Customer Reviews

The Deputy

5 star:		(35)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Toby Sawyer is an idiot. I'm sorry, but he is. He's kinda stuck in a trailer park with a dumb wife and a baby son. He loves the kid, but the wife. Feh. She watches reality shows all day. So, yeah. Not so much with that one. But Toby is trying to get his stuff together. He's on part-time with the sheriff's office and trying to get on full-time. A young punk from the local Hatfields or McCoys is found shot to death -- nine bullet holes. Toby is supposed to watch the body while the other cops go investigate and the coroner makes his way there. Toby goes into the local diner for a second and when he comes out, the body is gone. So now his future is shot to hell.

He's not really interested in finding the body. He's interested in just making it all go away, in waking up from a bad dream. One second he's crawling out the window of his college-bound girlfriend and the next he's getting chased like he's Dennis Weaver. And then he's on the run. And he has no idea why. Soon enough, not only is his life at stake -- but so is that of his baby son.

Crooked cops. Smugglers. Nasty locals. This 249-page book is so full of characters, sometimes it feels like that Thomas Mann book where he builds up the family to tear them down. And sometimes this one feels like a long short story, with action that you feel as if you're reading a short story -- all flesh and shotguns and chases.

I read this in one fell-swoop between lunch and dinner on Sunday. Which pisses me off. I should have just read a few chapters each day, so that I could enjoy it for longer.

Ah, well. As they say in the book: "What's a man supposed to do? How does a man know?"

This is what noir is: that rough, bloody adrenaline rush that makes you remember why you read books in the first place.

Buy. This. Book.

One warning before picking up this book: don't crack it open unless you are willing to park your ass in place for a couple hours and read it front to back in one sitting. Because once the action starts - and it starts almost immediately - it doesn't stop until the end of the book. It is almost impossible to put down.

The Deputy (2010, Tyrus Books) takes place over the waning hours of a single hot, humid night in August. Toby Sawyer is an aimless twenty-something who had abandoned the tiny Oklahoma town of Coyote Crossing to pursue his dream as a musician. Things didn't turn out as planned, and when his mother died shortly after his graduation from the police academy, he returned home to bury her, got a girl pregnant, and ended up staying. Now he's a part time deputy, and really has no higher aspirations than getting hired on full time. When the body of a local bully and small time criminal turns up, and disappears under his watch (he'd left it unattended just long enough to sneak off and have sex with his underage girlfriend, despite having a wife and young son at home), Toby is certain he'll be fired.

Events kick up several notches from there. Before the sun rises Toby will get laid one-and-a-half more times (once by his wife, and almost again a second time with his girlfriend) before getting abandoned or dumped by both. He'll wreck his car, then steal and trash a couple other vehicles that don't belong to him. He'll also be being shot at, attacked with an axe and clawed in the face. Through it all he manages to survive long enough to produce an impressive body count of his own, all while uncovering an illegal human smuggling ring that may or may not include more than half of the Coyote Crossing police force - his co-workers. Not bad work for a guy we really don't have any reason to believe would have it in him to be so efficient at killing people, either in self defense or out of vengeance.

Here's the thing about this book. If you are the kind of reader who wants to pick holes in the narrative, find flaws, or otherwise deconstruct a novel, then you should probably stay away. The book has plenty elements to make one raise an eyebrow over when it comes to the believability department. Toby makes some choices here that are hard to imagine anyone smart enough to get through the police academy making. He's relatively blasé about all the people he kills. Not only that, but lawman or not some of those kills are essentially murders that would be very difficult to explain away when the events of the night come under investigation.

I don't care about any of that. Victor Gischler has written a balls-out action movie of a book, with plenty of sex and violence to appease the most diehard of fans, and that is what I was after when I sat down to read. The story may be long on action and short on character development, but it's fun. It's easy to understand Toby's motivations, and Gischler captures perfectly the dead-end life in a remote small town and the impossible-seeming struggle to get away from it. Toby's not a guy I'd want to give any responsibility to, or be forced to count on to watch my back, but if I were pinned down beside a car with gangsters filling it full of holes, I wouldn't mind having him along for the action.

Besides The Deputy, Gischler has written the novels Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse, Vampire a Go-Go, Shotgun Opera, Suicide Squeeze, and Gun Monkeys. He has also written for Marvel Comics, including runs on characters The Punisher and Deadpool. The guy knows his mayhem, and he's got a great sense of humor. Gischler knows what his readers want and delivers it in gory handfuls. What more could you want?

For something new that is exciting and drips blood but doesn't require a huge time commitment, give The Deputy a try. Fans of violent crime fiction will love it.

Victor Gischler's latest novel is ripped from the old noir novels Gold Medal published back in the 1960s. Those books molded a generation of readers and writers that still succumb to tales of crime, criminals, and heroes that get their hands dirty while doing a violent job by their own rules.

As with his earlier novels, Gischler writes about Oklahoma, but Coyote Crossing is so far back in the woods that most people in the state never notice it on the map. Toby Sawyer is a twenty-five year old part-time deputy living the life of a total slacker. He's also got the requisite blue-collar life for living in small town Oklahoma: a wife that doesn't really love him, a young son he loves that forces him to grow up faster than he wants to, a trailer, and a souped-up rusting wreck of a car.

I grew up in towns like Coyote Crossing and Gischler fairly describes the residents and the environment. It's depressing in some instances, as the author intends, but it also reminds me a lot of how hard you have to work to get out of such places, and why life-long residents live there.

The murder of Luke Jordan, a member of an outlaw clan that's lived in Coyote Crossing forever, jump starts the novel into overdrive. I liked the fact that Toby reported for duty wearing his deputy's badge pinned to a Weezer shirt and that his .38 kept dragging his sweatpants down if he tried to hook it there.

Immediately, things take a turn for the worse while Toby's out cheating on his wife when he's supposed to be guarding the body of the murder victim. At the beginning, I really thought about giving up on the book because Toby was such an unsympathetic character and the murder didn't look all that interesting.

Then Gischler turns up the heat. No matter where he is in his life and his fidelity, Toby is a good daddy, and he's dead-set on taking care of his son. I liked that about him. I hung onto that one redeeming quality, which I'm sure was deliberately fostered by Gischler, and got sucked in by the challenges that mounted in front of Toby.

In no time at all, I was rooting for Toby as he went up against Mexican gangsters, crooked deputies inside his own department, and the Jordan clan as they rode into town looking for vengeance. The whole book takes place in the space of about twelve hours, and the pacing makes it impossible to put down as Toby's violent world escalates to total meltdown.

Gischler planned this novel to a T. The plot twists and curves whipcrack the reader into submission and shred any hope of putting the book down until the last page is turned and the gunsmoke haze finally thins. His girlfriend's screwed-up relationship with her step-dad is used throughout the book, as is the step-dad's eighteen-wheeler in ways other than for which it was intended. Everything dovetails into a tight package at the end.

The style of the novel is awesome in that it mirrors the old, pared-down to the bone presentation of those Gold Medal novels I mentioned. People that like Robert B. Parker will enjoy this book, although the hero isn't as pure or as polished as Spenser. However, people looking for deep characterization or deep thinking moments aren't going to find that here. The Deputy is a polished marble slab of noir violence and paranoia that never lets up, a chokehold that won't let go until the reader is down and out.

This mystery-thriller is plain brilliant. It is very well written and crafted around a plot that I find compelling. The setting and premise is unique and the characters are well drawn. It takes me back to Triple Agent Double Cross, which is also another story with a peculiar setting. Another attractive and fascinating thing about The Deputy is that its unfolding plot appears to hold something new and even more gripping with every new chapter. a well deserved read.

I have especially enjoyed and highly recommended Gischler's "Shotgun Opera" and "Go-Go Girls Of The Apocalypse". I was less impressed with "The Deputy" than either of these previous efforts. Toby Sawyer is a 25 year old desperately in search of himself. He is married to Doris, who may or may not be faithful to him, has a child, and lives in a trailer. He is also a part-time deputy in a 5 man police force in Coyote Crossing, Oklahoma and his main hope for vocational advancement is to become a full time deputy in this God-forsaken small town that is smack dab in the middle of the Mexican illegals underground highway.

When local bad boy Luke Jordan is killed in the middle of town, Toby is assigned to watch his body until the authorities can arrive to deal with it. In a very short time, Luke's body disappears, Toby is followed and later run off the road by suspicious Mexicans in a hi-performance Mustang, attacked by a fellow deputy, is put into kill-or-be-killed circumstances with former colleagues, with illegals, and with unknown assailants, and seems to have no one to turn to for help. In the meantime, he must deal with the mundane transgressions in Coyote Crossing along with his wife's sudden disappearance leaving him with the infant, and the growing knowledge that he is in the middle of a nightmare that he has no idea how to get out of.

Who can he trust? Who is involved in the illegal running of Mexicans across the border and how widespread is the conspiracy. What happened to Luke's body? Why do the Mexican gangsters want to beat him and take his keys? Where has his wife gone and why do the surviving Jordan brothers want him dead? All these questions are ultimately answered in this fast-paced easy to read novel that seems to promise more than it ultimately delivers. While Gischler piles up the bodies as young Toby comes of age during an impossible day-in-the-life-of Coyote Crossing, the reader is left to scramble for reasons to care. This reader never found a particular reason to care about Toby nor any of the other characters in "The Deputy" as character development was clearly sacrificed for fast paced thrills. There is a mildly surprising twist at the end that may catch some readers. I was also distracted by at least 9 typos which are less a responsibilty of the author than of the editor. If you are a Gischler fan, try this one out for the pacing, the suspense, and the body count. But don't expect depth of character and nuance.

Before today, I had never read one of Mr. Gischler's novels, and knew him only by his comics work. But "The Deputy" was recommended to me as good starter book, so I decided to give it a shot.

I started reading the book this morning, intending to only read a few chapters before lunch, but I ended up not being able to put it down and finished it in one day. Why? Because "The Deputy" is one of the most captivating crime thrillers to come along in ages!

The story is narrated by Toby Sawyer, a young part-time deputy who's never even made an arrest. He's put in charge of watching a dead body which he promptly loses and then all hell breaks loose. There is tons of action involving guns, fists and vehicles as Toby uncovers the biggest case his small town will ever see.

So, yes, I thoroughly enjoyed the book and look forward to my next Gischler novel.

Toby Sawyer is a lovable loser, kind of. He would rather be playing his guitar on stage than chasing bad guys. Unfortunately the band broke up and his mother died. So now he does the only thing in town he is qualified to do. (Even if he is only barely qualified) He is the part time deputy in a nowhere town.

He has a trailer, a wife he married because she was pregnant, a son, and an underage mistress. Toby Sawyer is lazy, lecherous, and loves to shirk responsibility. He does love his son though. That quality serves to make him much more likable. He is dedicated to his son in a way any father will understand.

The Deputy is not Gischler's best work to date. It doesn't have the cynical satire of "Go Go Girls..." or the twisted characters of "Gun Monkeys." What it does have is scene after scene of action that draws you forward. You keep reading just to see how Toby manages to get himself out of the next jam. The book is fun in the same way a movie like Die Hard is fun.

There were a few speed bumps that slowed down the high speed rush of "The Deputy." None of them were Gischler's fault. The person responsible for the final proofing of this book failed to do their job. There were numerous typos. In at least one place a word was completely left out. In another place an entirely wrong word was printed. To me the errors were enough to completely mangle the flow of the book at times. That is why I gave the book three stars. If the errors weren't in there, I think it would be deserving of at least 3.5 stars.

Gischler has written a good pulp novel. It crackles and hums in the right places. It is mellow and brooding in the right places. The pacing, timing, and descriptions of the action are very strong. There is a nice comedic undertone, in certain scenes, that ensures the story doesn't take it self to seriously.

At Amazon's paper back price I would recommend it for summer reading.

I have never read a story with so much action within a 24 hour period. Totally engrossing. Couldn't put it down. This story is about a character who could be anybody.

Pleasurable read. The journey from small town butt-of-the-joke deputy to a full fledged, fire breathing Law Man over one long eventful (literally, event full) night is told with a laconic humor that makes the neer-do-well deputy a character you won't want to forget. Neither will you forget passages like this: "The hardships and disappointments and tragedies of our lives can make us strong or they can twist us wrong and nobody is exempt from this crapshoot. Not old women or Mexican hellcats or part-time deputies."

I sat down at a lunch counter with this book one day and another customer said, "Oh I just read that. That book blazes!"

I can't say it any better. This book blazes. Much more contained and less frantic than other Gischler but no less enjoyable. I never knew where it was going and it kept the pages turning.