Customer Reviews

Street Raised

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Pearce is one of hardboiled's BEST! This novel is a monster! Dynamic, authentic [and HONEST], vivid to a degree where the words fly off the page like bullets and tears, it is an "astonishing" showcase of his awe-inducing talent as a writer. A powerful work of imagnative truth, filled with its own poetry, every page of this richly-detailed work seethes and pluses. This is a major work! The last time a hardboiled debut impressed me this much was Will Beal's L. A. Rex.

There is a peculiar synergy between noir, crime fiction, and horror. It wouldn't surprise me, were I to analyze it more thoroughly, that John D. MacDonald, Donald Westlake, and Robert Parker tales of hard boiled modern day knights, treacherous scoundrels, and sloe-eyed vamps and the assorted skullduggery sum and sundry found themselves enmeshed within had as much or more to do with my becoming a horror writer than the bloody works of King or Barker.

Nonetheless, some crime fiction cuts a hell of a lot closer to the bone than others, a good example being the raw and somewhat horrific exploits of narcoleptic PI Mark Genevich in The Little Sleep and No Sleep Till Wonderland by Paul Tremblay.

More recently, I got into a book called Street Raised by Pearce Hansen. This novel is a beautiful and horrifying proposition. Hansen's writing evokes an almost paralyzing aura of authenticity. His description of prison life and the life of a brutal con after he's been turned back out onto the street, or "raised," following a stint of hard time, is neither for the weak-kneed nor the prudish. Hansen's depiction of human predatory wildlife is sharp, yet neither glorifies nor condemns its subject. More like he's simply clicked on the camera and the secret microphone and allows nature to take its course. All told, this novel in following the grim and all too human exploits of an eclectic cast of thugs, murderous drug dealers, kamikaze bouncers, phone psychics with hearts of gold, and, most prominently, the freshly raised Speedy as that urban prowler returns to his Bay area hunting grounds, contains more bloody darkness in one pinky than ten times its weight in typical category horror fare. I'm one jaded fella when it comes to shocks in literature, and I was gratified at how many moments Street Raised raised my hackles or caused me to reread a paragraph because I couldn't quite accept that I'd seen what I'd seen. Hansen's delivery is nothing like Cormac McCarthy's, but this novel possessed a few visceral and nasty surprises that put it in the same territory of viciousness and macabre grandeur as Blood Meridian.

There is something of Michael Shea's street beat poetics in Hansen's rhythmic prose, and maybe a tab or two of whatever psychedelic Cody Goodfellow mixes into his morning joe, and maybe even a slight hint of what it would look like if Wambaugh stopped giving a rat's ass about anyone else in the entire world, hitched up his suspenders, spit into his cupped palms, and then grabbed an axe and started in with blood in his eye.

Too often addicts and criminals get homogenized into stock characters, with tired cliches and played-out scenes (ala hookers with gold hearts, one last shot at redemption, etc.). Not in Street Raised. I uploaded this on my Kindle on a whim, because I saw Hansen's name in the same noir circles I run in, and am a sucker for San Francisco-based stories (or across the bay in Oakland). I liked the description, thought I'd be getting a decent read. I wasn't expecting this though. The world of Speedy and Co., the hoodrats and dealers, the crooks and tough guys, the depiction of life on the street is spot-on. The writing zips along, never drags, and Hansen's portrayal of Oakland and beyond and its urchins and castoffs is at once loving and nostalgic and unflinchingly honest. Street Raised is not about easy answers, because this world has only tough questions, and the morality here is graded on a curve. Intentions matter to guys like Speedy, because sometimes it's all they got. Speedy proves a unique and lovable hero you can root for (which when you read this book, and you should, you'll see is one tough trick to pull off). I lived on these streets for a long time. Redemption is possible from there, but it's one crooked path out. Speedy embarks on it, and Pearce Hansen mines humanity from the profoundly wounded in a world very few know. In short, he gets it right.

Pearce Hansen is my best discovery yet on Allan Guthrie's Criminal-E blog, [...]

This is a terrific read about young Speedy who is released from Pelican Bay State Prison in North California and returns to East Bay, Oakland. Here Speedy hooks back up with his brother Little Willy and best mate Fat Bob and sets out to settle old scores and to make some new ones.

This is a story about life on the street, drugs, crime and simply surviving. The characters may not be people you'd want to take home to meet your mother but Pearce writes his tale so well that you can sympathise with these three guys and even like them as they battle with the daily challenges of their lives. They all show their soft sides, but more often than not their choices are aggressive and violent. There are terrific scenes throughout the book that give you real insight into each of the characters.

The other great feature about Hansen's story is the significant role that East Bay plays. On multiple occasions I was searching Google Maps to get a closer look at the locations that Hansen was describing (which are thousands of miles from my home in Australia). A great read from an author I had never heard of before. I will certainly be looking out for more of his work.

Having recently been released from prison in upstate California, Speedy hitchhikes home to Oakland to reunite with his brother, Little Willy, and best friend, Fat Bob. Unfortunately, during Speedy's time away Little Willy has fallen into a life of crime and crack, and Fat Bob's working as a bouncer in some of the area's rougher establishments. Not exactly what Speedy hoped to find.

When two of the group's longtime friends get rolled by a Mexican gang - tied up in chains and thrown into a river...alive - Speedy and the crew know things have to be put right and set out to make it so. Of course things aren't that straightforward.

Along the way Speedy gets distracted by a woman, becomes the target of a racist gang, and the obsession of a very disturbed (and disturbing) killer. Matters are further complicated when the same cop who sent Speedy up the first time starts sniffing around the crew with ill intent. Taking place over the course of one tense, action-packed week, Street Raised by Pearce Hansen is a truly remarkable read.

Perhaps the most stunning thing about Street Raised is its duality: from the reader's point of view, the violent, seedy version of the East Bay the story unfolds in is completely alien to anything they've most likely come to imagine it as. Yet, to Speedy and his friends - and enemies - that human wasteland is as normal as it gets; it's simply home. So much so, there are times when the book flows so smoothly, the characters so well defined and dialog coming so naturally, you almost forget there is a story being told, instead feeling like you're peeking in on the lives of real people. And then gears get shifted, violently, and you are reminded of the harsh reality that is Speedy's world, and that it's a brutal one you want nothing to do with...outside of a book that is.

That Hansen manages to make something both so vividly foreign and familiar at the same time, and with such ease, is truly an amazing bit of writing.

Pearce Hansen has some how combined a fable, a gritty street crime story and coming of age tale seamlessly into one novel. It is deep and richly textured with characters that will live with me for some time to come. Along with the human and feline characters there stands the East Bay as a living breathing organism. Hansen knows his turf and writes with clear eyed passion about it. My only word of caution is, it took me a bit to fall in love with this book, after a chapter or two though I fell hard. Damn fine writing.

Street Raised is one of those books that keeps you flipping pages until the wild, adrenaline-soaked, skidding-in-broadside ending! I loved it and was a royal pain to anyone who DARED speak to me while my eyes were glued to its pages. Seriously. If you like a great plot, colorful characters, lots of action, a touch of romance, and a fresh, streetwise tone then give Pearce Hansen a try! You won't be disappointed. I can't wait to read more.

Speedy's one compelling character, I tell you. I published a slew of Speedy stories in our first run of PLOTS WITH GUNS, and I love Hansen's crazy world in STREET RAISED. Speedy gets out of prison and dives right into trouble.

This is a good one, and I'm happy to see it have a second life on Kindle.

"He pulled the straight shooter from his lips, torturing himself with anticipation as he watched a tiny tendril of crack smoke waver from the mouth end of the pipe. The scent of it excited him more than the sight of a naked woman as he watched the crack smoke dissipate into the air, a little piece of Heaven wasted." -- from Street Raised

Few crime fiction writers have actually lived through the same events they put their characters through. For most, writing noir is an opportunity to experience illegal behaviors from a safe distance, things they would never dare to replicate because they don't have to. Pearce Hansen is the rare breed: he has run the same streets and struggled through the same precarious existence his characters do. For Hansen, writing is a kind of catharsis: it helps keep the nightmares away.

From the bio included with Street Raised, we learn that Hansen was "functionally homeless at a young age," and that he did a lot of self-educating through reading a variety of books: "he counts Thucydides & Spillane, Dostoevski & H.P. Lovecraft, Dickens & Nietzsche among his dear dead friends."

Street Raised is his debut novel, but it is not the work of a beginner. Hansen has been honing craft in short-fiction circles (including the now-defunct Plots With Guns) for ten years, and it shows. The story of Speedy and the aftermath of his release from Pelican Bay State Prison (far too much happens for me to even attempt a summary) displays a sure hand that knows what a good story requires: relatable characters, detailed settings, a clearly defined arc, and a satisfying ending.

It is in the spaces between, though, where Hansen's experiences and innate knack for storytelling shine through: There is no distancing from these people; we get up close and personal with their ways of life. Street Raised is filled with situations that could only be described by one who has seen them happen up close. That immediacy translates onto the page, resulting in at least one character who is thoroughly disturbing. (If you thought Begbie from Trainspotting was troubled, just spend a few minutes with Ghost.)

But make no mistake, Street Raised is not a memoir; that doesn't suit Hansen's needs here at all. He simply brings the rawness, the grit, and the upfront humanity to a genre that has, over time, gotten far too glossy. Hansen's unflinching (and completely engrossing) take will change how you feel about other crime writers. Kudos to Allan Guthrie and PointBlank Press for offering a forum to a powerful new voice, and to Hansen for writing what is without a doubt the most affecting crime novel of the year.

Street Raised by Pearce Hansen is a basic revenge drama set in the grimly depicted environment of the East Bay area in California in the early 1980s. Oakland street hood, Speedy, gets released from a prison in the northern part of the state, shoeless. He ventures home, encountering a few adventures and picking up a kitten along the way. In a long opening chapter, we see the complex mix of violence and compassion that makes up the protagonist's character. Once home, Speedy reunites with his younger brother, Willy, who's become a crack addict during Speedy's long incarceration.

Willy's wretched descent prompts Speedy to enlist a friend, Fat Bob, who bounces at seedy bars, to liberate Willy from his addiction and squalid residence. The three then conspire to vanquish a gang of Mexicans who recently killed two other friends in brutal fashion. These Mexicans are sitting on a pile of money too, so there's profit as well as revenge motivating this action. Stealing from criminals is essentially a victimless crime, or at least one that makes it easier for the reader to root for Speedy and his gang. Despite Speedy's inherently criminal nature, he has a desire to get off the streets and live a conventional life, one in which he can take care of his kitten and Carmel, a woman he falls in love with. Other encounters with street characters inhibit his goal. Violence and tragedy ensues, much of it grisly, along with a deliciously graphic tour of Oakland.

The Oakland setting often steals the show but this is Speedy's story. A nasty fellow portrayed heroically, larger than life. He almost instantly attracts enmity and admiration from other characters, such as the creepy and underutilized Ghost, and his lover, Carmel. The unlikely quickness of these bonds could have worked had it not been for the novel's slow pace. The sheer volume of back story and reflection of so many characters diluted the inherent and delightful viciousness of the story.

The pace also suffered from the frequency and irrelevancy of many authorial intrusions. An extreme example is when Speedy and Carmel are holed up in motel, trying to evade a gang chasing them. It's a tense situation but for some reason the action is interrupted with several paragraphs describing what's on television. The surprisingly high number of proofing errors puzzled me considering a much briefer version of this book was published over five years ago.

Street Raised was a frustrating read for me. It was just way too long. It's unfortunate because there is entertainment value here, particularly the comprehensive and uncompromising depiction of Oakland, which was often surreally riveting, like a mural. As in the following:

***

The apartment itself was a den of skinheads and bootwomen, at least a dozen lounging about with beers and cigarettes in their hands. Butts and empty bottles and cans littered the floor; decks and longboards stood lined against the wall. The walls were festooned with flyers for punk shows, numberless out-of-date banners for past hardcore gigs around the Bay, for local bands like Fang and Urban Assault, Bad Posture or Flipper. There were holes punched in the walls, which were covered with graffiti, mainly three-legged swastikas, racist comments, spray painted obscenities and declarations such as `Bay Area Skinz Rule!' A bootwoman with a lit cigarette dangling from her mouth was cooking food bank spaghetti at the kitchenette in the far back corner; an overflowing garbage can stood next to her.

***

The aura exuded by such passages is the book's biggest strength, just as Oakland is its best character. I liked how the author didn't hold back on the graphic violence, which was never gratuitous. Within Street Raised there is a gritty jewel of a novel that needs to come out, a rough diamond that needs a great deal of cutting and a significant amount of polishing to bring out its shine.