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Hellbent on Homicide
First-rate hard-boiled fiction. Mike Hammer probably crossed paths with Griff and Fats, who live in the back alleys of Jim Thompson country."" - Booklist. It's ""Bay City,"" 1962 - a time of peace and trust, when girls hitch-hiked without a care. But for an ice-hearted killer, it's a time of easy pickings. When he kills the daughter of a rich power-broker all hell breaks loose, and now he goes on a crazy killing spree to ""cover it up."" Griff and Fats are free-wheeling homicide detectives who are pitted against a monster who tortures and kills, and time is running out. This police procedural novel is a hardboiled roller-coaster of sex, violence, and suspense. Also includes two Griff and Fats stories.
140 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1992
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
July 22, 2020
Going into this, I knew absolutely nothing about it. I expected that it would probably be a bit contemporary and vulgar in that Welsh-and-Salinger kind of way, though it had escaped me that it was a detective story. Still, I'm as up for a detective story and a bit of plot as the next bored student stuck in endless summer holidays, so that wasn't necessarily a negative - only a few days ago I read A Study in Scarlet and completely adored it, for example. However, this changed when I actually started reading it.
The main story (which is succeeded by two short ones) deals with two policemen: Griff and Fats. 1990s Griff recounts a story of them solving a murder case in the 60s, which quickly evolves in something much more, leading them to go to a variety of places, from fancy hotels to sex worker-filled streets. This case is much different than others, because - wow - it becomes personal very quickly. Who would have thought? Fortunately, though, it doesn't just rely on that trope - which happens way too often.
I really didn't like this story, though. The story itself - its plot and setting - did close to nothing for me. There were a few pages where I found myself a bit interested, but that was literally as far as it got. I never found myself empathizing with characters, curious about a mystery, or engaged in the setting. The plot, to me, was quite convoluted, and often I felt that the characters jumped to conclusions on the basis of their intuitions way too easily - especially since those intuitions were never questioned.
My main problem with this story, though, was the writing. It was absolutely awful. I'm so sorry. I just don't know what else to make of it. Besides the frequent typos (often in the interpunction), the writing that was there on purpose was just really not good. Its main issue was that it was incredibly repetitive - it constantly used the same words in sentences very close to each other, which definitely pulls you out of the story, but it also kept putting forward the same ideas. An example is the constant nostalgia factor. If I had to guess, I think the phrase (or a variation thereof) "Back then, everything was much better"/"Everything has gotten worse now" occurs at least 30 times. And this is very short - the first story was 111 pages. It's also filled with cliches, and I just have to quote most of the prologue:
"It was in another world and a long time ago. ... I can't talk truthful about all of it. Even today. But it was a long time ago. In the old days. A lot has changed since those early days ... Things are done so different today. They say it's for the better. They say they're right. I got no comment.
What hasn't changed is crime, murder, mayhem. It's worse than ever out on the streets today. It grows worse each year. If they was all so right in dealing with it, wouldn't it be getting better? Wouldn't there be less of it today?
Fats and I had our own ways of dealing with things back then. It was an easier time, less complicated. You knew who the enemy was. You knew who your friends were. A man did what a man had to do.
We were partners.
We'd been together a long time.
It was thirty years ago. Remembering back now. Remembering back just how it all had been.
This is our story."
While this is definitely one of the better-flowing passages, it is SO repetitive. Another big issue I had, though, was the main direction the nostalgia took, which was "the police had much more rights in the past, this was better". Boii. There are multiple scenes which just really irked me. This book has aged incredibly badly, and I know that a year ago I probably would have read it quite differently. However, talking about how good it is for policemen to not follow regulations "to get the truth" or whatever, them being incredibly rude and mean to people just to exert power, etc. are all tropes that are just AWFUL in the current climate. I couldn't feel anything positive when they were discussed as these so good people for not letting the law stop them, not waiting for warrants, etc (this LITERALLY occurred), knowing what has recently happened, for instance to Breonna Taylor (petition: https://www.change.org/p/andy-beshear...). To then romanticize this really irked me. However, even without this aspect it'd been one star, and I get that it probably wasn't at all intended in a bad way. I do think, though, that it is useful to think about these kinds of tropes in light of the current news.
Oh, and are you wondering why one of the main dudes is called "Fats"? It's his nickname because - oh wow - he is fat. And nearly every time he is described, which is multiple times per page bc he is a main dude, this is incorporated in an awful, demonizing way. He's always eating (at inappropriate times which the main character constantly discusses), burping, coughing up slime for some reason, described as various marine animals (and no, not penguin), has hams for arms, etcetcetc. It just doesn't stop. Even if this weren't a toxic trope - even if it was some heartwarming funny aspect, this would be too much. But in this case...
I'm just picking a random page: "The fat bastard was giving me an I-told-you-so smirk". "... with me and Fatso right in the middle of it". "His grubby cheeks grew red with rage and I saw a golden tear run down the furrows of his fat face". If you think "oh that must be a relatively bad page", no, it's a relatively good page. All this is in the last quarter, btw.
And he says that the main character is allowed to call him fat etc but other people aren't, which of course is fine, but then the main character is constantly judging him in a way that felt very Not Good.
Unsurprisingly, Fats's personality traits are all presented in relation to him being fat. He's fat and unmannered. He's fat but a nice person. etcetc. It ain't good. Griff, on the other hand, does not have a personality at all. The only traits I could think of him is being nostalgic towards the past and being a proud policeman. Oh, and it's really very much expressed how they get thrills out of the shooting and stuff. Goddddd.
The only redeeming quality was in the final story "The Xmas Crazies" (yeah, on the slur-and-other-inappropriate-words department it's also not doing too well), which, in spite of its convoluted motive reveal, had some hartwarming and funny qualities. It also had okay commentary on poverty, I guess (though it also went hard on the 'poor people are too proud to go to shops' thing which, honestly, idk what to think about).
The main story (which is succeeded by two short ones) deals with two policemen: Griff and Fats. 1990s Griff recounts a story of them solving a murder case in the 60s, which quickly evolves in something much more, leading them to go to a variety of places, from fancy hotels to sex worker-filled streets. This case is much different than others, because - wow - it becomes personal very quickly. Who would have thought? Fortunately, though, it doesn't just rely on that trope - which happens way too often.
I really didn't like this story, though. The story itself - its plot and setting - did close to nothing for me. There were a few pages where I found myself a bit interested, but that was literally as far as it got. I never found myself empathizing with characters, curious about a mystery, or engaged in the setting. The plot, to me, was quite convoluted, and often I felt that the characters jumped to conclusions on the basis of their intuitions way too easily - especially since those intuitions were never questioned.
My main problem with this story, though, was the writing. It was absolutely awful. I'm so sorry. I just don't know what else to make of it. Besides the frequent typos (often in the interpunction), the writing that was there on purpose was just really not good. Its main issue was that it was incredibly repetitive - it constantly used the same words in sentences very close to each other, which definitely pulls you out of the story, but it also kept putting forward the same ideas. An example is the constant nostalgia factor. If I had to guess, I think the phrase (or a variation thereof) "Back then, everything was much better"/"Everything has gotten worse now" occurs at least 30 times. And this is very short - the first story was 111 pages. It's also filled with cliches, and I just have to quote most of the prologue:
"It was in another world and a long time ago. ... I can't talk truthful about all of it. Even today. But it was a long time ago. In the old days. A lot has changed since those early days ... Things are done so different today. They say it's for the better. They say they're right. I got no comment.
What hasn't changed is crime, murder, mayhem. It's worse than ever out on the streets today. It grows worse each year. If they was all so right in dealing with it, wouldn't it be getting better? Wouldn't there be less of it today?
Fats and I had our own ways of dealing with things back then. It was an easier time, less complicated. You knew who the enemy was. You knew who your friends were. A man did what a man had to do.
We were partners.
We'd been together a long time.
It was thirty years ago. Remembering back now. Remembering back just how it all had been.
This is our story."
While this is definitely one of the better-flowing passages, it is SO repetitive. Another big issue I had, though, was the main direction the nostalgia took, which was "the police had much more rights in the past, this was better". Boii. There are multiple scenes which just really irked me. This book has aged incredibly badly, and I know that a year ago I probably would have read it quite differently. However, talking about how good it is for policemen to not follow regulations "to get the truth" or whatever, them being incredibly rude and mean to people just to exert power, etc. are all tropes that are just AWFUL in the current climate. I couldn't feel anything positive when they were discussed as these so good people for not letting the law stop them, not waiting for warrants, etc (this LITERALLY occurred), knowing what has recently happened, for instance to Breonna Taylor (petition: https://www.change.org/p/andy-beshear...). To then romanticize this really irked me. However, even without this aspect it'd been one star, and I get that it probably wasn't at all intended in a bad way. I do think, though, that it is useful to think about these kinds of tropes in light of the current news.
Oh, and are you wondering why one of the main dudes is called "Fats"? It's his nickname because - oh wow - he is fat. And nearly every time he is described, which is multiple times per page bc he is a main dude, this is incorporated in an awful, demonizing way. He's always eating (at inappropriate times which the main character constantly discusses), burping, coughing up slime for some reason, described as various marine animals (and no, not penguin), has hams for arms, etcetcetc. It just doesn't stop. Even if this weren't a toxic trope - even if it was some heartwarming funny aspect, this would be too much. But in this case...
I'm just picking a random page: "The fat bastard was giving me an I-told-you-so smirk". "... with me and Fatso right in the middle of it". "His grubby cheeks grew red with rage and I saw a golden tear run down the furrows of his fat face". If you think "oh that must be a relatively bad page", no, it's a relatively good page. All this is in the last quarter, btw.
And he says that the main character is allowed to call him fat etc but other people aren't, which of course is fine, but then the main character is constantly judging him in a way that felt very Not Good.
Unsurprisingly, Fats's personality traits are all presented in relation to him being fat. He's fat and unmannered. He's fat but a nice person. etcetc. It ain't good. Griff, on the other hand, does not have a personality at all. The only traits I could think of him is being nostalgic towards the past and being a proud policeman. Oh, and it's really very much expressed how they get thrills out of the shooting and stuff. Goddddd.
The only redeeming quality was in the final story "The Xmas Crazies" (yeah, on the slur-and-other-inappropriate-words department it's also not doing too well), which, in spite of its convoluted motive reveal, had some hartwarming and funny qualities. It also had okay commentary on poverty, I guess (though it also went hard on the 'poor people are too proud to go to shops' thing which, honestly, idk what to think about).
November 16, 2009
Kirkus says: " ... makes Mickey Spillane look like Plato." I'm jealous.
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