- Paperback: 320 pages
- Publisher: Viking Press (June 1992)
- ISBN-10: 0962038911
- ISBN-13: 978-0962038914
- Product Dimensions: 17 x 10.2 x 3.3 cm
- Shipping Weight: 227 g
- Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
Enriched since 'wealth' follows by a wealth of historic detail and some evocative writing, this first novel (Thayer self-published an earlier version in 1986) brings to life the uncommon setting of '30s St. Paul, Minn., a safe haven for pimps, gamblers, bootleggers, dope smugglers and bloodthirsty gangsters of every stripe. In his popular column in the financially crumbling St. Paul Frontier News , protagonist Grover Mudd assails his city's cops, politicians and criminals--all of the forces that have brought on its moral decay. Characterized by cynical honesty and truculent wit, "Grover's Corner" alternately elicits anger, respect and amusement from the local citizenry. With the paper on its last legs, Grover and his editor, Walt Howard, mount a front-page campaign against the city's hospitality to criminals and the bloodshed in its streets. Meanwhile, the Feds come to town on the trail of some infamous crooks, among them Baby Face Nelson, Alvin Karpis, John Dillinger, Ma Barker's boys and the principal local villain, Dag Rankin. Lacking the distinctive narrative voice of the best crime fiction and with sex scenes seemingly grafted onto the story, Thayer's novel succeeds best as the story of St. Paul and of Grover Mudd. A contemporary of F. Scott Fitzgerald, in failing health as the result of wartime mustard gas, divorced and in love with a black hotel maid, an occasional opium user working for a dying paper in a decadent town, Mudd holds the reader's interest from start to finish.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Library Journal
This raw, gritty first novel hews fairly closely to the hard-boiled detective tradition, with the twist that protagonist Grover Mudd is a newspaper columnist. The journeyman journalist covers early-Thirties St. Paul, Minnesota, one of the most crime-riddled cities in the country. Against a backdrop of bank robberies, prostitution, drug deals, and money laundering, Mudd uses his columns to alert citizens to the corruption that enfolds St. Paul at all levels. Plenty of violence and some very explicit descriptions of sexual encounters will put off the squeamish, but Saint Mudd tells a realistic tale of how those courageous enough to fight back can ultimately defeat the criminal element dominating a city.
-Patricia Altner, Dept. of Defense Lib., Bolling Air Force Base, Washington, D.C.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
-Patricia Altner, Dept. of Defense Lib., Bolling Air Force Base, Washington, D.C.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Most helpful customer reviews
1.0 out of 5 stars
Poorly Written,
By
This review is from: Saint Mudd (Paperback)
I tried to wade through this book twice and couldnt bring myself to finish it. Thayer's research into St. Paul's past seems mostly credible, but his prose to me is unreadable. I even tried to listen to the book on tape and had to abandon that effort as well. I would not recommend this book.
1.0 out of 5 stars
Poorly Written,
By
This review is from: Saint Mudd (Paperback)
I tried to wade through this book twice and couldnt bring myself to finish it. Thayer's research into St. Paul's past seems mostly credible, but his prose to me is unreadable. I even tried to listen to the book on tape and had to abandon that effort as well. I would not recommend this book.
5.0 out of 5 stars
HIS NAME IS MUDD,
By A Customer
This review is from: Saint Mudd (Paperback)
...and he's one of the most unusual "heroes" in recent crime fiction. Grover Mudd is a newspaper columnist, whose "Grover's Corner" column is used to expose and hopefully eradicate the mobsters hanging out in St. Paul. Like other readers, I had no idea there was such crime in this illustrious city; Thayer's research and knowledge of the area is certainly evidenced.This book is heavily character driven, and most of the characters, even Grover, take some time to either like or dislike. Grover's relationship with the colored maid, Stormy Day, is touching and refreshing in its easiness and innocence. I could never bring myself to like Roxanne Schwartz, one of those goregous women who was a "victim" during her youth and uses that as an excuse to become an ... insatiable prostitute. The character of Nina Clifford I hated from the first time I met her. She's one of those old bags who lives in the past and thinks that just because she's St. Paul's most influential madam, it puts her above the law. And of course the law in this book is as corruptible as the gangsters. Beware, too, this book is graphic in its sexual descriptions and in its violence, but that's what this era was about. Thayer went on to write "Silent Snow" which utilizes the character of Grover Mudd; that's next on my list. Thayer has a very different style and one that in time should put him up there with James Patterson, Michael Connelly and John Sandford. RECOMMENDED.
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