Way Past Legal [Mass Market Paperback]

Norman Green (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 26, 2005

Fans of Elmore Leonard and Richard Price will find a new favourite in Norman Green for the first time in mass market. Manny's latest score left him with more money than he's ever dreamed of, but with money comes danger-from his partner, Rosey, who might get greedy, and from the Russian mobsters they stole it from. Worse, if he's busted again, he'll go back to prison for life, leaving his motherless five-year-old son, Nicky, still trapped in the foster care system. With the kind of guts born of panic and desperation, Manny grabs his son and heads for the wilds of Maine. When he discovers that the bad guys are on his trail, his impulse is, as usual, to run. But the people he's met in Maine-including the local police chief-have become unlikely friends and an unlikely surrogate family to his boy. Now they're all in danger, and it's because of him. Does Manny have what it takes to change his street-tough ways and become a real father to Nicky? And does he dare settle into a new life, putting at stake the safety of everyone he has come to love? Norman Green presents a gripping portrait of a man trying to break out of the stranglehold of a life of crime and create a future for himself and his son.

--This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Green's third novel (after Shooting Dr. Jack and The Angel of Montague Street) starts like a gritty crime yarn, told in slangy, crackling first-person prose by its tough but likable hero, an ex-con named Manny Williams. But early on, the story takes an unusual detour into something more like a coming-of-age tale. Turning the tables on his partner, Rosey, who, in a deft bait and switch, has managed to keep all the loot from a successful heist, Manny burgles his crony's cache in New York. Then he sneaks his adorable five-year-old son, Nicky, out of foster care and hits the open road. When their car breaks down, the two stop in Maine, at the home of generous strangers Louis and Eleanor, who become surrogate grandparents in short order. Trouble inevitably follows, but not before Manny has come to know and like an assortment of good-hearted locals. Ironically, one is the town sheriff, Bookman, who asks Manny to help him with a problem: his deputy, Hopkins, has a habit of beating his girlfriend, Brenda, and Bookman wants to cure him of it. Manny, of course, has reasons of his own for not getting involved, but he knows the right thing to do even if hasn't always done it in his life. As he grows attached to the people around him, he gradually learns that he can't run from trouble: "I needed to stop taking the easy way out, stop sneaking out the back window, stop running away. I always thought I was so fucking smart." That lesson is brought home to him with brutal force when his past comes back to haunt him. By breaking with formula conventions, Green creates genuine suspense and richly rewards the reader.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

*Starred Review* Writers with criminals for heroes have problems on their hands, the greatest being the question of how one makes the criminal sympathetic without seeming to side with psychopaths. Green, author of Shooting Dr. Jack (2001) and The Angel of Montague Street (2003), solves this problem by giving us a hero with a credible backstory, wry self-awareness, and a compelling problem to which he responds with heroism. Manny, who has been a "guest of the state" in Ossining, New York, a few times, narrates his story with a wonderful mix of street smarts and the kind of reflectiveness you might get if you've been sent away for a few years. Fresh out of the pen, Manny hooks up with another burglar for a million-dollar heist that goes bad in the sense that his partner in crime kills the other heisters and is after Manny (who has tricked the trickster by making off with the money). This gives Manny's story its racing pulse. The heart of the story, though, is Manny's love for his five-year-old son, trapped in the foster-care system. Can Manny pull off the heist of his life by getting his own son out of the system and running off to Maine? Tension and suspense abound as Manny tries to create a new life while his ex-partner and the cops attempt to track him down. Way past terrific. Connie Fletcher
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: HarperTorch (July 26, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060791306
• ISBN-13: 978-0060791308
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,795,446 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars refreshing character study inside a delightful thriller, June 1, 2004

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Way Past Legal (Hardcover)

Manny Williams enjoyed his vocation of master thief, but his last job left him wealthy though concerned. He and Rosario hit a small Brooklyn brokerage house expecting a small "fee", which is better than too much, but got the mother lode instead. Though they escape to Coney Island, he knows the Russian mob will be looking for him. In retirement, Manny thinks the time is right to snatch his five-year-old son Nicky out of a lousy foster care family and start over just the two of them.

The abduction goes smooth until Manny and Nicky reach Eastport, Maine, where he has car trouble. The townsfolk treat the two Williams males as if they have been long time residents as he waits for his vehicle to be repaired. However, his previous life comes to New England as his Brooklyn based enemies have a score to settle and arrive with guns firing at anyone who stand between them and Manny. Surprising even himself Manny refuses to let those angels who have come to the aid of he and Nicky get hurt even if it means his life for this small town as taught the cynic the meaning of life.

This is a refreshing character study wrapped inside a delightful thriller. The story line is a bright look at the trials and tribulations of a single father, raising (and running) with a kindergarten age child. The cast is top rate, but Manny is the focus as he learns the importance of caring for others in this small out of the way Maine town though the lesson may cost him his life.

Harriet Klausner

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ready to Make a Commitment after the First Date, July 30, 2004

By 

D. A Giacalone (NY United States) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Way Past Legal (Hardcover)

This was my introduction to Norman Green and it passed all my tests for a 5-star novel: After reading it I want to (1) read all of Green's prior work, while waiting for his next; (2) tell my friends about Norman Green and give them this book; and (3) "eyeball" rather than "merely" listen to Green's novels.

3.0 out of 5 stars Pleasant Enough, July 31, 2006

By 

M. Emrich "embo55" (Denver, Co.) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Way Past Legal (Mass Market Paperback)

Norman Green has a knack for dialogue and character development. I enjoyed all the characters of Northern Maine that comprise this novel and it's antihero Manny, but I found the plot a bit flimsy. You've got a big heist, redneck cops , Russian Mafia, and Oxycotin drug trafficking, but you put them all together and they kind of fizzle out. Yes, as I've already said the characters are great and the dialogue sharp but the plot is threadbare. I'd give Norman Green another try. He is truly talented, but this is a book that could have been a lot better had it been fleshed out.