Customer Reviews

Vixen (Inspector Brant)

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

 

 

If you're a fan of intricate crime novels - arcane forensics and brainy CSI babes running around in lab coats - Ken Bruen's brand of bare knuckled police work in London's seedy southeast side is probably not your cup of, um, formaldehyde. In fact, about the only tools the rude and crude but bone-breaking-ly efficient Inspector Brant and his misfit cronies employ in reducing London's crime rate are brass knuckles and .38's. Likewise, Bruen's prose is about a subtle as a sledgehammer - raw edged stories told without apology, refreshing free of political correctness and daring to offend.

"Vixen" is another gem of the author's twisted brilliance - a simple and stripped down story wrapped around Angie, as cold and heartless a female killer to hit the pages since Caleb Carr's "Angel of Darkness". Recently released from prison, the foxy Angie seduces a pair of small time criminal brothers who are soon blowing up buildings and extorting cops. Typical of Bruen, the plot is merely a convenient background frame the banter and antics of the southeast London's eccentric police force. As expected, this is a fast moving, hard hitting drama laced with black humor and told in Bruen's unique and quirky vernacular. He may not be for everyone, but he is fresh and uninhibited - that rare writer who eschews convention and sets his own course. If you haven't discovered Ken Bruen yet, "Vixen" is as good as any a place to start.

This is a continuation of White Trilogy/Blitz series. As always, there is Bruen's precise, spare writing, which remind me just a bit of McBain, which lets you get to know the characters without excessive description. He characters are not particularly likable, but always interesting. Not as dark as his Jack Taylor books but still very well done.

In London, Desk Sergeant Doyle receives the call about the bomb at the Paradise Cinema just before the explosion. The caller tells to cop to provide $300K or more bombs will ignite. The bomb was amateurish consisting of two sticks of dynamite and a simple timer with no one hurt. The second bomb a few days later proved a bit more sophisticated but still amateurish, but the extortion demand doubled.

While the cops like crazy Detective Sergeant Brant search for the bomber, Angie James and her associates the Cross brothers keep the blitz on by raising the ante with each new explosive incident. Angie also works on recruiting disaffected cop P.C. Falls upset for not receiving a promotion. As Brant and James head towards a collision, no one knows who of these two who feel so much alike yet think so differently than most people will survive.

The macabre fascinating Angie freshens the series with her inability to comprehend in terms of right or wrong but instead she feels life is for feeling good and to do that takes her into the realm of the criminal. Readers will enjoy her cat and mouse game with the cops with tough guy Brant her only competition. The story line is a combination of a police procedural enhanced by the sociopath subplot. Ken Bruen combines that into a terrific thriller starring two adversaries and a support cast burned by contact with either of them.

Harriet Klausner

When I read VIXEN I kept thinking of the long running television police movie "NYPD Blue," which is not to say that this novel is in any way derivative, only that one work of art reminds me of another. The Vixen here is a cold-blooded murderer who will kill her partner in crime without batting an eye. The police officers are tough men's men and all too human as they use the N word to describe their black colleague and the F word to describe a gay police officer. Unfortunately some things are universal.

Mr. Bruen's sparse prose is quick and deadly. You'll be through this little prize, if you start it at take-off, before your plane lands.

Enjoy.

The Vixen is crazy as a loon, sensous as Garbo and lethal as black widow. She's a serial killer who is behind a serious of deadly explosions that have been rocking London. She's using her bombs as an attention getter and it's working. She's into extortion and she's looking for a grand pay off. However, the coppers on the Southeast London Police Squad might have a thing or two to say about that.

Detective Sergeant Brandt, Inspector Roberts, Constable Falls and Sergeant Porter Falls want to stop the bomber, but they've all got problems of their own that keep popping up in this thriller that is both fast-paced and well written. Buren never uses a twenty-five cent word when a nickel word will do, never uses more words than he has to and he nails every sentence. This is British noir written by an Irishman about policeman that are human, flawed, likable and sometimes not so likable. Mr. Bruen's characters, especially Brandt, are more real than some may care to admit. Yes, Brandt may have crossed over the line a bit, but that's exactly the kind of man you want on the trail of somebody like the Vixen. This is stay up all night reading at its finest.

The "Vixen" in the title is the name of a painting. If you have read my comments on the Southeast London crime books, you already know that I have an unhealthy attraction to the London crime underground and to Ken Bruen books specifically. They are gritty, violent and have no redeaming features. The criminals tend to be plain stupid and the Met police who try to catch them are probably more violent and criminal than the "bad guys" themselves.

I love these books, but can understand why others (especially Americans) are offended by these books. Be warned, this is another.

This book is set in South London and is great. In his last couple of books Ken Bruen has been dipping into Ireland and the United States. Those were okay books, but not of the same class as his London books. I enjoy his humor and grittiness in these books (maybe I need to feel guilty for enjoying these books, but for some reason do not). May I give you a little example of his (sick) form of humor in these books?:

Two police are investigating a report of a spousal abuse and they knock on the door. A little boy answers the door. The police say that they want to see his father. The little boy says that his father is busy beating up his mother and gets very upset when he is interrupted when doing that. Could they come back later.

I know - it is demented to enjoy that form of humor, but I do.

My second Ken Bruen book in one work week. I admit that I still like this series with one little qualm. Firt the good in that Bruens writing is still sharp and to the point which I like. His characters are interesting in a way the way they interact within the confines of the plot. And the story has a sense of humor more evident than in Blitz with the ending of the story and a part I loved where Brant takes his boss to a party full of hookers after being forced to pay a ransom. The next morning his boss wakes up next to a run down prostitute extremely hung over in clothes covered in vomit and bile. He then has to go to a crime scene wearing a suit that Puff Daddy would have rejected. Like I said Bruens books are insanely readable, the very definition of a page turner.
The only problem with the books is the characters still don't have any real pathos or interesting qualities. Brant, Falls and Nash are cool characters but they're just skimpy in a way. Still the book is entertaining without feeling silly.