Wednesday, March 27, 2013

An Iceman at the Pen & Pencil; Hugo Hamilton's eight honourable gobshites

Detectives Beyond Borders took the evening off to attend a wine tasting at his club. But, always on the job, I snagged a movie tie-in edition from a crime writer/fellow club member, one of whose books has been made into a movie that will be in theaters in May.

The author is Anthony Bruno, the book is The Iceman, the stars include Michael Shannon, Winona Ryder, and Ray Liotta, and you can watch a trailer here.

When not imbibing Hollywood glamour at third hand, I began reading Hugo Hamilton's 1997 novel Headbanger. The book is a bit literary in its opening pages, by which I mean that Hamilton strains to draw parallels among crooks, cops, and civilians. But it's hard not to love a novel that includes a bit like the following:
"`Embibing Emporium' was another Dublin idiosyncrasy that sprang to mind. As a Garda, Coyne took an interest in the precision of language, and one of these days he would walk straight into that pub, slap a concise Oxford down on the bar counter and say: you pack of eight honourable gobshites, you can't even fucking spell. Look, it's I, not E. Imbibing."
© Peter Rozovsky 2013 

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4 Comments:

Blogger seana graham said...

I noticed this book in our 'to be shelved' area today. Without looking closer, I thought it was true crime.

March 28, 2013  
Blogger Peter Rozovsky said...

Seana, do you mean The Iceman? It is true crime, though Anthony Bruno has written a number of crime novels. It might be worthwhile to shelve this one both in true crime and in crime fiction.

March 28, 2013  
Blogger seana graham said...

Yes, that's what I originally thought. I suppose the movie is fairly fictionalized, though, so it will be hard to figure out just where to put it. Oh, well, it will probably be fine to just put it out where people can see the movie cover.

March 28, 2013  
Blogger Peter Rozovsky said...

I haven't looked at the book yet, but I suspect that, given the author's background as a novelist, it will appeal to crime fiction readers. Shelve it with crime fiction, with true crime, with movie tie-ins, with new books, on table up front where people can see it ... It's nice to think that a book might appeal to various audiences. Nice, too, to support a fellow member of the P&P.

March 28, 2013  

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