turned out to be a mayoral candidate An onlooker in an apartment above the alley manages to capture most of the episode on his cell phone (without bothering to call the police) and the video goes viral. Roy is declared a hero.
While Roy is recuperating in the hospital, he sees the video on multiple television stations. That is the last thing he wants. He’s been invisible for many years and there are people who would like to find him and pay him back for what he did to them.
Kelly Maguire, an LAPD detective, had been assigned to an area of LA where the gangs were the most active because knew the neighborhood, spoke fluent Spanish, and was able to establish a good rapport with many of the residents including some connected with gangs. Unfortunately, she had a bad temper as well as an alcohol problem and was pulled out because of the way she treated a suspect. But they need her help even though they didn’t want to admit it.
The plot includes insight into the juvenile justice system, city government, the police department, criminal groups, and baseball, as it continues towards identifying victims and capturing criminals. It frequently provides backstories of how the characters got into their current situations. Often, it was a serendipitous event or an event escalating because other people were involved. For example, Roy had been sent to a juvenile facility when he was twelve years old following the murder of his father.
The story has many twists as the characters try to escape their situations. There is a lot of violence, some of it a bit graphic, and an overuse of profanity, some of it realistic, some of it not. There are also some unnecessarily short chapters.
This is Scott Frank’s first novel. He makes good use of the skills he honed in writing films “Little Man Tate” and “Dead Again” and adaptations “Get Shorty” and “Out of Sight.”
Roy Cooper, the central character is a hired killer from New York, sent to LA a week after the first quake. His assignment is to kill a man he doesn’t know for reasons which he also doesn’t know. But that’s his job and he’d done it before. The hit goes as plan, but his plans change very quickly afterwards. While he is walking back to his rental car, parked a few streets away, he realizes he doesn’t remember where he parked it. While wandering around looking for it, he sees four gangbangers mugging and beating a jogger in an alley. He watches for a short time, then decides he should just leave the scene. It was not as easy as he thought and he got shot in the process. The jogger turned out to be a mayoral candidate An onlooker in an apartment above the alley manages to capture most of the episode on his cell phone (without bothering to call the police) and the video goes viral. Roy is declared a hero.
While Roy is recuperating in the hospital, he sees the video on multiple television stations. That is the last thing he wants. He’s been invisible for many years and there are people who would like to find him and pay him back for what he did to them.
Kelly Maguire, an LAPD detective, had been assigned to an area of LA where the gangs were the most active because knew the neighborhood, spoke fluent Spanish, and was able to establish a good rapport with many of the residents including some connected with gangs. Unfortunately, she had a bad temper as well as an alcohol problem and was pulled out because of the way she treated a suspect. But they need her help even though they didn’t want to admit it.
The plot includes insight into the juvenile justice system, city government, the police department, criminal groups, and baseball, as it continues towards identifying victims and capturing criminals. It frequently provides backstories of how the characters got into their current situations. Often, it was a serendipitous event or an event escalating because other people were involved. For example, Roy had been sent to a juvenile facility when he was twelve years old following the murder of his father.
The story has many twists as the characters try to escape their situations. There is a lot of violence, some of it a bit graphic, and an overuse of profanity, some of it realistic, some of it not. There are also some unnecessarily short chapters.
This is Scott Frank’s first novel. He makes good use of the skills he honed in writing films “Little Man Tate” and “Dead Again” and adaptations “Get Shorty” and “Out of Sight.”
March 7, 2016
I've loved his scripts, so I was excited to read his book. My only worry was that he was writing a novelization of a movie. That's not the case. It's a book, mainly because he spends a lot of time detailing characters' inner- (and outer-) lives.
We get inside these criminals' heads. And the police are not immune to their nasty sides being exposed. This world is one big gray area, and I love living in that "color" in a book like this. I do wish that more movies were like this. Being a jerk, a racist, a sociopath, or a selfish prick are all compelling traits, especially when they're counterbalanced with surprisingly gentle, selfless, and heroic qualities.
The story is simple, which allows Frank to take a complicated route to get there. He knows when to stop the "forward-movement" story to give us the life of Roy, the central character of the story. And as new characters are introduced, Frank goes back and shows us how these characters connect to Roy, and how their impending "reunion" in the present is not going to end well (for other readers, it might be the ending they wanted-- I'm on the fence about it).
I hope Frank writes more books. This one took a long time to get out (he put it aside to write screenplays-- he had to make a living, after all.), but I think when this book takes off, he'll have some more free time to knock out another great story in less time.
We get inside these criminals' heads. And the police are not immune to their nasty sides being exposed. This world is one big gray area, and I love living in that "color" in a book like this. I do wish that more movies were like this. Being a jerk, a racist, a sociopath, or a selfish prick are all compelling traits, especially when they're counterbalanced with surprisingly gentle, selfless, and heroic qualities.
The story is simple, which allows Frank to take a complicated route to get there. He knows when to stop the "forward-movement" story to give us the life of Roy, the central character of the story. And as new characters are introduced, Frank goes back and shows us how these characters connect to Roy, and how their impending "reunion" in the present is not going to end well (for other readers, it might be the ending they wanted-- I'm on the fence about it).
I hope Frank writes more books. This one took a long time to get out (he put it aside to write screenplays-- he had to make a living, after all.), but I think when this book takes off, he'll have some more free time to knock out another great story in less time.
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