All Due Respect Issue #2 (19 page)

At page one, paragraph one, Clay is about to make love to his sexy girlfriend Ella. It’s two thirty in the morning. Just as Clay and Ella turn off the lights and reach for each other, the doorbell rings. Much more interested in the lovely Ella than anything that could possibly be behind the door, Clay at first ignores the bell in the hope that the person will go away. But he finally does answer and finds Billy-Billy Cantell, a stuttering junkie who’s part of that same criminal enterprise as Clay, except that he’s so much less important that the two rarely run in the same circles.

Billy-Billy is in trouble—the kind that involves dead bodies and frame-ups and a potentially nasty and profit-threatening police presence in the lives of Clay and his boss. To help his boss, to whom Clay is utterly loyal, Clay must help Billy-Billy out of his jam and, at the same time, find and eliminate whoever is framing the drug addict for murder and jeopardizing the organization—the so-called “Cutie.” To that end, Clay acts as an investigator for the remainder of the book, and his efforts to find and neutralize this Cutie take him all over town and all over New York society. Along the way, the reader learns more about Clay’s background and how he ended up in his job. By the end of the book, he has to make many hard decisions about the kind of life he wants to lead, decisions that affect his relationship with Ella.

His ultimate decision both shocks and makes perfect sense, and brings the story to complete and very cold, dark end. Again, just what I like in a novel.

The Malfeasance Occasional: Girl Trouble
ed. by Clare Toohey

Reviewed by Chris Rhatigan

Modern crime fiction tends to be a mostly male affair. (Just look at the table of contents of this magazine.)

Not only are there few female writers in the genre, but there are far fewer stories
about
women.

Enter
Girl Trouble
, an anthology from the people behind
Criminal Element
. Fourteen stories based on an interesting, open-ended prompt by a formidable cast of authors.

My favorite of the bunch is “Mad Women” by Patti Abbott. It has all the hallmarks of an Abbott story—the lyrical voice, the fluid dialogue, the thoroughly imagined characters. She also excels at crafting detailed period pieces and demonstrating subtle, destructive sexism—both of which are on display here. This story is about Eve Moran, a compulsive shoplifter, and Abbott does a fine job creating Eve’s interior life.

Here’s just one of many excellent passages: “There were always grim-faced men in charge of her, she thought again. Men who guided her around by the elbow, steering her like an unwieldy ship into port. Men who were ashamed of what she’d done—at their association with her.”

Hilary Davidson has a strong entry with “The Barnacle.” Jess is involved with criminal Bobby Torres. When the police come knocking, Jess dutifully covers for him. But it doesn’t take much for Jess to figure out that he’s an all-around shit stain. This one struck me as a mini-novel—I wanted to find out more about Jess and her association with the underworld.

Brendan DuBois is a veteran of
Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine
and
Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine
. His story, “Her Haunted House,” is about a writer who unearths some skeletons from her past. DuBois is a pro’s pro—this is a finely tuned, perfectly paced piece that offers a complete view of a complicated character. I would expect nothing less from him.

Compared to the
Beat to a Pulp
or
Thuglit
anthologies,
Girl Trouble
is lighter fare in terms of content. That said, the introduction of mystery, speculative, and horror elements only serve to make the collection stronger. Each of these stories is well developed and highly enjoyable.