Run

Although Burdon Lane's job is somewhat out of the mainstream--he's a gun runner, trafficking in illegal firearms--his anxieties mirror those of many of his middle aged contemporaries: even when things seem to be going well, he harbors fears of being derailed, of having the life he's so carefully built slip through his fingers. Thus, he initially questions his business partners when they ask him to join them on a supposed "milk run" to New York City. Despite his misgivings (the operation, involving two volatile street gangs, doesn't seem to require his presence), Lane agrees to participate, assured by his companions that nothing will go wrong. But things do go wrong, and in spectacular fashion. As it turns out, the operation is a cover for the assassination of prominent civil rights leader Gideon Parks, gunned down during a political rally. Realizing that he is among those who have been left to take the fall for the crime, Lane runs for his life, vowing to get to the truth and punish those responsible. The remainder of the novel details his struggles to stay alive against formidable odds, as he uncovers the hidden subtext of his world, a place where nothing is as it seems, and alliances are broken and forged with alarming speed. Winter's first novel is a bleak, yet strangely optimistic thriller, an accomplished performance that delves deep into the heart and mind of its main protagonist, a criminal whose brutal mores and ambitions mask his all too human vulnerabilities. Lane's first person narrative, blunt and terse, convincingly conveys the surprising depth and variety of his emotions: his matter-of-fact attitude toward his strange career, his love for his deceased mother, the passion he feels for his girlfriend, and the anger he feels at the duplicity he endures. It also creates a sense of immediacy, one that becomes more noticeable as the book hurtles towards its bloody but inevitable conclusion. RUN seems to reflect the influence of several writers and filmmakers. Traces of Donald Westlake/Richard Stark, James Ellroy, Jim Carroll, William Goldman, Donald Goines, Quentin Tarantino and John Woo are evident, all filtered through Winter's unique sensibilities. As such, the book transcends those influences. Winter delivers an explosive tale of loyalty and betrayal, one which simultaneously honors and elevates the thriller genre. Powerful, compelling, and expertly crafted, Run is a singular accomplishment. We're talking serious crime fiction here folks, the kind that grabs you and doesn't let go. Ignore it at your own peril.

Absolutely sensational! The pace is breath-taking and the detail about the gunrunning business is fascinating (it reads like the detail Tom Clancy usually puts in his books). Several readers have commented on the lack of character development. I disagree--the central character, Burdon Lane, ultimately comes across as a very moral man in an immoral business. Some of the set pieces in the book will live in your memory after reading it (e.g., a tense escape from a Harlem building, a violence-filled wedding, etc.). I read a lot of thrillers and this is one of the best I can recall in the last few years.

I could not better this excellent review by Kate Muir, as it distills the book to it's coreWith gunrunners, drug dealers, and a political assassination, lawyer Douglas E. Winter's powerful first novel is no courtroom drama. Kate Muir finds out why :-Shooting back Run by Douglas E. Winter Being trapped in an office with a pile of dry legal briefs tends to induce diversionary activity, which is why so many American lawyers have been forced to write popular novels on the side. Here comes another one: Douglas E. Winter and his speedy thriller, Run. The lawyer-turned-novelist, a late developer at 49, has a beard and a black turtleneck so we know he's not just another suit. And he has earned the right to jettison his tie: Run is a powerful all-nighter of a novel about a bunch of illegal arms dealers whose $2 million "milk run" between D.C. and New York becomes entangled in a political assassination and a bloodbath that Caligula would be proud of. Plots within plots open up like a set of Russian dolls, as the hero-of-sorts runs to save his life. Much of his book is unquotable in a family newspaper. Indeed, one American reviewer wrote that the book "reads like it was written from a prison cell" rather than a law office. It's an effect Winter sought out. "There is a commercial way of rendering dialogue in thrillers which is in fact not as spoken. So instead I listened to people talking here in the city." Dealing with white gunrunners who are forced to work alongside black drug dealers, Run pits gangsters v gangstas, and much of the dialogue also echoes the urban rhythms of hip-hop, pretty ambitious for a white guy from Granite City, Illinois. It is Winter's fine collection of rap music that let him pull it off. "Rap is often very angry, and I understand that, and Run is a very angry book. I wanted to borrow a little bit of that aesthetic, that feeling, that honesty. But I wonder now sometimes what people think when they read the book. There's a lot of very vicious, very nasty language right out of the gutter . . ." In some ways, though, the plot is appropriately thrilling. Run is a rant against guns: their power and the way Americans put them on a pedestal. The narrator, Burdon Lane, is a gunrunner whose cover is legitimate arms dealing and his description of various weapons borders on the lascivious. Winter, a former army officer in the reserves, understands this: "As a child growing up in America you could not help but be attracted to the romanticisation of the gunslinger that takes place: westerns, secret agents, etc. I wanted to embrace that element because the book is about the culture of guns and the whole romantic appeal of the weapon as the solution, as a signifier of power or cool." So although the book begins with the Second Amendment, "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed", it actually goes out of its way to show what happens when a bullet hits a body. Thus there ar

Douglas E. Winter's RUN is indeed one of the best books so far this year. It took me 20 minutes to catch my breath after reading it. Winter's writing style takes on the speed of an action adventure movie--but faster. This book is the kind of action macho men dream about. Yet, more than that it is a superb story with masterful writing that anyone will appreciate. From page one, Winter pulls you into his story and never lets you go. His characters are fascinating, and though they seem superhuman, you can easily put yourself in their shoes. This novel, like so many great ones, is about the human condition--ugly as it may be. It is a cultural litmus test that digs into where we are as a society, and where we are going in the next millennium. Will our society of guns and violence and racism follow us into the 21st century, or will we see the light? You will laugh reading this book, and you may even cry, but most of all you'll feel exhilarated and you'll want to read it again. It's fun, it's fast, it tells a great story and has a wonderful meaning. So, chalk this one up on your grocery list of must-have books for your library.

Douglas Winter updates and deconstructs - nearly vivisects - the chiaroscuro of the classic noir style. The protagonist is gunrunner along Interstate 95. When a big shipment to a NYC gang goes haywire, an adrenaline surge propels the book - through the unraveling of scheme after scheme - to the necropolis of its cataclysmic conclusion. For good measure, a baroque quantity of minutia concerning firearms is peppered throughout. Suspenseful, stark, and startling, 'Run' includes the key hallmarks of the noir genre: taut, rapid-fire prose and an overarching existential nihilism. Like Highsmith's 'The Talented Mr. Ripley,' Goodis's 'Down There,' and Thompson's 'The Grifters,' Winter's neo-noir deserves to be put on screen, but get a copy of the book first - copies are disappearing faster than a pack of smokes at an AA meeting.