a.k.a. Sheila Doyle: A Novel of Crime [Hardcover]

Pat Jordan (Author)

Book Description

Series: Otto Penzler Books | Publication Date: July 10, 2002

The action comes fast and rough in this hotly paced crime novel set in steamy South Florida, and the plot is as unpredictable as the striking, sharp-witted, and slightly over-the-hill stage actress at its center. She’s the recently divorced Sheila Mackenzie, nee Ryan, and when she meets the sometime male stripper and full-time operator Bobby Squared—or Robert Redfeather, as the Cherokee case may be—she overnight discovers inside her fortyish self a furiously passionate, daring, and driven Sheila she never knew. Call her Doyle, she soon finds herself rubbing elbows, and more, with Cuban gangsters, neo-Nazi gunrunners, Rastafarian hitmen, Italian drug dealers, and trigger-happy rednecks. She also picks up some trigger skills of her own. She needs them, too. Unwittingly she, Bobby, and Bobby’s fat, balding, and all-business partner in crime, Sol Bilstein, have become entangled in a deadly web of vengeance that could turn the private army of Cuban political exile Juan Jose Medina against them all. The ruthless Medina may never forget a face, but actress Sheila Doyle has many of them—and some talents her stage career never tested. Only now Sheila Doyle is playing for keeps and playing for real. And it could be curtains.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Transformation is the name of the game in this hard-as-nails, supercharged excursion into the dark side of south Florida, the world of schemers and dealers and anything for a price, from journalist Jordan (A False Spring, etc.). These individuals are not shy about taking what they want, and they play for keeps. Sheila Mackenzie, n‚e Ryan, a reserved, 40-ish recently divorced actress, is at loose ends. When she meets Bobby Squared, born Bobby Redfeather, a sometime stripper and full-time dealer in questionable goods, her life suddenly takes a new direction. When she moves in with him and sheds her old life, Sheila begins to take on a new personality and a wilder, tougher, more passionate self unfolds. Good at disguises and strategy, she fits right into the middle of operations with Bobby's Cherokee partner, Sol. Too bad they incur the wrath of Medina, the exiled Cuban gangster who has a long memory and bides his time to exact revenge. Sheila's cold blue eyes take it all in and give away nothing. By the end, she has killed a few people, bad guys to be sure, but they are dead. Jordan delivers local color and an atmosphere in which violence and death are commonplace among the rastas, rednecks and neo-Nazis who dwell on the edge of the swamps and obey few rules. Sol, Bobby and Sheila have their moments, but almost all the female characters are victims of one sort or another and most of the males are predators. Life on the run seems a high price to pay for the illusion of freedom.1)
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Fortysomething Sheila MacKenzie is divorced and living in Ft. Lauderdale. Her last acting job ended abruptly when her costar in the soft-core flick blurred the line between simulated sex and the real thing. Sheila's ready to get on with her life when she hops into the bed and the life of Bobby Squared. Bobby distanced himself from his own past a few years back when he was Robert Redfeather, fresh off the reservation, so he knows a little about reinventing oneself. Bobby is a player in the Florida crime scene who delivers stuff--guns, drugs, people--for Sol, a portly ex-con who fashions himself as a minor-league Meyer Lansky. Soon Sheila is a featured player in Bobby's production, and her costars are Cuban freedom fighters, Rastafarian assassins, domestic neo-Nazi terrorists, and drug smugglers. Sheila, Bobby, and Sol eventually alienate one of their partners, and it's only Sheila's acting ability that can free them from the street-imposed death sentence. Author Jordan excels at depicting Sheila's metamorphosis from a terrified divorcee into a confident and focused person. Exciting and thought-provoking. Wes Lukowsky
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Carroll & Graf (July 10, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786710268
• ISBN-13: 978-0786710263
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,229,414 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Gritty 'caper' story. Sheila comes into her own, September 30, 2002

By 

booksforabuck "BooksForABuck" (Long Beach, CA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: a.k.a. Sheila Doyle: A Novel of Crime (Hardcover)

While celebrating her divorce, Sheila Doyle falls for Bobby Roberts, a male stripper who changes her life. With his instructions, she transforms herself from an 40-something ex-actress into a hard-bodied, sexy, blonde player. Together Sheila, Bobby, and minor Jewish gangster Sol Billstein smuggle money, run guns, and look for the illegal angle to make a few bucks. With the added intelligence that Sheila brings to the group, their potential appears unlimited.

Things turn rough when the Bobby and Sheila anger a Cuban exile. What had been a game becomes a death-defying struggle for survival.

Author Pat Jordan's smooth prose convincingly portrays the biggoted and appearance-dominated world of the underworld in Florida. Sheila's transformation, and her gradual ascendency toward dominance in the three-person team, is both interesting and unexpected.

Although many readers will be offended by the language that Jordan puts into his characters dialogue (slurs of racial and sexual orientation), to me this usage feels authentic rather than forced. A few editing glitches distract somewhat, and Sol's drug subplot toward the end of the novel adds little to the theme and detracts from the immediacy of the message.

Recommended for fans of 'caper' fiction.

4.0 out of 5 stars Gritty tale of south Florida, September 22, 2002

By 

Sandra E. Herron "Book Reviewer" (Florida) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: a.k.a. Sheila Doyle: A Novel of Crime (Hardcover)

Pat Jordan writes with a very visual style. I could see the numerous places the characters went, feel the heat of the sun or the cool of the night breeze. I could taste the succulent food ordered at restaurants. I could hear the characters speak, even their particular accents. Sol, himself, being "Nathan Detroit in gold chains." There's no doubt the author knows Florida, but he didn't try to impress me with that knowledge, he just used it as another character in this play.

I enjoyed the author's fragmented style of writing, much like a narrator telling a story. I enjoyed the amount of time he took with descriptions of people and places, not overdone, illustrations of the written plot. However, I wish that some of the story had been tightened up a bit, because I found myself wondering when he was going to get to the point. It was fun being on the ride, but eventually, you gotta have somewhere to land. When he did get to the end, the resolution was a bit vague, sort of a disappointment after the way the author had shared so many details along the way.

Through all the ups and downs, I can tell you that ultimately, Bobby and Sheila, and even Sol, all find some peace with their world. The three see justice served in their own individual ways. Maybe they even find love. As Sheila would say, "There's no reason not to."