Customer Reviews

Snitch Jacket

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

That Christopher Goffard could suck me into a tale this outlandish and have me laughing my (posterior) off at the same time is a testament to his skill as a novelist. Incredibly, a debut novelist.

I'd heard that this book was published to acclaim in the UK last year, but I could never find a copy. So I was pleased to see Overlook/Rookery publish it this summer in the US. I preordered.

Goffard does not waste your reading time or book budget. His roots as a newspaper reporter are evident here. His fabrications are woven seamlessly with the real-life absurdities that surface under small headlines in the best newspapers. Research and meticulous anthropological observations underlie the story and characters. The characters -- including a barfly protagonist with a vocabulary that would shame a Harvard English prof -- are gigantic, and the noir is over-the-top. This book's the perfect vacation from life in your middle-class cubicle. In this way, the book made me think of Fight Club.

I get the comparisons to Charlie Huston, but I have to say, Goffard does this kind of book better, striking the right tone, keeping it all just believable and bringing us profound observations while we take his entertaining ride. So go ahead; press buy. You won't be sorry.

To be nominated for an Edgar, a first time writer has to have a book that offers the reader an outrageous tale filled with humor, intelligence and characters that are definitely out of the ordinary. With Snitch Jacket, author Christopher Goffard gives us a book that, in this readers opinion, ranks among the best in unconventional crime fiction replete with a couple unusual characters in the persons of Benny Bunt the consumate anti-hero, and Gus "Mad Dog" Miller - Vietnam Vet with more war stories than General Patton. The question is are the stories true or the result of a psychotic personality?

Benny, our narrator, is a 41 year old dishwasher with an extensive resume covering several incarnations, both past and present, as a meth user, barfly, cop wannabe, police informant, and runaway husband. Most of his leisure hours are spent "socializing" at a Southern California dive known as Greasy Tuesday, whose other patrons Benny occasionally rats out (for their own good) to a local detective named Munoz.

When Gus approaches Benny seeking assistance with a contract killing, the fun really begins. Not wanting to spoil your enjoyment of this little jewel I will not divulge any further plot points so if your find yourself like Oliver Twist, wanting "more please", you will have to buy Goffard's book.

Just know that if you are a fan of the dark humor of Carl Hiaasen, or a movie buff who enjoys movies like the Coen brothers Blood Simple, this book is an A-ticket to a ride your sure to enjoy.

One of the best crime novels I've ever read. Certainly the most entertaining. Think of a noir-Cheers, and you get the idea of the tone for the numerous bar scenes depicted in the book. For as accurate a picture of the underbelly of any given community this book paints, it provides a surprising amount of laughs. Yet, the story is totally engrossing, and dangerous, in true crime story fashion. It keeps you guessing until the final five pages. Yet, the story is different in a totally refreshing way. Even the choice of the "first person" puts a different twist on the typical novel. This book is highly recommended for anyone who wants to enjoy an intelligent, well told story.

Don't let the low budget, comic book-like cover fool you: Christopher Goffard is the real deal, and "Snitch Jacket" may be the sleeper of the year - an amped up, in-your-face, irreverent tale of human wreckage - the stuff J.D. Salinger would be writing were alive today. This is the story of Benny Bunt, a 40ish burned out product of drug abuse and a dysfunctional family, scraping by as a dishwasher, making only enough to keep him on booze and the occasional crystal while wasting away the hours the squalid "Greasy Tuesday", a dive bar of Dantesque calibre tucked away in the seedy hills east of LA, well off the tourist trails and Hollywood Star maps. He is also a snitch or, as the local PD prefer, a "confidential informant". And as noted on the book jacket, "you will like him." Well, yeah, kind of, but not in a way you'd like a friend, and certainly not in a way you'd like your own kid to turn out.

So Benny's life is predictably dull, dead-ended, and pretty much despicable - when into 'Tuesday' rolls Gus "Mad Dog" Miller, the beer gutted and tattooed giant, self-proclaimed Viet Nam War hero and sometime assassin. In addition to his less desirable traits, Benny is also a good listener with a near-photographic memory for mostly useless trivia, who sits spellbound as Gus regales the regulars with tales of war and murder, increasing in violence and unbelievability. They are soon inseparable in a distorted friendship that eerily reminiscent of Dustin Hoffman's creepily brilliant portrayal of "Ratso" in "Midnight Cowboy."

But what gives the talented Goffard the fifth star is the depth and complexity of not only the story line, but the character portrayals of this rich but depraved cast, and Goffard's brilliant rendering of the relationships between them. While the author could have fallen back on the trite and overused "unfairness of American society" pap here, he offers no apology nor pulpit, and simply tells his story without overdone indignation. In the process, he transcends the expected (and expertly done) violence, black humor, and an intriguing premise, and rises to a superior tale with clever twists, unexpected poignancy, and a punch-in-the-gut climax that will linger long after you've put this one back on the shelf.

If you like well-written and intelligent crime, and aren't addicted to glossy, happy people performing impossibly unlikely feats of valor, this new author's debut is a must read. And for fans of Huston, Swierczynski, McKinty, Gischler, McCarthy, or Bruen - take heart - there's a new voice on the streets you'll want to get to know.

Everything I heard and read about this book were indicators that this book would be precisely my cup of tea: Off-the-wall characters and humor, darkly comic story. Well, it IS those things, and yet I did not find this book to be as satisfying to me as, say, Cook's "47 Rules..." or MacDonald's "Head Games." And certainly I did not enjoy it nearly as much as a Swierczynski tale. This book has all of the elements that work in those books, but in "Snitch Jacket" I could feel myself standing back with the author, not really engaging in the humor or the characters, but saying oh, yes, this needed to go here or would've worked better over there. And a big part of the problem for me was the rather lazy structure of the initial chapters. The lead character, Benny, digresses in his storytelling so often and at such length that no matter how funny some of the digressions are, they serve as distractions as much as they do substantive underpinnings for the story to come. I felt the story would be just as funny with far fewer meanderings. I would take the Ken Bruen or Duane Swierczynski or even the Donald Westlake editing pen to this story and whittle it down. I do think judicious editing would have tightened both plot and pacing, made the whole thing as edgy as it was comic.

But for all my nit-picking, I can't quarrel with Goffard's originality in both character and in his own voice. He's going to be a player in crime fiction for sure.

SNITCH JACKET is Christopher Goffard's first Novel. It's a very addicting read about a Snitch named Benny Bunt in California who meets an old Vietnam Vet who goes by the name Gus "Mad Dog" Miller. They become friends after Gus moves into the local Bar, The Greasy Tuesday, that Benny frequents. Wild stories that Gus brings a long with him sends Benny on a wild ride through California that ultimately ends on a fiery note. Told like a Tarantino script, it starts at the end with Benny in custody and trying to explain his way out of a mess.

I was put on to this Author because I'd seen him compared to Charlie Huston and Ken Bruen (by far my two favorite Authors) multiple times, so I had to see if it was true and I have to say he's making strides towards them. He has some ways to go before I'd group him in with an author such as Ken Bruen, who's truely a master of Noir, but he has promise.

I look forward to hearing if Goffard has any future Novels coming out.

A few weeks ago, I was loafing in the stacks of my local library while my wife looked for some things to read. Snitch Jacket by Christopher Goffard happened to catch my eye and I decided to check it out. Finding Snitch Jacket was remarkable good fortune; it is a great novel that all fans of mystery and suspense should read.

Snitch Jacket concerns a "confidential informant" named Benny Bunt who becomes enmeshed in a sinister plot in the Los Angeles underworld. This book has colorful characters and atmosphere to spare. I lived in a California for a year, and I think that Goffard does a great job of evoking the underside of the Golden State that we don't often see in the media.

The pathetic actions of Goffard's would-be tough guys bring to mind Elmore Leonard's characters. Snitch Jacket is also very funny; many times, it had me laughing out loud. In some particularly-amusing material, Goffard pokes fun at the tabloid media and at true-crime writers. Goffard's cynical humor reminds me of Joseph Wambaugh's The Choir Boys. Finally, Goffard`s twisted plot keeps the reader guessing right up to the finish.

Though I wholeheartedly recommend Snitch Jacket, I have a few quibbles with the book. The characters, at times, respond to very serious problems in lighthearted ways that aren't entirely plausible. (Snitch Jacket resembles Carl Hiassen's work in this regard). Potential readers should also be aware that Snitch Jacket is extremely graphic; the scene in which Benny applies Preparation H just before having sex is enough to turn anyone's stomach.

I can't believe that Goffard didn't even get an Edgar Award nomination for Snitch Jacket. Let's hope that Snitch Jacket is just the start of a long career for Goffard. I can't wait to read his next book.

This is a surprise, I kept reading and thinking that it was bound to have a down moment... But it never came. A page turner until the last page. I hope to see this as a Tarantino screenplay, as promised on the back cover.

Snitch Jacket is a perfect example of what I have experienced too many times: A great start, in fact a great first-half of a book, that ends up fading fast and losing me completely. I can't even imagine how hard it is to write a good novel from beginning to end, but the problem of ending a book seems to be one that plagues many, many authors. (Grisham is probably the best example of starting fast and fading faster; I was burned so many times by him that I won't even consider reading what he writes.)

Generally speaking, I don't know if authors need to take more time in writing a book, or if they need to obtain more feedback from a variety of readers, or if they need stronger and more insightful editing, but it's frustrating for me to read a book such as Snitch Jacket, that starts off so well and is so promising, only to have it lose me due to something in the story that cuts me off from all that has come before. In this case, it was when I learned how the scars on Gus' chest and belly really got there. Bam! The door of the story was shut in my face instantly. A friend of mine had the same reaction. Neither one of us finished the book.

Having said that, I believe the writer is talented, and the first half of the book was unlike any other story I had ever read. Perhaps that's why I was both surprised and disappointed that the author ended up losing me. But since this was his first book, maybe he will be able to pull it off with his next book. I, for one, will certainly check out his next book, but I may end up doing so from a library rather than a bookstore.