Customer Reviews

Semiautomatic: A Novel

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I liked Hollowpoint, but I really like the follow-on, Semiautomatic. If you read one, you must start with the debut novel, as there is a tremendous amount of back story that Reuland does not repeat in sufficient detail in this book.

After Hollowpoint, we saw a down on his luck assistant DA do his best to insert the right outcome into a case he was handling for the prosecutor's office. The author's prior work as a DA there lent a lot of charm to the first book and all of that continues here. As with the first book, the protagonist is handled a 'simple' case that turns out to be anything but. He's pared with a partner who has no experience in prosecuting murder cases, and they develop a very tentative and complex relationship while they try to move forward with the case. As you might expect, there are bigger forces and a larger agenda here at work. Watching them figure this out and what they're prepared to do about it is a real treat.

I wrote in my review of Hollowpoint that the sense of place for Brooklyn was strong. It's even stronger here. You can practically smell the steam of the summer shower coming off of the still hot pavements.

Reuland is an author to keep an eye on. I for one will be following him.

Recommended highly.

I picked up this short crime novel 'cause I was in a rush and it had a nice blurb on the cover from George Pelecanos (one of my favorite writers). Well, haste definitely made waste for me, and I'm sad to report that Pelecanos gave me a bum steer. This story about a murder trial in Brooklyn is an utterly tepid and uninteresting piece of work. Part of the problem is that a lot of the backstory to the protagonist Giobberti, a 40-year-old homicide prosecutor for the District Attorney's office, resides in Reuland's debut, Hollowpoint. Apparently in that book Giobberti screwed up so badly that he was exiled in disgrace to the backwater of the Appeals Bureau. He also either then or subsequently lost his daughter in a traffic accident and his wife walked out on him. Now, some 18 months later, he is unexpectedly told to take over a routine case involving a teenager who killed a bodega owner in a stickup.

Already on the case is inexperienced junior prosecutor Laurel Ashfield, who's never tried a homicide. Most of the book revolves around Giobberti and her getting a feel for each other and the case. Almost immediately, Giobberti (and the reader) realizes there's something not quite right about the case, and it takes an awfully long time for the specifics to be revealed. Once revealed, the specifics end up being woefully uninteresting, revolving around the completely unshocking reality of cops and DAs playing fast and loose with the truth in order to put away bad guys in order to score political points. The theme of corrupt a corrupt legal system and bent cops has been exhaustively explored in film and fiction for over a century, and Reuland brings nothing new to the table here.

The author was himself a lawyer for the Brooklyn DA's Homicide Bureau, so the book does benefit from a certain authenticity of detail. Reuland is particularly strong in describing places and creating vivid mental images of the courtroom, apartments, bathrooms, offices, and so on. Unfortunately, the people moving through these spaces don't talk or think the way real people do. The dialogue tends to be so clipped and elliptical that one wonders if the author is trying to parody of pulp films. At one point Giobberti actually addresses Ashfield as "sister" and another character laughably tells Giobberti to "take your meathooks off me!" Worst of all, there's no suspense and no dramatic tension to be found anywhere in this entirely skippable book.

Rob Reuland's Semiautomatic is the follow-up to his excellent 2000 debut Hollowpoint. The author has brought back hard-bitten Brooklyn Assistant District Attorney Andrew Giobberti for another go-around on the borough's mean streets and in its grim halls of justice.

A bodega owner has been murdered in what seems to be an open-and-shut case. As Gio digs deeper, though, he senses that something is rotten underneath the surface. There's a reason he was assigned to this murder and, once he learns it, his outrage leads him to take on his corrupt bosses.

There are times when Semiautomatic suffers from an excess of personality, with machinegun sentences and clipped dialogue assaulting readers so fast they hardly have a chance to catch their breath. That is also part of the book's charm, though, as Reuland breaks out of the typical urban crime mold with his fresh, compelling protagonist and idiosyncratic style.

Semiautomatic is recommended to anyone who is tired of the usual, run-of-the-mill legal thriller and wants to read something that tells it a little more like it really is.

Reviewed by David Montgomery, Chicago Sun-Times

Brilliant, insightful page-turner on what it is like to prosecute murders in an overworked big-city homicide unit. Reuland is a superb writer and must be one heck of a good lawyer. Unlike many (but not all) lawyer-writers, he gets it right. Too bad this and Hollowpoint are his only two published books.

I agree both with the people who liked this novel and with those who didn't. The level of writing is well above average, as is knowledge of the subject. Both are so welcome after a J. D. Robb "In Death" novel which is utterly mediocre in comparison.

Except... Mr. Reuland absolutely refuses to use a contraction (e.g. "won't" or "can't") so ALL the dialog (uneducated criminals included) is unbearably stilted. "She will not tell me, and I cannot insist, because we had not...". Nobody talks or thinks like this. How an otherwise perceptive writer could be so obtuse or so self-indulgent - and his editor permit it - is beyond me. It's like avoiding every word with the letter 'e'. Even in the excellent reading by Jason Collins this soon becomes excruciating. I soon began listening as much for an exception to this as to the relatively modest plot. Result: one contraction noted in the entire book.

Also, as mentioned by another reviewer, conversations between the principals are often unrealistically fragmented. People are constantly breaking off just when they're about to explain something important. This authorial trick creates many misunderstandings to advance the plot, but after a few of these the reader is thinking "just spit it out, for heavens sake!".

Mr. Reuland is a talented author and could easily do without the idiosyncrasies I'm criticising. I hope he'll iron these out of his future books. But, what author ever pays attention to the lay reader's opinion?

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. At no point did I sense that the author was trying to put one over on me, playing for a reader reaction, or throwing in standard thriller plot elements for effect, cleverly disguised. Reuland has written a book that matters, and he's written it in a fully natural, entertaining, and flowing style. He's in a class with Robert B. Parker, only better, because Reuland knows the world he describes, and cares about the people. Above all, it's an expansive book--a very rare quality among legal thrillers and crime novels; that is, the characters actually grow. Thus, the book is subtly moving; this is more than entertainment, though it is superbly that, too.

SEMIAUTOMATIC is Robert Reuland's second book following on from his impressive debut with HOLLOW POINT. Like his first book it is set in Brooklyn and features homicide prosecutor Andrew Giobberti. Also, like his first book, SEMIAUTOMATIC focuses heavily on the legal system and the faith that the central characters place in it.

It's been eighteen months since the events of HOLLOW POINT took place and Andrew Giobberti has been removed from his position in the DA's Homicide Bureau to the safer, more sedate dead end that is the Appeals Bureau. But now the DA has decided that Gio has served his penance and is now ready to prosecute homicide cases again.

The homicide case in question is the shooting of the owner of a bodega by a young black man who was robbing the store. At first glance it looks like a straightforward case with a witness who has identified Haskin Pool, the defendant, and is willing and able to testify to what he saw. But after reading through the case records, Gio can't help but feel that there is something more to the case that he's not been told about.

Gio is taking over the case from Laurel Ashfield, a young prosecutor who has been recently appointed to the Homicide Bureau. Laurel had worked the case from the moment it broke until trial only to have Gio brought in to take over at the last minute. Gio expects her to be resentful of him for being bumped to second chair, but surprisingly she is anything but. The reason that she's not is the big mystery of the story. It starts out as a nagging itch but soon leads to the greatest cause for division between the two lawyers.

This is a rather unusual book because although it revolves around a murder trial and features the prosecuting attorney who is trying the case, we never really experience any of the usual courtroom drama scenes. The only time the courtroom comes into play is in between sessions with Gio and Laurel discussing points of the case. As each day's proceedings actually begin we invariably fade to black and then cut to a later scene outside the court.

Social and moral values are put under the microscope as arguments from the younger, idealistic but rather naïve Laurel are countered by the more seasoned and realistic Gio. Reuland concentrates more on emotions and personalities pushing this mystery into a category beyond the mere legal thriller standing. It's dark, confrontational and proceeds to grab your attention as the true story of the case gradually unfolds.

Reuland's first book Hollowpoint hooked me with the throw-away line, he was so tough, 'he saved with a badger'. Reuland's dialogue works so well that one feels himself at the bottom of the same hole his hero with the heart of dread, Gio is looking up from. You don't read about the someone's state of mind in a Reuland book, you feel it. That time when your girl left you and you couldn't eat for a whole day; that's what Semiautomatic makes you feel. The ketchup seen and reference to Coney Island whitefish had me laughing for hours. Just when you feel bottomed out, he describes someone as being 'dropped into the chair with a spatula' and the plot drags you back from the brink. The jacket says Chandler and Hemingway but it should say James Joyce written by Ed McBain.
Semiautomatic is a must read for those pilgrims looking for the new noire classic. It is full or great throw away lines and my favourite this time is "There are only wrong moves left"
Great read, Reuland deserves more readers and better support from his publisher. This is a guaranteed come back to next year.

It would be a mistake to call this a legal thriller, just as it would be a mistake to believe that what happens in most American courtrooms is legally thrilling. This is taut, believable urban crime drama from someone batting .1000 right out of the box on his first two novels. It's not plot-crazed Grisham. It's a story and characters to think about and a protagonist you can actually buy. I loved it, just as I loved Hollowpoint, his first. The second is more enjoyable if you read HP and got the setup but Semiautomatic also stands on its own as a first-rate urban crime novel. Very good stuff.Can't waint for the next one.

this book was like watching paint dry. there was little to no suspense. if the author would have taken as much time developing the characters as he did over describing every little detail of rooms, desks or the elevators, maybe he would have ended up with a half way readable novel. the characters didn't evoke any emotion from the reader except maybe disinterest.