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Title: Hard as Nails: A Joe Kurtz Novel by Dan Simmons ISBN: 0-312-30528-1 Publisher: St. Martin's Minotaur Pub. Date: 01 October, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.4 (5 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: Nice and Hard
Comment: Hard As Nails begins with Kurtz being shot in the head. The bullet ricochets off his skull, leaving a non trivial wound and landing Kurtz in the hospital. Following the grand tradition of tough men everywhere, Kurtz takes the macho penchant of ignoring pain to new limits after waking from his coma and escaping from the hospital. The shoot-out occurred in a dark parking garage and Kurtz did not see his assailant. He is determined to find out who tried to kill him. At the same time, he his hired by two rival mafia bosses to find a serial killer who is murdering their favorite drug dealers and users. Simmons weaves these and other plots intricately together and follows them to an explosive conclusion.
Being the third time around, Hard As Nails lacks the brutal impact of the first novel, which was the literary equivalent of a kick in the nuts. However, the series appears to be maturing. We start to see a softer side of Kurtz in this novel and greater development of him as character with a entire life's history behind him. We glimpse his past as an orphan. An old girlfriend, Rigby King, is introduced and plays a major role in this novel. There also hints of future developments (for possible new novels?), as Simmons is clearly reviving an emotional connection with Rigby as well as introducing another major crime boss, Baby Doc, which would be a welcome break from all the time spent on the Farino and Gonzaga families in the last three books.
One aspect of this novel that really shines his Simmons' impecable ability to capture the feel of a location. Simmons always takes great care to do research for his books, often traveling to locations and taking detailed notes. His skill with setting shines here, treating the city of Buffalo, NY as a character just as important as Kurtz himself. He paints Buffalo as a dying city. The march of progress has left it and its old industries behind. There are pockets of money and life that Simmons describes with real feeling and skill, but he is more concerned with the abandoned and forgotten places where low-lifes, indigents, and criminals live and work. Simmons won't do the Buffalo tourist trade any favors with this novel, but it stands as a fascinating look at a crumbling American city.
Although a fast and fun read, Hard As Nails is not Dan Simmons at his best. But it is a fine example of what Dan Simmons does best--take any genre and fulfill all its expectations with enough skill and literary prowess to make it a cut above most other books in that genre.
Rating: 4
Summary: Kurtz is back!
Comment: I recommend Dan Simmons' latest Kurtz thriller. Kurtz is one of my favorite on-the-edge-of-society people. This time he's in hospital with one hellatious headache while his respected parole officer, Peg O'Toole, lies nearby in a coma after both of them were ambushed in a parking garage. Kurtz is left wondering about the photos of an abandoned amusement park she showed him.
While Kurtz is recovering he is visited by a) an ex-military type in a wheelchair & his Vietnamese partner; b) Peg O'Toole's fiance who is a bigshot in security & c) Detectives Kemper & King from the Buffalo Police Dept.
While Det. King & Kurtz go way back to their orphanage years, there appears to be no love lost between them, or is there?
Buffalo's shady characters are back as well...the gay don Gonzaga & the female don-in-waiting Angelina F/F. Someone is slaughtering their heroin dealers & addicts, leaving globs of blood all over the place & carting off the bodies. Why?
Kurtz's side-kick Arlene is back at her desk, chain-smoking & making good money with her dot coms & in HARD AS NAILS she proves her mettle.
Rating: 5
Summary: a top-notched thriller with a very likable hero in it
Comment: this is the 3rd joe kurtz novel and it's getting better and better. i do think this series is better than lee child's jack reacher stories, 'cause it's less pretentious and more humanly functioned. the only thing that looks pretentious is kurtz driving a pinto now. that, i'd call too pretentious. dan simmons is one of most talented and very high i.q.ed writers. his versatilities are quite beyond me reach but never failed to amaze me. well, another thing in this book comes to my mind: 'high tension wires'? what are they? not the 'high voltage power lines'? there's also some noticeable eiditing errors in this book, but since i don't want to elaborate too much, i'll let you find out yourself.
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Title: Hard Freeze by Dan Simmons ISBN: 0312989482 Publisher: St. Martin's Press Pub. Date: 15 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Ilium by Dan Simmons ISBN: 0380978938 Publisher: Eos Pub. Date: 01 July, 2003 List Price(USD): $25.95 |
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Title: Hardcase by Dan Simmons ISBN: 0312980167 Publisher: St. Martin's Press Pub. Date: 19 August, 2002 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Last Car to Elysian Fields: A Novel by James Lee Burke ISBN: 0743245423 Publisher: Simon & Schuster Pub. Date: 30 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Stone Cold: A Jesse Stone Novel by Robert B. Parker ISBN: 0399150870 Publisher: Putnam Pub Group Pub. Date: 29 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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