One-hit wonder Nick Carbone has married, settles down, and makes a living in Southern California producing bands who barely remember his own gold record, but when an old friend shows up with his sexy girlfriend, Alison, jealousies flare and murder soon follows. 40,000 first printing.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Nick Carbonne is solid, good-looking, and disarmingly hip. The former front man for the thrash band Plague Dogs, he has found his space as a producer of such cutting-edge groups as O. J.'s Knife. He's also found his wife and his best buddy snuggled naked together in a hot tub. Dead. To determine what happened, he scours the sleaze off the denizens of southern California's music industry in this acerbic look at Orange County, the rock industry, and the unhealthy business of murder.
From Publishers Weekly
Familiarity with Ferrigno's three previous novels (Dead Man's Dance, etc.) won't breed contempt for his fourth, which is as fast and nasty as a cobra strike. It does raise the question, however, of why this talented author doesn't vary his formula. Again, Ferrigno presents an ominous California noir-scape teeming with quirky sadistic villains, dangerous slinky babes and a hip but good-hearted hero caught in their violent wake. Former rock star Nick Carbonne becomes the cops' chief suspect in the shooting death of his wife and his old band buddy, Perry. Ferrigno lavishes his liveliest prose, however, on Alison, Perry's sexy Texas girlfriend, who keeps Nick in a state of erotic expectation as the two of them attempt to solve the murders. Alison and Perry's specialty was making and selling audiotapes of dirty phone calls that Alison placed to strangers?a relatively harmless and quite lucrative pursuit, until the couple inadvertently taped the murder of one of their regular "clients." As they track the killer, Nick and Alison win the shaky support of a local cop. They also acquire more insidious help: the protection of the "Blue Angel," an ice-blooded killer who's after the same quarry, if for different reasons. Ferrigno spices this fruity slice of West Coast life with acerbic takes on aging rockers and motorcycle gangsters, post-punk bar and party people, lowlife agents, videophiles and perverts. He tells a nimble mystery, nostalgically propelled by sex, drugs, rock-and-roll?and more than one echo of his earlier work. Film rights sold to Twentieth Century Fox.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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More About the Author
I was born in South Florida, a tropical backwater rife with mosquitoes, flying cockroaches and the sweet stink of life. My youth was spent stealing science-fiction paperbacks from the local mini-mart and cutting tunnels through the palmetto thickets behind my house with a machete. Later, I regularly burned down those palmettos for the pleasure of seeing the fire trucks arrive, sirens blaring.
After earning degrees in Philosophy, Film-Making and Creative Writing, I thought that I would be happy as a college professor, writing dense, literary novels which I would assign to my students. I found, however, that being a professor was mostly a matter of going to meetings, and that I hated reading, let alone writing dense, literary novels. Instead, I went back to my first love, poker.
The next five years I gambled full-time, living in a high-crime area populated by starving artists, alcoholics, and drug dealers. I was comfortable there, and became friends with many people who would later populate my novels, the loveable, but dangerous sleazeballs as they have often been described. After a time, I got restless and used some of my winnings to start a punk rock magazine called The Rocket, where I interviewed the Clash, Elvis Costello, Iggy Pop, etc. The success of The Rocket got me a job as a feature writer for a daily newspaper in Southern California, where I took the adventure-and-new-money beat.
Over the next seven years I flew jets with the Blue Angels, drove Ferraris and went for desert survival training with gun nuts. More importantly, the newspaper taught me to train my eye and ear, to observe, to research, and how to use direct, concise language to create a character, and set a scene. The newspaper was a great gig but I wanted to write novels. I quit my day job.
My first novel, THE HORSE LATITUDES, (1991) was called the fiction debut of the season by Time magazine. It was, however, only May. I have since written seven more novels. My work has been described by the Washington Post as "Quentin Tarantino territory, with drugged-out and sometimes violent people in search of sensory overload, but what makes it all not just bearable, but often compelling, is Ferrigno's scorching wit and his relentless moral sense."
I love writing crime thrillers. At their best they are an honest portrayal of the human heart, within the context of love, humor, ambition, greed and betrayal. Just like life, the good guys are usually tainted, and the bad girls are smarter than anyone. While I can no longer understand a word of my undergraduate thesis on the philosophy of British logical positivist Ludwig Wittgenstein, thanks to researching my novels, I can steal a locked car within thirty seconds, effectively clear a jammed Mac-10 machine gun, and make crystal methadrine from ingredients found in any supermarket. I wouldn't have it any other way.
After earning degrees in Philosophy, Film-Making and Creative Writing, I thought that I would be happy as a college professor, writing dense, literary novels which I would assign to my students. I found, however, that being a professor was mostly a matter of going to meetings, and that I hated reading, let alone writing dense, literary novels. Instead, I went back to my first love, poker.
The next five years I gambled full-time, living in a high-crime area populated by starving artists, alcoholics, and drug dealers. I was comfortable there, and became friends with many people who would later populate my novels, the loveable, but dangerous sleazeballs as they have often been described. After a time, I got restless and used some of my winnings to start a punk rock magazine called The Rocket, where I interviewed the Clash, Elvis Costello, Iggy Pop, etc. The success of The Rocket got me a job as a feature writer for a daily newspaper in Southern California, where I took the adventure-and-new-money beat.
Over the next seven years I flew jets with the Blue Angels, drove Ferraris and went for desert survival training with gun nuts. More importantly, the newspaper taught me to train my eye and ear, to observe, to research, and how to use direct, concise language to create a character, and set a scene. The newspaper was a great gig but I wanted to write novels. I quit my day job.
My first novel, THE HORSE LATITUDES, (1991) was called the fiction debut of the season by Time magazine. It was, however, only May. I have since written seven more novels. My work has been described by the Washington Post as "Quentin Tarantino territory, with drugged-out and sometimes violent people in search of sensory overload, but what makes it all not just bearable, but often compelling, is Ferrigno's scorching wit and his relentless moral sense."
I love writing crime thrillers. At their best they are an honest portrayal of the human heart, within the context of love, humor, ambition, greed and betrayal. Just like life, the good guys are usually tainted, and the bad girls are smarter than anyone. While I can no longer understand a word of my undergraduate thesis on the philosophy of British logical positivist Ludwig Wittgenstein, thanks to researching my novels, I can steal a locked car within thirty seconds, effectively clear a jammed Mac-10 machine gun, and make crystal methadrine from ingredients found in any supermarket. I wouldn't have it any other way.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
great writer,
This review is from: Dead Silent (Mass Market Paperback)
I'm really surprised by the savage reviews here. In my opinion, Ferrigno has written another interesting, cool book with a plot that kept me guessing and a relationship that I kept rooting for. I've read his first three and now this one, and I've thoroughly enjoyed them all.
2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Slightly Better than Terrible,
This review is from: Dead Silent (Mass Market Paperback)
Okay, judging from all the other reviews it's obvious that I'm not the only person who didn't like this book. Since Ferrigno has written several other books that are quite good, it truly does seem like this is one that just got cranked out in a hurry without much thought. The plot is weak, the characters mostly unlikeable...I found very little to like about this book at all. In fact, the only reason I gave it two stars instead of one is because the villianous character called The Angel was rather amusing. All in all, I would say avoid this book and buy one of Ferrigno's other novels. This one is just really, really bad...as my title says, it's only slightly better than terrible.
6 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Flat Out Awful,
This review is from: Dead Silent (Mass Market Paperback)
To Say Robert Ferrgino's forth novel "Dead Silent" is disappointing would be a major understatement. "Dead Silent lacks the imagination, grittiness, and sharp dialogue that past Ferrigno novels have. I know Ferrigno tries to show the Los Angeles dark side, however this story is too mundane to keep the reader interested.The novel is about ex-rock star Nick Carbonne who comes home and finds his best friend and his wife shot to death in the hot tub together. Carbonne is the main suspect, and teams up with the best friend's girlfriend to find the real killer. Their journey takes them deep into the underworld of the music industry, phone sex industry and the mob. In total this book is a major flop. The characters are all the same cookie cutter charatcers. They are all know it all, pinhead punks. Even the Blue Angel character who held the beginings the book together, dissolved into something unlikable. What happened to characters like Quinn and Jen from "Dead Man's Dance" and "Cheshire Moon". What happened to the great plots like Ferrigno's first novel "The Horse Latitudes". Hopefully Ferrigno can regain his form.
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