Loser’s Town: A David Spandau Novel
by Daniel Depp
Hardcover, 290 pg.
Simon AND Schuster, 2009
Read: November 8 – 12, 2012
Um, ugh. This is a really well-written, occasionally clever, disappointment.
See here’s the thing…in a detective novel, the protagonist, or if you will, the detective, should detect things. Spandau did nada. His violent associate (not really a Hawk, Joe Pike or Bubba Rogowski, but close enough) investigated; his boss did; his boss’ secretary did. Spandau? He sat around and mooned over his ex-wife, bullied his client, bullied his associate, bullied the bad guy, was a jerk to just about everyone. And then sorta cleaned up the mess at the end. But even in that, he was pretty passive.
Blech.
A passive hero — no matter how nice of a guy, how thoughtful, whatever — is not something you want to read.
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