The First Quarry: Quarry

I love Lawrence Block's Hit Man series featuring John Keller. For something completely different (but structurally similar), try Max Allan Collins' Quarry series. Both Quarry and Keller receive their assassination assignments through intermediaries and then adapt to circumstances on the ground. Quarry, however, is no stamp collector. He's a Vietnam vet approached by an intermediary for some serious wet work. He's young, feisty and not in the habit of taking prisoners. The First Quarry tells of his initial recruitment and his handling of a case in Iowa City, where he is asked to kill an arrogant, philandering creative writing professor. The time is 1970 and the tight toreador pants illustrated on the cover are straight out of a key scene in the novel. The professor has made a nasty set of mistakes. In addition to hitting on his students and being serially unfaithful to his wife, he has recently become involved with the daughter of a Chicago mob boss. When he's not in bed with her (or sprawled across the living room furniture), he's eliciting information from her concerning her father, information which he plans to use in a non-fiction novel. The mob boss wants him erased and he also wants his manuscript destroyed. As Quarry pursues his mission he encounters a PI hired by the professor's wife, then a pair of black crooks from Chicago whose boss is contending with the previously mentioned mob boss for control of drug turf. What's an assassin to do? Hint: not leave loose ends. Along the way he has some serious sexual encounters, eats a serious number of slim jims and twinkies and makes serious use of an assortment of weapons. If your taste runs to pulpy, sexy, violent fare, this is a don't miss. Collins is an old pro and having lived in Iowa himself he knows how to make it scary. Highly recommended.

Max Collins' "The First Quarry" is hardcore noir at its best! Kudos to "Hard Case Crime" for publishing some of most outstanding hard-boiled crime novels on the market today. Hard Case recreates the spirit of the pulp fiction of the 1940s and '50s. The covers feature original art done in pulp style by artists such as Robert McGinnis and Glen Orbik. The collection includes both hard to find books from the pulp era and new novels. There are seven novels in the author's "Quarry series," which precede this one. I wish Hard Case would republish the earlier books as I would like to read them in order, and the prices for the original publications are sky-high. Fortunately for me, "The First Quarry" is a good place to start, as this is really a prequel to the later books and concerns professional hit man Quarry's first job. It also contains fascinating background material about him. Quarry, and that's the only name we are given for our protagonist, is contacted by a mysterious man, the very suave Broker, who offers him a job with his "team" - an "unusual money-making opportunity." The Broker, a sort of middle man in the murder business, had researched Quarry and knows his bio backwards and forwards, including info about his recent stint in Vietnam as a sniper, and his failed marriage. When Quarry returned from the war he found his wife in "flagrante delicto" with a mechanic. He walked out on his wife, and the mechanic, subsequently, had a very serious accident. Anyway, the money is good, Quarry's a pro at the work - after all, he is being offered big bucks for what he did in Nam for free - and he is at a low point in his life. So, of course, he accepts. Usually the jobs involve a two man team - one man gets the necessary information through "established surveillance techniques." The second man makes the kill - a "surgical strike without any collateral damage." However, on this first job, Quarry is to work alone. This is a test run, so to speak, and earns him a fifty thousand dollar advance. Not only is he to eliminate the target, a libidinous college professor, but he must find and destroy some documents in the soon-to-be victim's possession. The professor makes a habit of sleeping with his students and as Quarry watches, the girls who parade in and out of the house make for a 3 ring circus. It also makes it very difficult for Quarry to get his quarry alone to do the dirty deed. As the history behind this complicated kill becomes apparent, I became so hooked that I read the novel in one sitting. Just couldn't put it down. There are many layers to be uncovered here, surprising x-factors, and much action, violence and sex...so be forewarned. I was totally amazed by the denouement. In contrast to the lurid subject matter, the novel contains some terrific humor. The sarcastic Quarry runs a wry inner dialogue which can be really funny. His obsession with music made me laugh also. "The First Quarry" was originally published as "The Broker" in 197

I love when the prolific Max Allan Collins writes an original mystery or crime novel, as opposed to the many movie novelization/tie-in books he's been doing the past several years. Not that those tie-in books are bad (they aren't), but when writing his own stories and using his own characters, he's the best. Take my word for it and look for some of his "Nolan", "Mallory", or "Quarry" titles (most out of print, alas, but easy enough to find with a little resourcefulness on the computer), as well as diverse titles like "The Titanic Murders", "Strip for Murder", and "A Killing in Comics" (all still in print). My first three examples are part of the "hardboiled" school of mystery/thriller, and the others are more straight-up mysteries, but not without some toughness. Mr. Collins even writes decent "cozy" mysteries in conjunction with his wife, Barbara Collins, under the name Barbara Allan. "Antiques Roadkill" is a good one from that group. And there just isn't time right now to go into Mr. Collins' award-winning "Nate Heller" series of historical mysteries, but those are wonderful, too. Anyway, enough background. Thanks to paperback publisher "Hard Case Crime", there's now a venue for Mr. Collins to trot out some of his past series characters who've been underutilized of late, due to a limited market for "tough" stories. "The First Quarry" is the latest entry in his cult-favorite "Quarry" series, about a professional hit man. This one's a prequel to the other books in the series, concerning Quarry's first assignment from his mysterious and stylish boss, known simply as The Broker. Here Quarry (that's all we know him as) is given the task of killing a college professor who's making trouble for a Chicago mob boss, because he's writing a book about the mob boss and bedding the boss' fetching and rebellious daughter. A pretty good premise, huh? Soon complications ensue, confrontations abound, and we even get broadsided by a surprise or two. The 200 pages or so fly by. Just be warned, engrossing or not, this is hardboiled stuff. You know how some reviews say things like "the book has everything, a little violence, a little sex, something for everyone"? Well, "The First Quarry" has a LOT of violence and a LOT of sex and makes no apologies. Hard Case Crime's mission, after all, is to deliver truly tough, non-PC tales of crime and mystery, and that's exactly what's delivered here. And, reading the story, you can tell Mr. Collins enjoyed working without constraints as he delivered the tough, involving story his publisher wanted. And, just so you know, Quarry is a pretty interesting character to boot, kind of funny and sarcastic, and only violent when he needs to be. But when he needs to be, watch out. Thriller fans shouldn't pass this one up.

In my opinion, the lowest form of fiction writing is the novelization, followed by the "shared world" genre (e.g., Star Trek novels). For the writer, it is principally a mercenary act, one motivated by the easy sales associated with a movie or TV series and requiring a minimal amount of creativity; after all, the characters and setting are already provided, if not the plot itself. For the reader, no real imagination is required: why imagine what a character looks or sounds like when you already have one given to you? The reason for this minor rant is Max Allan Collins, who has made a living off such books. Normally, this would give me a negative view of the writer (though many decent authors have done this type of writing), but he has also written his own works as well. One such series features the assassin Quarry. I'd never read any of the Quarry books before, but the most recent one was still a good place to start: The First Quarry deals with the hitman's first paid job. Quarry fits into the same mold of characters that is most notably depicted by Donald Westlake/Richard Stark's Parker: the cool professional who has little in the way of emotions or conscience. Quarry is not quite the stoic that Parker is, but he comes close. A sniper just returning from Vietnam (the story takes place in December 1970), Quarry has been hired to kill a professor. It's his first job working for the mysterious middleman known as The Broker, who provides a level of insulation between client and killer. What should be an easy enough task is complicated by a second task that's required: the professor is working on a manuscript that must be destroyed. And though Quarry would like to avoid collateral damage, the professor is usually in the company of a shapely coed. It's just after Christmas, and in the small college town that the professor works, there are so few people that Quarry will have encounters with both the professor and people associated with him. All of which makes an easy job all the tougher. Like most of the novels in the Hard Case Crime series of books, this novel is short and tersely written, reminiscent of the paperback mysteries of the 1950s and 1960s, the type of novels that authors like Lawrence Block, John MacDonald and Donald Westlake got their starts with. I typically enjoy that lean style of writing (I'm a fan of all those authors), and Collins does a first-rate job with this book. So the lesson is: even if the author writes potboiler novelizations, that doesn't mean he can't write other, better books as well. It may not always be the case, but with Collins, it is.

Crime and suspense novelist Max Allan Collins has been writing about a professional hitman codenamed Quarry for forty years. I picked up the first book back in my teens and fell in love with the hard-hitting sparse style and the no-nonsense approach the author has with the character. Quarry, real name unknown, served in Vietnam and came home to find his wife in bed with someone else. Rather than kill his wife, Quarry killed the guy by kicking the jack out from under the car he was working on. After the trial and the decision to get him off the front page because he was a returning vet, Quarry got recruited and codenamed by a man he knew only as the Broker. In 2006, Hard Case Crime books gave readers the last book in the series. It was the first new Quarry novel in years. Not only was the book a success, but it created a demand for more Quarry novels and it reignited Collins's passion for the character. Unfortunately, there was that whole business about it being the "last" Quarry novel. Thankfully, Collins decided to take us back to the other end of the spectrum and deliver THE FIRST QUARRY to Hard Case Crime. The novel details the first actual hit-for-hire that Quarry accepted from the Broker. The time is 1970. The Vietnam War still rages. Long hair and bell bottoms are still in fashion. Civil Rights movements still fill the news and the streets. No one has a cell phone. And the Mafia still has the toughest crooks on the street. That last becomes important as the novel progresses. In the beginning, Quarry is assigned to observe and kill a university professor who's committing adultery every chance he gets. With free love still in the air and AIDS a thing of the future, the professor gets a lot of chances. In fact, his dance card stays so full that Quarry has trouble figuring out a time to punch the guy's dance card once and for all. I love Collins's first-person narrative in the novel. Quarry is a stone killer even at the outset of his career, but he's packing a lot more one-liners and biting sarcasm this time out. I found myself chuckling and laughing out loud as Collins's showed Quarry responding to an unexpected situation/threat or unleashing a poignant piece of reflection on people and society. I could tell Collins was just having a blast while writing this novel. And he had fun making Quarry's life difficult, which made the read even more entertaining for me. Every time Quarry thinks he's got a lock on the hit and has a time to take advantage of, a new twist occurs (or a man steps into the room with a pistol - and old noir standby that Raymond Chandler often espoused to beginning writers). I enjoyed watching Quarry scramble like a broken field runner as he had to deal with other women, a crooked private eye looking to make money on a blackmail scheme, a pair of African-American crime hitters, and the Mafia. The novel is a short read and I consumed it in a couple sittings. The pacing and dialogue just make it impo