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Daddy Cool
"The voice of the ghetto itself." — The Village Voice
A bold action-packed street opera from Donald Goines, the godfather of urban lit. . .
To his clients, Larry Jackson is known as "Daddy Cool." Nobody's better at what he does. Nothing knocks him off his game. With ice in his veins, he'll pull the trigger or stick a knife deep. All that matters is he gets paid—and that his teenage daughter, Janet, stays clear of the streets. But when Janet is lured into the stable of a young, smooth-talking pimp, Daddy Cool sees red—and goes into action deadly cold and unstoppable. . .
"He lived by the code of the streets and his books vividly recreated the street jungle and its predators." — New Jersey Voice
A bold action-packed street opera from Donald Goines, the godfather of urban lit. . .
To his clients, Larry Jackson is known as "Daddy Cool." Nobody's better at what he does. Nothing knocks him off his game. With ice in his veins, he'll pull the trigger or stick a knife deep. All that matters is he gets paid—and that his teenage daughter, Janet, stays clear of the streets. But when Janet is lured into the stable of a young, smooth-talking pimp, Daddy Cool sees red—and goes into action deadly cold and unstoppable. . .
"He lived by the code of the streets and his books vividly recreated the street jungle and its predators." — New Jersey Voice
- GenresGraphic NovelsComics
224 pages, Mass Market Paperback
Published January 1, 2003
2 people are currently reading
60 people want to read
About the author
Donald Goines
30 books758 followersDonald Goines was born in Detroit to a relatively comfortable family - his parents owned a local dry cleaner, and he did not have problems with the law or drugs. Goines attended Catholic elementary school and was expected to go into his family's laundry business. Instead Goines enlisted in the US Air Force, and to get in he had to lie about his age. From 1952 to 1955 he served in the armed forces. During this period he got hooked on heroin. When he returned to Detroit from Japan, he was a heroin addict.
The next 15 years from 1955 Goines spent pimping, robbing, stealing, bootlegging, and running numbers, or doing time. His seven prison sentences totaled 6.5 years. While in jail in the 1960s he first attempted to write Westerns without much success - he loved cowboy movies. A few years later, serving a different sentence at a different prison, he was introduced to the work of Iceberg Slim (Robert Beck). This time Goines wrote his semi-autobiographical novel Whoreson, which appeared in 1972. It was a story about the son of a prostitute who becomes a Detroit ghetto pimp. Also Beck's first book, Pimp: The Story of My Life (1967), was autobiographical. Goines was released in 1970, after which he wrote 16 novels with Holloway House, Iceberg Slim's publisher. Hoping to get rid of surroundings - he was back on smack - he moved with his family to the Los Angeles ghetto of Watts.
All of Goines's books were paperback originals. They sold well but did not receive much critical attention. After two years, he decided to return to Detroit. Goines's death was as harsh as his novels - he and his wife were shot to death on the night of October 21, 1974. According to some sources Goines's death had something to do with a failed drugs deal. The identity of the killers remained unknown, but there were reports of "two white men". Posthumously appeared Inner City Hoodlum (1975), which Goines had finished before his death. The story, set in Los Angeles, was about smack, money, and murder.
The first film version of Goines's books, Crime Partners (2001), was directed by J. Jesses Smith. Never Die Alone (1974), about the life of a drug dealer, was filmed by Ernest R. Dickerson, starring DMX. The violent gangsta movie was labelled as "junk masquerading as art."
During his career as a writer, Goines worked to a strict timetable, writing in the morning, devoting the rest of the day to heroin. His pace was furious, sometimes he produced a book in a month. The stories were usually set in the black inner city, in Los Angeles, New York or Detroit, which then was becoming known as 'motor city'. In Black Gangster (1972) the title character builds a "liberation" movement to cover his planned criminal activities. After this work Goines started to view the social and political turmoil of the ghetto as a battlefield between races.
Under the pseudonym Al C. Clark, Goines created a serial hero, Kenyatta, who was named after the 'father of Kenya', Jomo Kenyatta. The four-book series, beginning with Crime Partners (1974), was published by Holloway House. Kenyatta is the leader of a militant organization which aims at cleaning American ghettos of drugs and prostitution. All white policemen, who patrol the black neighborhoods, also are his enemies. Cry Revenge! (1974) tells of Curtis Carson, who is tall, black, and used to giving orders. He becomes the nightmare of the Chicanos, who have crushed his brother. Death List (1974) brings together Kenyatta, the powerful ganglord, Edward Benson, an intelligent black detective, and Ryan, his chisel-faced white partner, in a war against a secret list of drug pushers. In the fourth book, Kenyatta's Last Hit (1975), the hero is killed in a shootout.
The next 15 years from 1955 Goines spent pimping, robbing, stealing, bootlegging, and running numbers, or doing time. His seven prison sentences totaled 6.5 years. While in jail in the 1960s he first attempted to write Westerns without much success - he loved cowboy movies. A few years later, serving a different sentence at a different prison, he was introduced to the work of Iceberg Slim (Robert Beck). This time Goines wrote his semi-autobiographical novel Whoreson, which appeared in 1972. It was a story about the son of a prostitute who becomes a Detroit ghetto pimp. Also Beck's first book, Pimp: The Story of My Life (1967), was autobiographical. Goines was released in 1970, after which he wrote 16 novels with Holloway House, Iceberg Slim's publisher. Hoping to get rid of surroundings - he was back on smack - he moved with his family to the Los Angeles ghetto of Watts.
All of Goines's books were paperback originals. They sold well but did not receive much critical attention. After two years, he decided to return to Detroit. Goines's death was as harsh as his novels - he and his wife were shot to death on the night of October 21, 1974. According to some sources Goines's death had something to do with a failed drugs deal. The identity of the killers remained unknown, but there were reports of "two white men". Posthumously appeared Inner City Hoodlum (1975), which Goines had finished before his death. The story, set in Los Angeles, was about smack, money, and murder.
The first film version of Goines's books, Crime Partners (2001), was directed by J. Jesses Smith. Never Die Alone (1974), about the life of a drug dealer, was filmed by Ernest R. Dickerson, starring DMX. The violent gangsta movie was labelled as "junk masquerading as art."
During his career as a writer, Goines worked to a strict timetable, writing in the morning, devoting the rest of the day to heroin. His pace was furious, sometimes he produced a book in a month. The stories were usually set in the black inner city, in Los Angeles, New York or Detroit, which then was becoming known as 'motor city'. In Black Gangster (1972) the title character builds a "liberation" movement to cover his planned criminal activities. After this work Goines started to view the social and political turmoil of the ghetto as a battlefield between races.
Under the pseudonym Al C. Clark, Goines created a serial hero, Kenyatta, who was named after the 'father of Kenya', Jomo Kenyatta. The four-book series, beginning with Crime Partners (1974), was published by Holloway House. Kenyatta is the leader of a militant organization which aims at cleaning American ghettos of drugs and prostitution. All white policemen, who patrol the black neighborhoods, also are his enemies. Cry Revenge! (1974) tells of Curtis Carson, who is tall, black, and used to giving orders. He becomes the nightmare of the Chicanos, who have crushed his brother. Death List (1974) brings together Kenyatta, the powerful ganglord, Edward Benson, an intelligent black detective, and Ryan, his chisel-faced white partner, in a war against a secret list of drug pushers. In the fourth book, Kenyatta's Last Hit (1975), the hero is killed in a shootout.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
September 29, 2021
Very enjoyable. A quick read, gritty and grimy and shocking in places.
Daddy Cool is a man with a secret job that his family knows better than to ask about. We, the readers get to travel along as he crosses the country to take care of business. The real story starts when he gets back home.
Another book from the 500 Essential Cult Books list.
Highly recommend!
Daddy Cool is a man with a secret job that his family knows better than to ask about. We, the readers get to travel along as he crosses the country to take care of business. The real story starts when he gets back home.
Another book from the 500 Essential Cult Books list.
Highly recommend!
May 24, 2015
NOTE: I am reviewing the graphic novel version of this. I've heard of Donald Goines 100 times, but have never read any of his stuff. I thought if I liked the graphic novel then I'd cross over and read an actual novel. Nope. Nope nope nope nope.
I quit reading after the second time Daddy Cool (the cheesiest try-hard name for a black dude in a black book ever IMHO) called his wife a bitch. I honestly only skimmed the rest. I was ready to quit after the supposed hero of the story hit his daughter in the face for having an attitude. I was ready to quit again when I realized this was a pimp story. And I almost quit again after the statement that Daddy Cool cared more about his daughter than his half-sons because she was his (read: his possession) and her treatment was basically a poor reflection on him. All of this happened in less than 40 pages. Once I started skimming, somehow I ended up on a page where his daughter Janet is taking a shower. We get a full page illustration of her naked body while she is thinking to herself, 'Oh Lord, why couldn't I've met a man like Daddy.' GROSS.
The short of it: If a white person wrote this kind of story about black people we'd all say it was the most racist thing ever produced. And I'm not playing 'respectability politics'. It's the literary version of black movies from the 70s, but even more sexist and even more stereotypical.
The long of it: I'm just not going to read a story about a man who slaps his daughter around, calls her a bitch, calls his wife a bitch, kills people and kills animals before the 40th page. How could any black woman applaud this?? This is the very definition of (and I hate this word and I never use it cause it just reeks of black intellectual, hyper academic 'look at how smart I am' type bullshit, but no other word can suffice) misogynoir. Our hero's strength and badassery (and desire to prove and preserve his black masculinity in a white world by any means necessary) comes from making the black women in his family know he is superior/they are inferior and actively participating in a life of crime.
Also - I despise any book where grown ass women are calling their lovers 'daddy'. I despise any book where a father behaves like a jealous boyfriend. I despise any book where women are openly pining for a lover like their father. To me it is all GROSS AND WEIRD AND GROSS AND NASTY AND GROSS and I have personal beliefs and morals that couldn't make it to page 50 with this graphic novel. So I'm pretty sure I'm not missing much by skipping out on reading any of his actual novels.
I quit reading after the second time Daddy Cool (the cheesiest try-hard name for a black dude in a black book ever IMHO) called his wife a bitch. I honestly only skimmed the rest. I was ready to quit after the supposed hero of the story hit his daughter in the face for having an attitude. I was ready to quit again when I realized this was a pimp story. And I almost quit again after the statement that Daddy Cool cared more about his daughter than his half-sons because she was his (read: his possession) and her treatment was basically a poor reflection on him. All of this happened in less than 40 pages. Once I started skimming, somehow I ended up on a page where his daughter Janet is taking a shower. We get a full page illustration of her naked body while she is thinking to herself, 'Oh Lord, why couldn't I've met a man like Daddy.' GROSS.
The short of it: If a white person wrote this kind of story about black people we'd all say it was the most racist thing ever produced. And I'm not playing 'respectability politics'. It's the literary version of black movies from the 70s, but even more sexist and even more stereotypical.
The long of it: I'm just not going to read a story about a man who slaps his daughter around, calls her a bitch, calls his wife a bitch, kills people and kills animals before the 40th page. How could any black woman applaud this?? This is the very definition of (and I hate this word and I never use it cause it just reeks of black intellectual, hyper academic 'look at how smart I am' type bullshit, but no other word can suffice) misogynoir. Our hero's strength and badassery (and desire to prove and preserve his black masculinity in a white world by any means necessary) comes from making the black women in his family know he is superior/they are inferior and actively participating in a life of crime.
Also - I despise any book where grown ass women are calling their lovers 'daddy'. I despise any book where a father behaves like a jealous boyfriend. I despise any book where women are openly pining for a lover like their father. To me it is all GROSS AND WEIRD AND GROSS AND NASTY AND GROSS and I have personal beliefs and morals that couldn't make it to page 50 with this graphic novel. So I'm pretty sure I'm not missing much by skipping out on reading any of his actual novels.
January 3, 2009
Frightening in it's realisticness. No, really scary. This is the most graphic graphic novel I have ever read. I do not mean simple violence, but the emotion that surrounds true miseries. I did not feel good after reading this, but I cannot deny how well done it was.
July 30, 2015
Dolemite-esque shenanigans in Detroit with Larry Jackson, aka Daddy Cool. Mob hits, pimps, and familial troubles ensue...I can't even imagine what the complete novel must be like.
April 14, 2025
i think these reviews are based on the novel not the graphic novel. the graphic novel is not worth the average readers time imo.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews