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Cash City
It is an obsession that has haunted Nick Malick for seven years - to avenge the murder of his young son. In his gut Malick knows who did it. But the psychopath is in prison for another crime, scheduled to be released in a year. All Malick has to do is wait...and survive.
The tragedy cost Malick his marriage and his career. Now he scrapes by as a PI in the blue-collar town of Cain City, West Virginia. His latest case tasks him with finding a young woman gone missing. Seems simple enough. But when his investigation exposes a link between a corrupt police force and a drug gang from Detroit, Cain City explodes. And Malick finds himself dead center.
Turns out when there's no one to trust and a whole lot of people want you dead, survival and revenge aren't so easy.
Cash City is Jonathan Fredrick's debut novel, heralding a tough new voice in crime fiction.
The tragedy cost Malick his marriage and his career. Now he scrapes by as a PI in the blue-collar town of Cain City, West Virginia. His latest case tasks him with finding a young woman gone missing. Seems simple enough. But when his investigation exposes a link between a corrupt police force and a drug gang from Detroit, Cain City explodes. And Malick finds himself dead center.
Turns out when there's no one to trust and a whole lot of people want you dead, survival and revenge aren't so easy.
Cash City is Jonathan Fredrick's debut novel, heralding a tough new voice in crime fiction.
10 pages, Audible Audio
First published May 30, 2017
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 35 reviews
December 9, 2017
This one starts out with promise. Nick Malick is a Chicago cop who’s moved to a mid-sized city in West Virginia for his doctor-wife. They’re divorced now, in large part because a sexual predator kidnapped and killed their only son. Malick has become a hard-drinking P.I., and he’s more or less waiting around until the man he’s convinced has killed his son gets out of jail.
The opening scene is right out of the Chandler playbook, but who’s complaining? A father hires him to find his missing daughter, and the trail leads to drugs, prostitution, and despair. There’s a gang coming in from Detroit, calling themselves Cash City, and they sell drugs and then buy guns to take back. They’re organized, and they’ve bought off enough local cops to be mostly untouchable
So the original frame of the narrative is strong – and Frederick does tone and description with real skill – and the plan to move it to a setting that gets so little attention is a good one. And this holds up for more than half of the novel in that vein.
But somewhere along the line, things go disappointingly awry. One premise of Chandler’s work is that, however bleak and fallen the world is, we see some of that fallen state in our detective as well. He’s a flawed man in a flawed world, and that’s part of what makes him effective.
In this one, it becomes increasingly clear that there’s a bogeyman (or bogeymen). It’s not just that the city is fallen; it’s that it’s infected. The gang is a plague – there’s even a hint of the Biblical sense to that since it takes a lot of first-born children. If it can be gotten rid of – and if the sexual predator can be killed – then it seems there’s hope for redemption.
I see the logic, but it seems an ethical cowardice after the opening structure. That is, Malick doesn’t really need to redeem himself; he just has to kill the bad guys. There’s simply less at stake than the first chapters implied.
And, to bring that point home, the predator becomes more and more monstrous. He’s always part of the novel, even though he’s a muted backstory figure to start. By the end, though, he’s a Hannibal Lecter knock-off, a sadist who’s been stalking his stalker. Frederick slips a couple notches in skill, imbuing the guy with a creepy quality that changes the entire tone of the novel.
It’s a shame that this takes the nose dive it does because Frederick seems to know what he’s doing when this begins. Finishing a book takes a knack, though. Instead of staying true to its intriguing early premises, this one grafts on a different genre altogether and the lurid conclusion undermines that opening promise.
The opening scene is right out of the Chandler playbook, but who’s complaining? A father hires him to find his missing daughter, and the trail leads to drugs, prostitution, and despair. There’s a gang coming in from Detroit, calling themselves Cash City, and they sell drugs and then buy guns to take back. They’re organized, and they’ve bought off enough local cops to be mostly untouchable
So the original frame of the narrative is strong – and Frederick does tone and description with real skill – and the plan to move it to a setting that gets so little attention is a good one. And this holds up for more than half of the novel in that vein.
But somewhere along the line, things go disappointingly awry. One premise of Chandler’s work is that, however bleak and fallen the world is, we see some of that fallen state in our detective as well. He’s a flawed man in a flawed world, and that’s part of what makes him effective.
In this one, it becomes increasingly clear that there’s a bogeyman (or bogeymen). It’s not just that the city is fallen; it’s that it’s infected. The gang is a plague – there’s even a hint of the Biblical sense to that since it takes a lot of first-born children. If it can be gotten rid of – and if the sexual predator can be killed – then it seems there’s hope for redemption.
I see the logic, but it seems an ethical cowardice after the opening structure. That is, Malick doesn’t really need to redeem himself; he just has to kill the bad guys. There’s simply less at stake than the first chapters implied.
And, to bring that point home, the predator becomes more and more monstrous. He’s always part of the novel, even though he’s a muted backstory figure to start. By the end, though, he’s a Hannibal Lecter knock-off, a sadist who’s been stalking his stalker. Frederick slips a couple notches in skill, imbuing the guy with a creepy quality that changes the entire tone of the novel.
It’s a shame that this takes the nose dive it does because Frederick seems to know what he’s doing when this begins. Finishing a book takes a knack, though. Instead of staying true to its intriguing early premises, this one grafts on a different genre altogether and the lurid conclusion undermines that opening promise.
December 13, 2017
If you like gritty noir, this may be right up your alley. Set in a small town in West Virginia, the plot manages to be interesting and a bit twisty, but it's the narrator that makes it work. He's straight out of a Marlowe novel. The supporting characters tend to be pretty flat, which was ok for some of them, but made a few of them unsatisfying. I also noticed some interesting linguistic quirks that don't sound West Virginian to me, but since the novel is based on Mr. Fredrick's hometown, I'm pretty sure I just haven't run into that particular local variant.
A word of warning, when I say gritty, I mean it. This is a dark, dark story. The protagonist's 6-year-old son was raped, tortured, and killed before the story begins and while there's no graphic description of that event, there's enough to make any parent ache. Fredrick handles it well, but there's no way to make it easy to hear. There's also plenty of violence against women, sexual and otherwise. And violence against men. Just plenty of violence.
This is Mr. Fredrick's first novel, which makes it pretty darned impressive. If he can do this well right out of the blocks, he's definitely a writer to watch. I'll certainly be interested in his next novel.
This is an Audible exclusive audio book, so there's no print version. Ari Filakos does a fine job with the narration.
A word of warning, when I say gritty, I mean it. This is a dark, dark story. The protagonist's 6-year-old son was raped, tortured, and killed before the story begins and while there's no graphic description of that event, there's enough to make any parent ache. Fredrick handles it well, but there's no way to make it easy to hear. There's also plenty of violence against women, sexual and otherwise. And violence against men. Just plenty of violence.
This is Mr. Fredrick's first novel, which makes it pretty darned impressive. If he can do this well right out of the blocks, he's definitely a writer to watch. I'll certainly be interested in his next novel.
This is an Audible exclusive audio book, so there's no print version. Ari Filakos does a fine job with the narration.
July 8, 2017
Read as audio book. Good story line and well done audio.
December 22, 2017
I picked this because I wanted to listen to the Narrator of the Year Ari Fiakos. He's good. Perfect voice for the narrator of this noir tale although with some of the minor characters I couldn't determine if they were white or black. Also, the story is set in West Virginia and the main character had no regional accent at all which was confusing. All that said, Ari is easy to listen to a drives the story along. This is an entertaining book though a bit over the top when it comes to noir. It's about as noir as you can get and, at times, seems close to parody. We've got the alcoholic ex-cop now a PI who has almost hit bottom ($200 in his bank account). While waiting for the pedophile who murdered his six year old son to get out of prison, an event that cost him his marriage and his job due to a revenge obsession, Nick gets hired to find a missing girl. She turns up dead but leads him into conflict with the Detroit crew who have taken over the drug trade in this West Virginia town. Turns out our protagonist's ex-partner is on the take and helping the drug dealers. While all this is going on Nick, who lives in a converted school, gets involved with a tough talking teenager and his mother (not that it matters but could never figure out if they were white or black. The accent thing again). The story gets darker and darker as it progresses. Our hero barely survives an assassination attempt by the Cash City crew and ends up with a useless arm and concussion. Even though he is terribly handicapped he manages to come up with a plan to take out the dealers which will rehabilitate his old partner's situation in return for help in tracking the pedophile he still wants to kill. But the pedophile drugs Nick and begins a slow process of psychological torture unaware that Nick has something up his cast: SPOILER ALERT—a switch blade. This is a first novel and not a bad outing. Some laugh out loud dialog, a very good reader (though not the very best IMO) and a fast and furious read, or listen, as the case may be.
March 2, 2018
Cash City is a hard core, fast paced novel. Its smart, dark in humor and features a fantastic new detective. The narration of Ari Fliasko brings it all to life.
Nck Malick is a former policeman who lost everything after the murder of his young son at the hands of a pedaphile. Now he is an alcoholic P.I. waiting for his son's killer to be released from prison. As he waits he works small jobs biding his time.
Nick takes on a missing girl case that leads him straight into a drug war. The case exposes Nick's saavy and genious as a detective. Cash City features great police work, inner departmental politics, dirty cops and great characters.
Nck Malick is a former policeman who lost everything after the murder of his young son at the hands of a pedaphile. Now he is an alcoholic P.I. waiting for his son's killer to be released from prison. As he waits he works small jobs biding his time.
Nick takes on a missing girl case that leads him straight into a drug war. The case exposes Nick's saavy and genious as a detective. Cash City features great police work, inner departmental politics, dirty cops and great characters.
December 21, 2017
This started out as a good detective story, but the mystery that P.I. Nick Malick, a troubled and bitter former cop, is hired to solve actually gets resolved fairly early on. After that, it degenerates into a common thriller with P.I. as superman. Jonathan Frederick writes well, but the revenge story with nefarious villain playing cat-and-mouse with the protagonist is one we've all seen before too many times. Malick becomes macho man with an ex-wife he still loves.
After listening to nearly 6 hours, I packed it in and dnf with only about 4 hours to go. I just didn't care how it turned out, even though I felt it likely I already knew. Frederick has promise, and I might given him another try if he does something with more depth and more mystery. Unfortunately, I suspect this is the first of a series of not very interesting thrillers.
Ari Fliakos does a good job as narrator--no complaints.
After listening to nearly 6 hours, I packed it in and dnf with only about 4 hours to go. I just didn't care how it turned out, even though I felt it likely I already knew. Frederick has promise, and I might given him another try if he does something with more depth and more mystery. Unfortunately, I suspect this is the first of a series of not very interesting thrillers.
Ari Fliakos does a good job as narrator--no complaints.
August 20, 2018
Got this on the 2 for 1 sale a while back. When it finally came up in line in my "to read" list and I looked at the book cover and the title, I wondered what had attracted me to it. I thought about returning it. I re-read the summary and decided to give it a try. So glad I did!! It was excellent and the narration was excellent! This story never lagged. Good job to the author and the narrator--they are both on my favorites list.
February 5, 2018
Loved it. Mickey Spillane for the 21st century.
December 30, 2017
Fantastic. Loved it. It was gritty and dark and just done very well. The narrator held my interest and didn't detract at all.
I had to slow down towards the end, because I just didn't want the story to end.
Looking forward to listening to other books in the series. Well done Audible.
I had to slow down towards the end, because I just didn't want the story to end.
Looking forward to listening to other books in the series. Well done Audible.
December 7, 2017
I'd probably give the story 4 stars- but the narrator made it 5 stars. Ari Fliakos is my new favorite narrator.
December 26, 2017
Really enjoyed this book and it’s narration! Listened to it in one day.
December 27, 2017
Good decent plot...but made doubly interesting by the narration.
Great effort by the debut author and expect more from him in future.
Great effort by the debut author and expect more from him in future.
December 28, 2017
good modem noir crime novel.
gritty characters, dark themes, real flawed plans.
gritty characters, dark themes, real flawed plans.
May 17, 2020
Fredrick hit a grand slam (in baseball jargon) with this book! I did not realize this was his debut novel; it was so well done! I think it had a lot to do with this being via Amazon audible. The narrator, Ari Flakos, was brilliant. He 'voiced' all of the 10-15 characters - superbly done!
The plot was very believable - Nick Malick, PI, moves from Chicago to Cain City, a small town in West Virginia. His career, marriage, and life fell apart in Chicago due to a child molester. Malick gets involved with the disappearance of a young female and things start to change in Cain City. There are drugs being distributed from the Detroit gangs, people getting murdered, and a list of interesting characters - Tadpole, Cupcake, Davey, etc. to name a few.
I don't want to give away too much, but read this one! Or even better yet, LISTEN to it! The suspense, drama, and conversations make this book come alive. I am anxious to read the sequel, which I believe is already available!
The plot was very believable - Nick Malick, PI, moves from Chicago to Cain City, a small town in West Virginia. His career, marriage, and life fell apart in Chicago due to a child molester. Malick gets involved with the disappearance of a young female and things start to change in Cain City. There are drugs being distributed from the Detroit gangs, people getting murdered, and a list of interesting characters - Tadpole, Cupcake, Davey, etc. to name a few.
I don't want to give away too much, but read this one! Or even better yet, LISTEN to it! The suspense, drama, and conversations make this book come alive. I am anxious to read the sequel, which I believe is already available!
March 19, 2019
An Audible customer service representative suggested this book to me as she was helping me address a technical problem. I'm glad she did. The book seemed to be two mysteries in one united by a drug theme. I appreciated that the author didn't wait until the end of the book to quickly solve both mysteries, but I found myself getting confused at times about whether certain incidents had happened in this narrative or in another book I'd read recently. That being said, the book is jam-packed with lots of activity and character development.
October 4, 2019
This is one of the best “Audible Originals” to date. The story kept me engaged and interested without knowing all that might or would happen - that is storytelling at its best in my book. While written and narrated in a stereotypically cynical noir style, the melancholic drone of the narrator wore on me at times, but that only dropped my rating of the narration, not the story and overall performance. This was a 5-star experience and just what I look for in fiction, audiobooks, particularly crime fiction. Thank you, Audible!
November 5, 2018
This reads like a Michael Connelly Mickey Haller-type novel, though a bit grittier. It's an urban detective story , and the action is non-stop if a bit unbelievable. The lead character is an outlaw with a heart of gold, but a rule-breaking bent and no fear of violence, with strong need for revenge for his child's killer and an ex-wife that he is always trying to live up to the expectations of. It's exciting but pretty much just a popcorn action flick in substance.
June 29, 2020
gritty, small town west virginia former cop with a serious vendetta! good story. good characters. i listened to this on audible, and i can't figure where the reader came up with the absurd accents and the ridiculous vocabulary of the young characters. yes, the choice of wrods came from the author, but the accents and intonation came from the reader.
March 18, 2018
Got into this about 30 mins (audio book) and was completely turned off by the lowness of life described in the novel. The hopelessness described in the strip club was what sealed the deal for me when I put it aside.
September 30, 2020
I got this book because the reviews said it was good. well at first I thought, what did I use a credit on? then as the book progressed it turned out to be very good. gritty, noir and lots of action. I enjoyed it
August 10, 2017
Good audiobook--fast-paced with a great narrator.
December 9, 2017
Interesting story-line but unnecessarily base and vulgar. Not recommended.
December 6, 2017
Very down to business...even when things did fall together pretty easily.
December 19, 2017
Crime, murder, drugs and corruption take over a small town outside Detroit. Excellent narration!
January 13, 2018
This is a good, solid novel. It largely made me think of one of the many TV series on the last few years. The only thing is that it’s so familiar. Nothing new here, folks. My initial enthusiasm died as things more or less remained on the beaten path. Again, it’s well written with good characters. I certainly dig the WORLD being built here. But yeah. Would have been nice if Fredrick got weird and took chances. It’s fairly vanilla.
February 14, 2018
I'll read more. Great story, fun characters, imperfectly perfect
March 3, 2018
Throughly enjoyed and narration was excellent. Adding a new top-tier narrator. There is a description of a crime towards the end of the book that is pretty disturbing and unsettling to listen to.
April 15, 2018
AAA narrator. I obviously liked the story too.
July 27, 2021
Testosterone, blood, bullets, revenge...light fun as long as you're not in search of Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Dickens, Conrad or Melville.
November 28, 2021
This was not enjoyable. It was action packed, but lots of hard to hear topics and horrible human beings.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 35 reviews