Pulp In A Hard Place

Picture, if you will, a good bad guy. Not just a guy who's good at being bad, but an honest to goodness bad guy, a bad guy who retains, through all his badness, a certain set of good principles. A Lone Ranger in a black hat.

Charlie Swift is that bad guy. Damn good at being very bad (some would even say evil, but to me that's in the eye of the beholder), he also has a few scruples. In other words, through murder and mayhem and then-some, Charlie Swift (usually) errs on the right side of badness.

Gun MonkeysGood bad Charlie Swift also happens to be the hero (beholder; remember?) in Victor Gischler's literally kickass debut, Gun Monkeys (Dell $6.99), a tall tale of lowest life that goes well beyond Good and Evil, all in a dastardly place calledÖ

Orlando. Oh, don't worry, this is not the Orlando of Universal soldier boys and mouthy little Mouseketeers, but the Orlando that brings such square things to life - the mobbed-up, shaken down, run around town hustle that illuminates the seamy side of the Sunshine State's number one tourist distraction. That Orlando.

Yep, there's a whole lotta loot in that thar sprawl, and Stan's the man who's got his filthy fingers into most of it. Charlie Swift is Stan's alpha thug, boss of the monkey cage, the old man's pet name for the murderous back room at O'Malley's, the gin joint that fronts for all that dark world's money and muscle.

Problem is Stan's oh-so ancien regime and his steady way of doing shady business has made him somewhat of an underachiever. That's what Beggar Johnson and the Miami Crew believe anyway, and they're willing and wiling to put Stan out to pasture to prove it.

Swift, as you might've guessed is loyal to his bitter hard core, and no Slick Willie's gonna get between him and his father figure. Or his livelihood. Nor are the Feds. And to illustrate his ruthless allegiance, he's ready, able and eager to kill everyone who tries.

By the end of it all, this new-angled bed-check Charlie pretty much succeeds in doing so - no qualms about it.

Gun Monkeys has more bloodspill per page than a spree killer's date book, and nearly all of it is necessarily gratuitous. At many moments, Swift could simply step away from the fray, save his own thick skin. He's even got a dame for a reason. But Swift's the kinda fast cat who steps up and into rather than away, regardless of any hokey come what may.

A shrink might say Swift is gift-wrapped in issues. That his extremely misguided sense of bloody loyalty masks a deep-seeded set of Daddy problems, or, worse, questions of identity. (Zeus forbid.) I say the rollick and the roll (and the delirious dementia) makes Swift - and Gun Monkeys - severely entertaining. And like Leonard, with whom this tome should most often be compared, Gischler's not afraid to let a bad guy come out good.

Think of Gun Monkeys as Tarantino if scripted by Hiaasen, Sir Elmore as directed by the old John Woo, Peckinpah in plaid. Cinematic pulp in a hard place. From the slo-mo poot to the sass-paced swoop, this is, er, killer reading. Some bloody fun, indeed.

Note: This article was first published online in the now defunct Bully Magazine. Supplied with immense thanks to Ken Wohlrob.

 

 

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