The Winter of Frankie Machine

This book is the one I recommend the most to friends and others. All of Winslow’ books are great but this is special. This and Bull Mountain are my favorite reads of the decade.

This was my first experience with Winslow and it definitely will not be my last. I thoroughly enjoyed this novel and found it has something to offer everyone. Winslow is great at creating believable characters that sometimes seem to leap off the page. His protagonist here, Frankie Machine, a retired hit man for the mob, is still portrayed so sympathetically that the reader pulls for him much as we did for Tony Soprano... Read Full Review

How can you not like Frankie Machine? As he says, "It's a lot of work being me," and that's quite true. However, that's what makes him so attractive - he's a persnickety cook who drives to five different stores to get the exact brand of ingredients he wants for a single dish. Only the best for him. He's a man who believes that "Quality of life is about the little things - doing them well, doing them right." He's 63-years-old,... Read Full Review

THE POWER OF THE DOG and THE WINTER OF FRANKIE MACHINE have secured Don Winslow's place among the world's great crime writers. The former is epic in its influences and urgings; the latter is less ambitious but no less effective. The novel is the most pliable of forms; in his new novel Winslow's model is autobiography rather than epic, but this personal story carries larger cultural freight because Frankie is a retired Mafia... Read Full Review

If "The Power of the Dog" and "California Fire and Life" were not enough to prove the talent and versatility of Don Winslow, then this hard-hitting and intelligently plotted tale of life in the Southern California mob should put any doubts to rest. This is a no-nonsense epic of crime, of loyalties honored and trusts broken. Frankie Machine, like his creator, has serious chops. And if this isn't one of the best books of... Read Full Review