Pagan Babies [Mass Market Paperback]

Elmore Leonard (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 8, 2002

Father Terry Dunn thought he'd seen everything on the mean streets of Detroit, but that was before he went on a little retreat to Rwanda to evade a tax-fraud indictment. Now the whiskey-drinking, Nine Inch Nails T-shirt-wearing padre is back trying to hustle up a score to help the little orphans of Rwanda. But the fund-raising gets complicated when a former tattletale cohort pops up on Terry's tail. And then there's the lovely Debbie Dewey. A freshly sprung ex-con turned stand-up comic, Debbie needs some fast cash, too, to settle an old score. Now they're in together for a bigger payoff than either could finagle alone. After all, it makes sense . . . unless Father Terry is working a con of his own.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

After 30-odd novels, one might think that Elmore Leonard has nothing left to prove. But Pagan Babies, a novel filled with his signatures (tight plotting, scathing wit, and that grittily realistic dialogue), shows once again why he sets the standard against which other crime novels are measured. In fact, Leonard has raised the bar. How many authors would dare use the Rwandan genocide as backdrop for a story that moves gaily between romantic comedy and a massive, labyrinthine con? More to the point, how many of them would pull it off?

Father Terry Dunn doesn't have qualms about substituting punishment for penance. If that means killing four Hutu murderers who slaughtered his Tutsi congregation, so be it. Being an instrument of divine wrath has certain disadvantages, however, so Dunn breaks camp and heads for Detroit, where he's welcomed by family, a five-year-old federal indictment for tax fraud, and a fast-talking fireball named Debbie Dewey. Fresh from a stint in prison for assaulting her former fiancé, Randy, with a Ford Escort, Debbie is out for revenge:

"I still can't believe I fell for it. He tells me he's retired from Merrill Lynch, one of their top traders, and I believed him. Did I check? No, not till it was too late. But you know what did me in, besides the hair and the tan? Greed. He said if I had a savings account that wasn't doing much and would like to put it to work... He shows me his phony portfolio, stock worth millions, and like a dummy I said, 'Well, I've got fifty grand not doing too much.' I signed it over and that's the last I saw of my money."

It's only a matter of time before Debbie's desire for cold, hard cash and Dunn's fundraising for Rwandan orphans join forces in a carefully plotted financial assault on Randy's benefactor, Tony Amilia, who just happens to be the last of the old-school Detroit Mafia. Throw in a couple of hit men to whom loyalty is a foreign word, and you've got vintage Leonard: a fast-paced, roller-coaster ride of a novel where deceiver and deceived are gloriously shifty signifiers. --Kelly Flynn --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Buscemi offers a standard, dry reading of Leonard's sly new tale, which is appropriate (though his attempt at producing African accents is unconvincing) for the opening scene: Rwanda after its rabid interethnic violence. Unordained priest "Father" Terry Dunn ministers to the local congregants (47 of whom were slashed to death) and shacks up with his housekeeper until he decides to take matters of justice into his own hands. Having arrived in Africa on the lam from a criminal charge in the U.S., Terry returns home to Detroit under similar circumstances. But Buscemi's tone never becomes as lithe as Leonard's tale does in Detroit; his best effort at atmosphere is the smart-alecky tone he gives to Terry's confederate Debbie Dewey, an aspiring stand-up comic just released from prison for having tried to run over the ex-boyfriend who scammed her out of thousands of dollars. Debbie intends to scam him back and joins up with Terry, who has his own shady operation. Debbie's ex fronts for the mob and is in cahoots with a witless hit man called Mutt, who in turn allies himself with an ex-smuggling partner of Terry's. Everyone tries to protect his or her own interest in the rapidly circulating money. One can't help feeling that the abridgement has cut out some vital material before Terry's final return to Rwanda. All in all, though, this is a hugely entertaining story by LeonardAalbeit one conveyed only moderately well by Buscemi. Simultaneous release with the Dell hardcover (Forecasts, July 3). (Sept.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 368 pages
• Publisher: HarperTorch (January 8, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060008776
• ISBN-13: 978-0060008772
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (73 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #426,466 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #18 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Mystery & Thrillers > Authors, A-Z > ( L ) > Leonard, Elmore

More About the Author

Elmore Leonard has written more than forty novels, including bestsellers Up in Honey's Room, The Hot Kid, Mr. Paradise, Tishomingo Blues, Pagan Babies, and Glitz. Many of his books have been made into movies, including Get Shorty and Out of Sight. He lives with his wife, Christine, in Bloomfield Village, Michigan.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Elmore Leonard just can't miss, January 23, 2005

By 

Peggy Vincent "author and reader" (Oakland, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Pagan Babies (Mass Market Paperback)

Elmore Leonard just keeps going and going and going. I guess he never runs out of insane situations to write about, quirky protagonists, nefarious bad guys and quick-witted not-quite-so-bad guys, conniving (or totally innocent - - but rarely) beautiful women, stellar dialogue, twisted plots...
I dunno, but I'll read anything he writes cuz I know I'm going to be royally entertained.
Pagan Babies concerns Terry, a guy on the lam from the IRS, who hies himself off to Rwanda to stay with his priest/uncle, and while there he witnesses the genocide. Leonard downplays the grisly, horrific details of this, but we can tell it has changed Terry in some fundamental way. When his uncle dies, he sort of assumes the priest alb and carries on in his stead for something like 5 yrs, hearing confessions, giving penance, and occasionally even saying Mass.
He comes back to the states, still playing the priest, and meets up with Debbie Dewey, the usual lovely you'll find in Leonard's books, only this one just got out of jail for assaulting her ex with a Ford Escort and wants to be a stand-up comic focusing on prison humor. Hello? I mean, you can't make this stuff up! But Elmore Leonard does.
They team up to pull of a scam, and things of course go awry - and that's all I'm going to tell you.
Read it. It's a hoot.

25 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Leonard at top form, September 13, 2000

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Pagan Babies (Hardcover)

Father Terry Dunn knows it is time to leave the Rwanda massacre. His church contains forty-seven corpses turning to "leather." Although Terry is hiding as a priest, he cannot take any more of the killing fields. He kills several of the culprits but flees home to Detroit. He originally fled to avoid jail time.

Debbie Dewey has just left prison after three years for trying to run over her former husband with a car. Debbie wants to become a stand-up comic until she meets Terry still masquerading as a priest. They are immediately attracted to one another and he brings her into his current con, bilking wealthy patrons in a save the Rwandan children cause which is another name for his wallet. She ups the ante by persuading him that her ex and the mob boss he is tied to is the perfect pigeon.

PAGAN BABIES is more than vintage Leonard. This novel is classic Leonard wildly destroying moral barriers. The story line is entertaining, never eases up, and contains Mr. Leonard's graphic but picturesque prose that shows he is quite a talent. The characters are typical of Mr. Leonard's novel as they run the full spectrum of sleaze, in other words likable to detestable parasites. This tale is superb reading for those fans that enjoy something different along the lines of a fabulously written crime drama heavily spiced with the absurd.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Sound Familiar?, September 24, 2000

By 

Maurice Williams "mauricewms" (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Pagan Babies (Hardcover)

An all right read. Fast and easy but not as entertaining as some of Leonard's earlier work. In Pagan Babies, Leonard tells the story of a criminal priest and his dealings with the mob element of Detroit. From Africa to Detroit, the priest conjures up scheme after scheme, only to have them get tripped up by the mob element he's gotten in bed with. Leonard could have written this one in his sleep as the plot twists were predictable, uncreative and out right dull. The characters could have been lifted from any of his previous novels and at times it seems they were. Perhaps a movie version (and this reads like a screenplay) of this novel would make a better showing.