Hide-Out / I Get What I Want

by Lorenz Heller, Gregory Shepard (Introduction)

HIDE-OUTGangster Lew Markey knows when it’s time to lay low, and with all the racketeering investigations going on, he figures he’s a lot safer in Florida. He’s got the perfect hide-out—no one gets in, or out. But Lew needs company, and he brings with him his watchdogs Vito and Yutsy, plus his lawyer, Harry Joyce, for intelligent conversation, and wise-cracking Goff to act as butler and maid. And there’s his wife, Josie, of course, and her sister Nellie, who he plans to pair up with his brother Ozzie. But Harry and Nellie have other plans. Trouble is, they are locked behind Lew’s iron gates, with no telephone, 20 miles from the nearest town. It’s the perfect hide-out alright, and the perfect set-up for violence, hate—and death. I GET WHAT I WANTWhen Jeff Tucker first spots Letty on the dock, he knows he has to have her. It’s love at first sight. But Letty is nothing but trouble, a fiery woman with a red-hot temper. And her uncle, a huge guy named Buster, is something else again. Jeff knows that Buster is trouble. First they hire Jeff to take them out in his boat. Then Buster suggests that maybe Jeff would like to get involved in some Cuban liquor smuggling. It’s Letty that Jeff wants, but Buster is part of the package. So when the two of them leave town suddenly, and return a few days later with a man who has been shot in the shoulder—wanting to hold up in his cabin, no cops involved—Jeff knows he’s going to have to go through Hell to get her.

266 pages, Paperback

Published November 4, 2020

Reviews

[Kurt Reichenbaugh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have this two-fer from Stark House Press and I've read the first novel, HIDE-OUT. It's a good pressure cooker plot that takes place over a few days in a remote Florida mansion. A mid-level mobster, Lew K., is hiding out from would be hit men that he believes would kill him so that he'd never testify against the higher-up mob bosses. Mostly he's hiding out because he's paranoid. He brings with him his psychopath brother, a couple of body guards, his lawyer, his wife and his sister-in-law. The pressure cooker is that Lew allows no one in the mansion to leave. They're all basically prisoners of Lew's paranoia. It's a character study with mounting head games and sudden splashes of violence. An abrupt ending is my only gripe. I will review the 2nd novel I GET WHAT I WANT soon.

9/3/2023 - So after a year I get around to reading the 2nd novel in this Stark House double feature. I GET WHAT I WANT takes place on the gulf coast of Florida, my favorite setting for a mid-century noir story. This one has commercial fisherman Jeff Tucker waiting out a spate of red tide that's ruined his fall season. The red tide is a symbol for corruption, obviously, and in the lull of the long hot Florida days with nothing else to do Jeff spots a couple on the beach one day who hire him for a boat trip. Letty and Buster seem an odd pair. Letty is hot stuff who has Jeff torqued up in no time flat. Buster is a beefy glad-handing pushy guy with a sinister streak. He asks Jeff questions about getting to Cuba and back and how much it might be worth it to a skipper to move some packages on his boat. Against his better judgement, and because Letty's got his head spinning with lust, Jeff entertains the idea. Letty is one of those sullen, hot-tempered babes who populated tons of books like this found in drugstore turnstiles back in the day. Ultimately, the novel turns into a one-setting pressure cooker of a play with Jeff, Letty, Buster, and a wounded felon named Daly, cooling their heels in Jeff's cabin. There's a lot of drinking and yelling and wielding of spear guns and revolvers. Jeff calls Letty "honey" constantly to the point of distraction. How could a jaded hard-bitten skipper be such a chump for an obviously twisted chick? Tempers, boredom, lust, suspicion and alcohol build the pressure cooker until the shit's going to blow. We'll have to see who's left standing who ends up chum for the sharks.