Country: USA
Genre: Literary/Noir
Pages: 320
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He had two weeks to go before they strapped him down and injected poison into his heart. I knew Collie was divided about it, the way he was divided about everything. A part of him would look forward to step off the big ledge.He'd been looking over it his whole life in one way or another.
You have to understand. I gave a five stars review to Tom Piccirilli's EVERY SHALLOW CUT last Winter and it was damn earnest. Now, his latest novel THE LAST KIND WORDS is longer, more layered, more complex emotionally and believe it or not, bolder. It's also very different from his 2011 powerhouse novella, which is the only variable that saves my scoring system from looking silly. I had the priviledge to read this novel which is only released on June 12 and expect it to turn heads. Many heads. I expect THE LAST KIND WORDS to win awards this year. Probably more than one. It's been my favorite read this year so far and there's a reason for that. Not only it's a great noir novel, but Piccirilli's concern while writing it went far beyond the tropes of a single genre. This is a great novel, period. You will find it dark and tough, but you don't need to be into any genres to appreciate it.
There is a plot (a damn good one) but going into THE LAST KIND WORDS, you have to understand the dynamics it's build around. It's a family story. The Rands, a family of thieves from generation to generation. Old school thieves who mastered the art of sneaking without recurring to violence. Oh and they are also all named after dog breeds, which I think it's awesome. Pinscher, Collie, Grey(houd), Mal(amute), (Air)Dale and the protagonist himself, Terrier Rand. He's coming back home after cutting the ties for five years, two weeks shy of his brother Collie's execution. His elder brother has went mad dog five years ago and killed eight people for absolutely no reason. The issue is, Collie pretends he killed seven people that night, not eight. He has information regarding other potential victims from the same unknown killer. Terrier will investigate those claims, torn in between the pain he caused by leaving and the pain Collie caused to the family.
What made THE LAST KIND WORDS larger than life is the dimension Tom Piccirilli gave to his characters. His premise was risky. A serial killer whoddunit has been done to death. But Piccirilli masterfully leaped over this potential issue by making his story about the Rands. Terrier abandonned his family for five years, thinking he was running away from thieves, from a lifestyle. But he came back to human beings, who missed him and who could've used having him around all that time. Terrier's relationship to his parents is particularly heartbreaking in its veiled conversations and the affirmation of love through symbolic gestures. I thought it was an interesting commentary on the crime genre, that the function doesn't make the individual. To have given to thieving such a small place against family issues was a bold move. This conflict is expressed within Terrier in a bone chilling scene at the end of chapter one.
There is a plot (a damn good one) but going into THE LAST KIND WORDS, you have to understand the dynamics it's build around. It's a family story. The Rands, a family of thieves from generation to generation. Old school thieves who mastered the art of sneaking without recurring to violence. Oh and they are also all named after dog breeds, which I think it's awesome. Pinscher, Collie, Grey(houd), Mal(amute), (Air)Dale and the protagonist himself, Terrier Rand. He's coming back home after cutting the ties for five years, two weeks shy of his brother Collie's execution. His elder brother has went mad dog five years ago and killed eight people for absolutely no reason. The issue is, Collie pretends he killed seven people that night, not eight. He has information regarding other potential victims from the same unknown killer. Terrier will investigate those claims, torn in between the pain he caused by leaving and the pain Collie caused to the family.
What made THE LAST KIND WORDS larger than life is the dimension Tom Piccirilli gave to his characters. His premise was risky. A serial killer whoddunit has been done to death. But Piccirilli masterfully leaped over this potential issue by making his story about the Rands. Terrier abandonned his family for five years, thinking he was running away from thieves, from a lifestyle. But he came back to human beings, who missed him and who could've used having him around all that time. Terrier's relationship to his parents is particularly heartbreaking in its veiled conversations and the affirmation of love through symbolic gestures. I thought it was an interesting commentary on the crime genre, that the function doesn't make the individual. To have given to thieving such a small place against family issues was a bold move. This conflict is expressed within Terrier in a bone chilling scene at the end of chapter one.
He showed teeth and I loathed his smile. It said that he had me in his hand, that he could make me come to him whenever he called. I'd thrown a hundred fists into that smile and I'd never hit it even once.
There is so much more to THE LAST KIND WORDS than what I can fit into a review. Piccirilli has made the neighborhood of the Rand family come alive with great characters and problems and Terrier is bouncing all over the city trying to solve issues for his family with a nagging feeling of guilt and at the same time, wrestle with his own demons. This is layered with many subplots that will keep you reading as Terrier is slowly pulling the strings on his brother's claims. Many other strange bird are flying around the Rands nest. A policeman with an Oliver Twist complex, a deadbeat boyfriend, a horny journalist, a mobster living in the shadow of his father. There is a lot going on, but it never gets derivative due to Tom Piccirilli's amazing sense of pacing. The right amount of new information comes at the right time and often through the support cast, so it binds all this people together and the most experienced readers/writers will barely notived, because they will be way too involved emotionally in the story to pick apart and find issues. On a technical standpoint, THE LAST KIND WORDS is nothing short of a tour-de-force.
While Piccirilli has his very distinctive style and themes, THE LAST KIND WORDS kept reminding me of one of my favorite novels, MYSTIC RIVER. It's imbued with the same sense of place and the same taint to the characters. To me, comparing anything to what Dennis Lehane has done is the highest compliment and Tom Picciirilli's latest novel holds up to what my favorite writer does. It's that good. Piccirilli writes crime with a perspective and a sense or urgency that nobody else has. He finds the beauty in chaos and darkness. You want to know what's even more exiting about THE LAST KIND WORDS? Word is that there's a sequel coming...
FIVE STARS