Road Dogs [Mass Market Paperback]

Leonard Elmore (Author)

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Harpercollins (October 30, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061767190
• ISBN-13: 978-0061767197
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (106 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #11,084,328 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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

54 of 58 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Count Me a Fan, April 27, 2009

By 

Christy Tillery French "reviewer/writer" (Powell, TN) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Road Dogs: A Novel (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

Elmore Leonard brings back three characters from previous books for an encore performance in his latest comedic foray into the criminal world. Bank robber Jack Foley (Out of Sight), and Cundo Rey (LaBrava), meet in prison and quickly become friends, referring to themselves as Road Dogs. Rey's lawyer has arranged for his early release from prison and Rey offers her services to Foley, who's in for thirty years. She manages to get Foley's prison term reduced to 30 months and Foley is released two weeks before Rey. Rey offers Foley one of his houses in Venice Beach but admonishes him to keep his hands off his girlfriend, Dawn (Riding the Rap), a psychic/ghost hunter patiently waiting for Rey's release so she can con him out of his millions. When she meets Foley, Dawn knows he is her way to the money and tries to work her magic on him. Foley is intrigued but distracted by an FBI agent tailing him, waiting to capture him after he robs his next bank.

As usual, Leonard adroitly moves the story forward through realistic, at times quirky, dialogue and the inner thoughts of some pretty wacky people. He excels at delivering entertaining scenes of duplicity and complicity among characters on the wrong and right side of the law. Foley takes the lead in this comedy and is a cool guy who manages to stay one step ahead of those who have no qualms about taking him out, legally or illegally. The interplay between Foley and the others will keep the readers turning pages, laughing along the way. This is one fun read.

35 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Streetwise Banter Undercut By Lazy Plotting, May 9, 2009

By 

Kevin Joseph (McLean, VA United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Road Dogs: A Novel (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

Jack Foley and Cundo Rey, the titular "road dogs," form a bond in prison that ties their fates after release. Enter Dawn Navarro, a psychic grifter who has acted the part of Cundo's dutiful wife during his eight-year prison sentence, patiently biding her time for the opportunity to steal his sizable fortune from him. When Foley is released from prison before Cundo, and becomes Dawn's lover and would-be accomplice, the stage is set for a triangular struggle that pits the road dogs' buddy-bond against their feelings for Dawn and against Dawn's own ambitions. A subplot involving Lou Adams, an FBI agent who is stalking Foley in the hope of catching him in a bank robbery so that he can find a compelling ending to a book he's writing about America's most accomplished bank robber, adds another entertaining dimension.

As is typical of an Elmore Leonard work, its main strength lies in the hip, streetwise banter between this trio of hustlers and in the conflict between their loyalties to one another and their rising distrust. The plot, unfortunately, suffers from one major flaw, which becomes harder and harder to overlook as the story unfolds: why does Dawn have to wait until Cundo is released from prison before conspiring with Cundo's money man Little Jimmy to embezzle Cundo's millions? The ending is also something of a letdown.

If you can suspend disbelief enough to overcome the lazy plotting and let yourself be immersed in the cool, hustler banter, there's enough here to keep the pages flipping.

29 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars More like Roadkill, June 2, 2009

By 

B. Sanger (New Jersey) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Road Dogs: A Novel (Hardcover)

Nobody writes crime better than Leonard -- and very few wrote westerns better than Leonard. However, of all the novels he's given us, "Road Dogs" is at the bottom of the heap.

When I first heard Foley and Cundo were coming back I was ecstatic and didn't think for a second he could miss with that team. But miss and miss badly he has. As somebody mentioned above, nothing happens for 200-plus pages. Nothing. And quite frankly, this is some of the lamest "banter" ever in a Leonard novel. Plus, Dawn's plan was not only stupid and hideously planned, it wasn't even gripping. And the FBI guy tailing Foley leads to nothing.

A dog of a novel and giant disappointment for this Leonard fan.