Customer Reviews

Cold Caller: A White Collar Noir (Norton Paperback)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

If Jim Thompson were a Yuppie, he might have written this book.

Bill Moss is a failed advertising exec living in Manhattan. Restarting his career as a telemarketer (for a lot less money), he and his co-workers are routinely humiliated by a petty and racist supervisor. But things get more tolerable for Moss when a chance lie he tells to the company's President results in a surprise promotion. Then he gathers enough courage to live out his long-time fantasy of an encounter with a 'lady of the evening'. Feeling guilty afterwards, Moss batters the woman.

Then, when his boss threatens to fire him over an unrelated manner, Moss snaps. Now he's got a dead body in his office and a bunch of violent p imps chasing him. And things go downhill from there.

_Cold Caller_ is a seductively easy read that has several exquisite plot points. If you liked Thompson's _The Killer Inside Me_, I can almost guarantee you'll think as I do about _Cold Caller_: it's deliciously good.

This is Jason Starr's first book and it's great. It's pure noir that keeps you trapped and wanting more, but makes you feel guilty about it. If you like New York and you don't like yuppies, you'll love the book. Like a good roller coaster ride I wanted to get off after the first drop but also wanted to know what was next. The main character Bill Moss is sympathetic and manipulative and the great fun for me was being duped by his warped sense of reality and justice. The fiendish acts unfold so quickly that by the time they are all done you feel like they make sense. Then after a while it just gets downright scary. I think this is good noir because the plot is both attractive and repulsive at the same time. I believed the story was plausible and that main character represents a good part of the dark side of many young, white, upwardly mobile men. It's a quick read that's gripping, unpredictable and disturbing. I'm definitely looking forward to the next book by Jason Starr.

This novel is at the same time humorous and dark, a good book in the tradition of Noir. Sort of a tamed down version of American Psycho. Follows the life of an ex ad executive into the world of telemarketing and NYC life. His temporary job as a telemarketer turns into a long term stint and when instead of getting promoted, he gets fired, well as the back of the book says "he snaps...now he's got a dead supervisor on his hands". The book is evenly divided between leading up to this, and events afterwards. A good ending awaits you...

Although not my usual kind of read, I picked up Starr's book by chance and couldn't put it down until the consistently strange and compelling end. Starr led me innocently into the story and into the life and head of Bill who most likely represents those aspiring, yet frustrated group of mid-30's educated creative types who are forced to yield to the competitive corporate inanities and heirarchies. Many of those young men and women must harbor similar fantasies and the book, like a good film, allows them a vicarious safe go at it. I liked the style and the creative turns the novel took. Looking foward to another good read by Jason Starr.

I bought this book after I read Starr's new novel, Nothing Personal (which was also great), and I enjoyed this one just as much. Really dark and really funny. Bill Moss is one of the most memorable characters I've read in a crime novel in years. Very highly recommended.

This book chronicles the rise and fall of Bill Moss, an ex high flying ad exectutive, who has lost his job and now works as a telemarketer. It's one of the best crime novels I've read in years. It's dark, tense, suspenseful and--at times--hilarious. Starr really knows how to write crime fiction, and the characterizations and dialogue are great. I once had a boss from hell like Bill's and, well...I hope they make a movie of this one and get Johnny Depp to star. Very highly recommended.

Jason Starrs "Cold Caller" is a thriller from the modern working sphere. Its hero Bill Moss works as a telephone salesman in a call center. Which does not sound itself only times particularly excitingly, turns out however already after few sides as an ultra exciting book, which one does not want to put out of the hand, before one knows how it ends. Because Bill Moss is threatened. However not of the mafia, secret agents or natural catastrophes, but of many more realistic and thus more uncanny dangers. He is threatened of unemployment, social degredation and cancellation of the personality. Bill Moss fights against these dangers and releases with it a terrible vortex of events.

"Cold Caller" is also a horror book concerning the frights of current capitalism. Jason Starr supplies a convincing society criticism in the garb of an exciting thriller. Best in a slide read!

For a long time now I've been looking around for a contemporary crime author with some of the unapologetic nastiness of Jim Thompson or Charles Willeford. Well, finally, with Cold Caller, I've found it. This is a gripping read with a darkly funny tone. The narrator of the story draws you into his bitter, bleak, office world in a way that anyone who works in an office can relate to. Not that you would go to the lengths he does to get ahead, but he certainly does what many of us have imagined we'd like to do. Anyway, a highly recommended, enjoyable read. Noir at its blackest.

White Collar Noir describes Cold Caller perfectly, and I agree with other reviewers who said it's reminiscent of Jim Thompson. What makes this book stand out in the genre is the twist ending. Just when you think it's headed to the inevitable conclusion, Starr adds an extra layer of satisfaction that will make the story linger in my mind for a long time.

I am sure we have all seen movies/tv shows where cops are portrayed as being not very bright. However, in this case, it's a whole new level of stupidity. Given all the clues left behind by the narrator, this may have been the easiest case ever for the police to solve....and yet, somehow they don't nor even come close really.

I was tempted to point out weak parts, but I don't have enough space. The dialogue and ending are both brutal and not good brutal either. I mean brutally bad. And the part with the prostitute in the river....heaven help us. THIS IS ABOUT AS EASY AS IT COULD GET FOR A COP TO SOLVE!!!

While I understand he is trying to develop his character, the lies in the book are so lame that you almost get embarrassed as as you read. And I could be wrong, but the guy is proud of making $40k in NYC? And another family in the book is moving to the Hamptons or something similar on just over $100k of annual income? Will that even allow you a one bedroom apartment in that area?

I have read several of Starr's books and this is the weakest by far. Go read Ken Bruen for good noir. And if you are involved with the law in any way, do not read. It will just anger you.