- Paperback: 240 pages
- Publisher: Vintage (Aug 23 1994)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0679756817
- ISBN-13: 978-0679756811
- Product Dimensions: 20.3 x 13.4 x 1.7 cm
- Shipping Weight: 204 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #458,629 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
In Vachss's seventh novel, an asassin searches for his partner in crime, a topless dancer who vanished three years ago.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
Vachss's seventh novel--and his first not to feature ``outlaw'' p.i. Burke (Sacrifice, 1991, etc.). The author's new antihero inhabits the same mean streets as Burke, but on the shadow side: Known as ``John Smith'' or ``Ghost,'' he's an uneducated contract killer--and in a voice that's so stripped-down simple that it veers close to parody, he tells the compelling, violent tale of how he tracked down a long-lost girlfriend. John and Shella first meet in a bar where she strips: ``Like blind dogs, we heard the same whistle. Recognized each other in the dark.'' The two hook up to play the ``Badger game''--a dry-hustle extortion--until John's caught and sent to prison. There, he makes an example of one ``wolf'' (``I got my thumb in his eye. Pushed it through until I felt it go all wet and sticky'') in order to serve quiet time for the next three years. Released, he begins to search for Shella even as he picks up stripper/hooker Misty, a born victim who doubles as a springboard for Vachss's usual street-moralizing (Shella won't hook so she's superior to Misty, etc.). John-- revealed as a product of child abuse and Dickensian reform schools- -travels with Misty until a lead on Shella takes him alone to Chicago. There, he hooks up with a radical Native American who introduces him to a mysterious government operative, a computer genius who asks John to kill the head of the paramilitary group of white supremacists who murdered the operative's undercover agent. In exchange, the operative will find Shella. John poses as a redneck bigot, infiltrates the group's camp, and, after much danger and death, makes his kill. He's then directed to Shella--whose surprising fate closes the story with a punch to the heart. Despite the absurdly hard-boiled prose: a swift, savage, and unexpectedly moving exploration--somewhat reminiscent of Jim Thompson--of love among the swamp lizards. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
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Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Love?,
By "netchild" (Lubbock, TX. United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Shella (Paperback)
Ghost promises to kill Shella's father. He tells her this. It is so romantic you weep when you read it. Vachss writes crisp. So sharp it cuts your mind. He creates characters with such depth they are bottomless. They are bottomless because the depths of human depravity is bottomless. You like Ghost by the end of the book. Hell, you like him at the beginning. To label him an antihero belittles his character, just as labeling him a murderer belittles his actions. It would be accurate but not accurate. He does kill. A lot. But there is no emotion in it. He is like a weapon. Neither truly good nor truly evil. Simply there. Waiting to have its sights locked and its trigger pulled. But Ghost, John, whatever his name, doesn't need anyone to justify his actions. He doesn't care about those things. All he cares about is Shella. He will go to hells without number to find her if necessary. And it is necessary. I don't know if one could call what he feels for Shella love. I don't know what it is. Love doesn't exist where he and Shella are. It never did and never will. But the closest word that describes it is love. Does love exist in hell? You'd have to ask Ghost. Perhaps that is what Vachss wants to tell a story about. Maybe he wants to show us what true love is like in true hell.
4.0 out of 5 stars
A disturbing nightmare.,
By
This review is from: Shella (Paperback)
This story, about a soulless man's obsessive search for the woman he loves, is a dark, disturbing nightmare of a book. It shows in graphic detail what this world can do to those unfortunate lost children crushed by the cruelty of the world. Recommended for readers with steely nerves.
5.0 out of 5 stars
A merciless urban tragedy,
By Scott Sweet "Music Freak" (Colorado Springs, CO) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Shella (Paperback)
With "Shella," Vachss strips the narrative down even further than in his Burke novels. The first-person delivery rivals Forrest Gump. The coverflap lays it out. Ghost is (metaphorically) an alligator; his body and skills have grown during captivity, but his soul is crippled in its youth. With "no experience of nurture or education," he becomes a bare-hands killer with no sense that lives might matter beyond their bounty. The hardback edition features a drawing of an alligator. The corners of the page show a diamond, a spade and a club...no heart. After Ghost's last prison term, he needs to find Shella, the "sole witness to his own humanity." If she's gone, Ghost loses his only evidence of hope in human connection. The plot involves no self-discovery. Other killers help him find Shella and he helps them by infiltrating a white supremacist stronghold and closing in on the leader. The events serve a cautionary theme. When Ghost (more than once) shows a steadiness and strength of hand ideal for a life-giving surgeon, it's too late for that. When Shella and Ghost reunite, it's also too late. "Shella" is a sad picture of what people become, by society's doing and by their own. Shella and Ghost weren't torn apart from each other. They were each torn apart when they met, and needed each other to become more or less whole. This is Vachss' best example of dead souls still walking around, playing their roles. An alligator has no greater destiny than One More Day...
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