Customer Reviews

L.A. Rex

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(18)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is gritty and real and after I read it I felt like I was a little less innocent than I was when I had begun.

I was born and raised in South L.A. (South Central) and was surrounded by the gang lifestyle, complete with drugs, police and violence but was a statistical outlier and fortunately, I went on to college and eventually earned a professional degree. That being said I have a connection with many of the gritty gang bangers Beall writes about that most people never will. Somehow, I feel this book captures the road I didn't travel with amazing reality. This book is eerily real. In so many ways it truly captures not only the everyday happenings in our nations most dangerous areas but it captures the soul of the area. The book is a real page turner but what struck me was how Beall delved into psychological and spiritual underpinnings behind the social ills in urban Los Angeles.

I was actually shocked to turn to the back cover and see that the writer was white. But when I found out that he was a cop in 77th division of L.A.P.D it all made sense. Beall has probably been in my old neighborhood 100 times more than I in the last decade and clearly has his finger on the pulse of the real demons of my hometown and this country. There were parts of this book that made me literally stand still and marvel at how Beall had translated the thoughts and feelings of young urban America for the masses to read.

On its face the book has some of the strengths of some of my favorite novels. The book is as colorfully descriptive as the Da Vinci Code and almost more satisfying as I have never seen the cities in Europe that Dan Brown speaks of but with this book I could see every little familiar spot that I had grown up around in my mind as I read. It reminded me of how Walter Mosley books used to describe L.A. in the 40's but now as a child of the 90's I can check the authors work like only my grandparents could Mosley's.

The book is a highflier, no doubt has ups and downs and crazy plot twist that I didn't see coming but to me this book gets high marks because of something much more important, good old fashioned character development.

I highly recommend getting this book. I hope there's a sequel and really hope there's a movie. I see Crash meets Training Day meets Pulp Fiction.

In his debut novel L.A. Rex author and LAPD officer Will Beall takes us to a world that we might never otherwise know. His novel is escapist only because of our limited access to the streets of L.A.'s 77th District, not because they don't exist. Only an LAPD officer who patrols South Central could take us to the places Beall does. As readers, we are fortunate that in addition to being a no-frills beat cop, Beall is also a supremely talented writer who hasn't added to a genre as much as he has created one.

As a former large city / urban patrol and narcotics cop myself, I can attest that Beall's novel is set in a world that offers edge, grit, brutality and consequence that will enthrall and surprise both the cynical cop and the lay reader.

His first time out, Beall swings for the fences and delivers a walk-off homerun. He reveals to the reader a world that is, sometimes mesmerizing, sometimes bleak, but always vivid. While authenticity is Beall's trump card, this book represents a royal flush: a balanced novel with a plot bolstered by Beall's credibility but also powerful, original and extremely imaginative in its own right.

Beall details a world he experiences instead of describing a ghetto he imagines. Beyond the realism of Beall's work is a structured novel that transcends the abilities of most debut offerings. At first glance, I thought that Beall's decision to use a type of scattered chronology would render the plot hard to follow. Instead, he uses time to his advantage and it results in a novel that is more journey than story.

I believe that few people are as hesitant as I am to pick-up crime fiction or as quick to discard it. If most novels are like tattoos that are created; this novel is like a scar--something actually experienced and with a better story.

This book is no tease--it delivers and makes you breakfast the next morning. L.A. Rex represents Beall's initial offering--hopefully just one of many. Someday you'll thank Officer Will Beall for weaving his world into honest, quality fiction, and thank God he's out there so you don't have to be.

First-time authors who crank out a killer book piss me off, whether it's Will Beall or Uzodinma Iweala.

But you have to give credit where it's due. Beall's got talent. And experience. If a non-cop had written this book, some of the outrageousness in it could be dismissed as hyperbole. Knowing he's walked the mean streets for years makes you wonder what really goes on out there.

If you like tough-guy talk, humor and action, action, action, you're going to like this book.

The first 190 pages of this novel are superb. Mr. Beall's writing style is unsurpassed in the genre of gritty, LA cop noir realism. The author employs an almost rhythmic cadence that moves the reader along and keeps one turning the pages for more.

Mr. Beall's dark humor leavens even the most horrifying sequences.

And then...there's a shifting of gears. It's as if Beall had to go answer a 911 call somewhere and a junior editor named "Buffy" takes over writing the novel's critical third act. Previously evil villains mysteriously soften. Secondary, uninteresting characters suddenly assume center stage.

The taut action and previously well-crafted plot begin to lurch.

Just as suddenly, it seems, the real author later returns and submits more script. The junior editor, (Buffy?), throws the copy in randomly and the reader is left with a jumble and a distinctly unsatisfying ending.

I won't play the spoiler for anyone who hasn't yet read this basically fine first novel of Mr. Beall's. But the hapless, 20-something "Buffy" has a screw loose in plotting the finale.

If Beall is as tough as he comes across in this novel's promising opening, he'd blow "Buffy's" head off and find a new editor for his next novel.

Superb Fiction That Hits Home

Every so often, someone attempting a panorama gets it completely right. With the studied eye of a scientist still willing to dirty his hands in the field, Will Beall has given us a Los Angeles without precedent. Precisely and brutally, he paints the colonies existing in the petri dish that is our city. You dare not look away from the faces strewn about this landscape.

Beall masters the dialects of the gangs that flow through LAPD's 77th division. Like Linnaeus, he knows the genealogy of the senior cops left behind after Chief Daryl Gates' wagon smashed head first into tectonic plates faster, larger, and more intractable than his own.

Beall knows how it smells on a still August night underneath the flight path above Imperial Highway, the stillness a pregnant pause between salvos. But any motivated rookie can know these things within a few years. Without context, anecdote and skilled observation cannot approximate art. Beall provides it abundantly and reveals a very real talent as he shows us what happens when worlds collide south of the Santa Monica Freeway, that Mason-Dixon line dividing the white-collar from the no-collar.

Years ago, I stopped telling people about my work in the neighborhoods that are the foreground in L. A. Rex. Those who endlessly revised their own histories north of the 10 had no real interest in the darker world that lay beneath it.

Recently, I ate breakfast at the Pantry with an old friend, recently paroled. Lino did a stretch for a crime he probably did not do. I suppose he was serving and protecting in his own way, in the only way he could. The details are not important.

We ate at a table in the back. Sitting at the counter was not an option, his back would have been to the door. Though chiseled, Lino had the weariness of a black-maned lion, ground down by the very life that had given him definition.

"So. Are you going to stay in town? It's changed more than you could imagine," I asked, after we ordered. New, younger lions would come after him from every angle.

"Yeah," he said, watching sugar dissolve into black coffee.

"Mexico's not an option?"

"Look carnal, I was born in Sinaloa. But I'm from L. A. Intiendes?"

"Intiendo." He had the tattoo to prove it, bigger than the letters on a Dodger cap.

Lunch arrived. We ate without speaking.

"You know, those books helped," he said, not looking at his mashed potatoes.

"No problem." Every year, I sent him a volume of Durant's History of the World. Thirteen years. Thirteen volumes.

"I read them all, man. Every page." he used a napkin to wipe steak sauce from his lips. "And this is how I look at it. L. A. is ancient Rome at it's peak. Only modern, right?"

"Right."

"We are the center of the universe, Holmes. As goes L. A., so goes the world. No, man, I missed too much already to be stuck in some pinche backwater province. I am a Roman. And in Rome I'll die."

Wow! This book grabbed hold of me and I read it almost in one sitting. The writing is excellent; a gripping and evocative account of life as a police officer in South Central LA. Heartbreaking descriptions of life on the street, and some of the most jaw-dropping occurances. Miguel is a great character, and I loved the subtle hints at Ben's troubled background. But as the book went on it became too much. It was as if at some point the book took a turn from a gritty realistic cop novel to an operatic Mad-Max-type fantasy. Secret ominous gang hideouts? Drug dealers on horseback? Leashed jaguars? Underground phone-sex bunkers?

Too many coincidences overwhelmed the tale. Every key character was too closely connected to each other in the past, the believability of it was strained to the point of collapse. The bad cop's connected not only to Ben's gangsta friend, but also deeply connected to his new partner? the pair of cops keep happening upon even bit-players we've met before, like the pregnant woman. It's like there are only 50 or so people populating all of LA!

Still - the writing was excellent, and if you are able to weather switching gears from hardboiled noir to over-the-top fantasy, it's a great read. Warning - there is incredible violence and misogyny. It's amazing how many ways people die in this book. Death by train, dog, jaguar, garbage disposal, fire, scalping, - whew!

A number of crime novels set on the mean streets of South Central L.A. have been written, however few stun with the authenticity of Will Beall's debut L.A. Rex. An officer in the 77th division of the Los Angeles Police Department, this author has seen and felt it all. His firsthand impressions and visceral reactions sear throughout the pages.

Adding to the authenticity is, of course, the narration by film/television/stage actor Dan Oreskes. His voice is deep, husky, commanding. It is rich in timbre, a voice that one could imagine playing the part of a patrician, but here what comes through is toughness, strength. He brings a heard-it-all, seen-it-all tone to this not for the weak of heart story.

There's a roll call room at the LAPD's 77th division that houses a plaque reading "Abandon all hope ye who enter here." Rookie cop Ben Halloran doesn't seem to take note of the warning nor do other officers take note of him. Apparently, he's just clean, scrubbed and brand new with shiny shoes and pressed shirt ready to right the wrongs of the world. However, looks can be deceiving and there's more to Ben than meets the eye.

He's partnered with an experienced officer Miguel Marquez to do battle with the city's bloody and burgeoning gang war. Every sort of sleazy character is on the streets of South Central from relentless killers to rapists to unethical lawyers to drug dealers to cops on the pay. Before long Ben is faced with some tough decisions - the most important one being how to stay alive.

- Gail Cooke

Will Beall's first novel, L.A. Rex, is a real winner. Tough, gritty, innovative and ferocious beyond words, this novel is your prescription for learning about the mean streets of Los Angeles. The most impressive novel about L.A. crime since Joseph Wambaugh's The Blue Knight.

I thoroughly enjoyed this debut novel. While comparisons to Richard Price are going to be unavoidable, that's not necessarily a bad thing, particularly because this story takes place on a coast where Price doesn't venture, which adds a different perspective to the cops/robbers scenarios presented in both author's work. The blurred lines between the heroes and villains was intriguing, particularly since the hardcore criminals were reminiscent of the real-life thugs in Leblanc's Random Family. Overall this is a good read if you're looking for a crime drama that puts you the heart of the action and one that will keep you guessing with each turn of the page.

I picked up this book from the SCIBA because of the "buzz". I'm usually wary of "buzz" but then I overheard the rep from Penguin talking about it and knew I had to read it. I did and I really enjoyed it! I was surprised to read that the author is still an L.A.P.D cop! Where he finds time to write and police I'll never know.

If you enjoy reading books about good guys, bad guys, trying to find the line BETWEEN the good guys and bad guys, blatant brutality, and violence then order this book NOW! I will agree that it was a bit confusing to flip flop back and forth between the time periods. I got so into this story that I sometimes missed the "present", "1985", "1986" headings and was like WTF?! Also, there were times I had to consult the internet so figure out some of the gang slang and bits and peices of Spanish, but it was worth it.

Definately get this book for your gritty novel lovers this Christmas!