This book written in the early ‘80s made me nostalgic for the days when it wasn’t common knowledge that the ammonium nitrate in fertilizer made for a dandy car bomb. Oh, to be that naive again!Speaking of naive...Elizabeth Waring is an analyst for the Justice Department who sifts through reports of suspicious deaths nationwide looking for indications that they may be related to the Mafia. The car bombing of a union member in California catches her attention, and she’s sent out on her first field assignment to investigate it. In a parallel story we’re introduced to the Butcher’s Boy, a nameless professional hit man in the midst of a double header in which he killed the union guy and is working on assassinating a US senator in Colorado. Circumstances conspire to suck both Elizabeth and the hit man into an on-going mob war.This was kind of a weird one. The summary makes it sound like the kind of story where Elizabeth would track down the hit man, or maybe even that the Butcher’s Boy and her would have to form an unlikely partnership to survive the mob war if it was another kind of thriller. It ends up that both of those stories happen and neither one of those stories happen. Yeah, I know. I was confused too.Instead of any kind of straight line narrative, Elizabeth and BB remain on their individual story rails in which the tracks intersect, but the trains never collide. At the end of the day it’s like the story was really about this mob war with BB in the middle of it while Elizabeth is on the outside looking in. The story zigs and zags and confounds expectations, and that should be a good thing, right? I know in the other Thomas Perry book I’ve read, Strip, that was one of the things I liked about the it.However, Strip had a large cast of characters that had their own agendas, and it felt like you were getting the scope of the action while reading. Since Butcher’s Boy features only two characters who often aren’t around when major events happen, it ends up feeling oddly disjointed and as if we’re only getting part of the story.This might have worked if I liked the two leads better. The hitman doesn’t have much of a personality by design, he’s a blank who hides in plain sight, but even his interior dialogue doesn’t tell us much about the guy and the few personality traits we get don’t make him particularly memorable. I did enjoy the details of how he went about his work and his dealing with the unwritten rules that the mob world has to abide by, but I’ve gotten similar stuff in other hitman novels that I’ve enjoyed more.Elizabeth started out with a lot of promise as a rising star in the Justice Department who still has to contend with the office sexism of the ‘80s. She seemed like the kind of smart and interesting character who could be the hero of this kind of thriller, but somewhere along the way she turned into an absolute dunce. Yeah, she’s supposed to be a rookie, but she screws up a couple of huge things in this, and it stretched credibility to the breaking point that she wouldn’t be suspended and facing some kind of review board instead of remaining on the investigation. At one point this reaches a level where she isn’t just terrible at her job, she’s pretty awful at being a decent human being, too.(view spoiler)[Her escorting the mob informant to his doom was just a comedy of errors, and after she practically hands the guy up on a plate to be murdered, she does...nothing? There’s a line where she thinks that there’s no point in hurrying after she finds his body. Uh...How about getting on the phone and sounding the alarm that two guys in a Cadillac on a desert highway in the middle of nowhere just murdered a potential federal witness? Then she doesn’t express any remorse about the guy dying on her watch, and she is far more concerned with what it means for her career. Plus, the fact that she doesn’t once consider that the Mafia’s mole might be her boss after he set her up for that just makes her seem beyond ignorant. (hide spoiler)]
An Aged 2.5 Stars Random Ramblings Within the past year I have read In the Woods, Rogue Island and now The Butcher's Boy. Each of these won the Edgar Award for best first novel. On the basis of the first two award winners, Tana French and Bruce DeSilva are now two of my favorite authors. Unfortunately, this former award winner does not leave me excited about the further novels.The writing and pacing of the book felt disjointed, slow and dated. The majority of books I read have been written the past ten year. The Butcher's Boy was written a couple of years after I was born and it certainly felt its age. Plot summary As this was a weak point in the book, my summary will be likely be equally weak. A female agent from the US Departments of Justice is following a trail of murders. In a parallel storyline, "the butcher's boy", a oddly sympathetic hitman for the mafia. After completing series of hits, he finds himself on the run. Instead of simply hiding out, he decides to take it to the mafia and fight back. The Good Our friendly neighbourhood hit man was an interesting character. For a man that spends his time blowing up, poisoning and shooting people, he is oddly sympathetic. I found myself rooting for the bad guy. It may have simply been that he was only "badish" and the people that hired him were worse. It may have been the fact that he only killed as part of his job or to protect himself. He didn't get his jollies from killing little girls or torturing boy scouts which I guess makes him a discriminating killer.While not thrilling by today's standard, the portion of the subplot where the killer was on the run was interesting. While it was not difficult for him, it was fun to watch him take down the varous mob bosses by various means. The Bad The Plot and Female Lead. For an award winner, I thought the plot was thin and poorly constructed. Realistically, the plotline with the Department of Justice Agent could have been omitted. The agent was flat, prone to serious errors and not especially bright. Her actions did nothing to further the story. I found myself scratching my head and wondering was I was being forced to read her story. This was the story's biggest downfall. Had the story focused on the hitman alone, my rating would have been at least 1-2 stars higher.Additionally, the story structure was both jerky and disconcerting. I continually found myself lost and backtracking. It did not follow the smooth and coherent structure of the modern crime novel. Final Thoughts I read this book after multiple people sang its praises. Although I did not find the story engaging this may be what I call the "star wars effect". I don't like Star Wars. I don't find it interesting in the least. Many of my friends are big fans. I have always attributed my ambivalence to the series due to the fact that I did not watch the movies as a kid. Having watched the movies for the first time while in my twenties, they didn't hold any magic and simply didn't compare to the new movies. Maybe this novel held some magic in 1983 but in 2014, the magic has faded.It is difficult to find commentary on the sex/violence/language content of book if you are interested. I make an effort to give you the information so you can make an informed decision before reading. *Disclaimer* I do not take note or count the occurrences of adult language as I read. I am simply giving approximations.Scale 1 - Lowest 5 - Highest Sex - 1 There is no sexual content. There is no love story or romantic relationships. Language - 2 There is minimal adult language. Violence - 3 There are multiple murders throughout the story. The murders are not graphic and are relatively mild compared to more recent crime novels.
What do You think about The Butcher's Boy (2003)?
This was a re-read, I first read this book back in about 1983 and it has been one that has stuck with me all these years. I read the 3rd in the series, "The Informant," a couple years ago and decided I needed to go back to the original. I was able to pick up a copy at a used book store and also got the second in the series, "Sleeping Dogs," which I will also re-read. "The Butcher's Boy" is often compared to "Day of the Jackal" which is an apt comparison. It is a cat and mouse story involving an assassin and the Justice Department agent tracking him. The second book came out about 10 years after the first and the third in about 10 more years. I don't think there will be another one but it is an outstanding series and if you like this sort of book, read them. Thomas Perry has written a lot of books and I have really liked every one of them I have read. His Jane Whitefield series is another good one -- very different from this series.
—Gail
Yes. Very much yes. "Butcher's Boy" is one of my very favourite crime novels--- witty, dark, complicated, full of feints and twists and unexpected moments. Thos. Perry's unnamed main figure, the hitman know as "the Butcher's Boy", is a fascinating and sympathetic figure--- a craftsman proud of his trade and proud of his professionalism. His main female character--- the DOJ analyst unexpectedly (and unwittingly) chasing him ---is no less well-crafted and sympathetic. It will take you three-fourths of the way through the book to figure out exactly who is after the hero and why...and the feds never quite do figure out whether there's anyone there to really pursue. A fine, fast, adrenaline-filled read...very much worth a Friday night. And you do learn a number of very helpful tricks and stratagems should you ever need to escape the mob and the feds...
—DoctorM
Happily rounding up my 3.5-star rating to 4 because of Elizabeth Waring who, despite being a woman in the man's man's world of 80s government, and proclaiming that “I'm not even a field investigator. I'm a data analyst.” still manages to be pretty kickass. Data nerds FTW!
—Mara
