By Chris Knopf (the Permanent Press, $26).
Grade: A
Take one hard-boiled burnout case, add an eastern Long Island
setting and a cynical sense of humor, throw in a sweetheart
of a dog and
you've got The Last Refuge. But there's plenty more to this
excellent debut novel by a Connecticut ad man.
Fiftysomething
Sam Acquillo has dropped out of life. He's given up on career
and marriage, living out his days in his boyhood
home in an as-yet ungentrified corner of Southhampton, where
he waits
for time and vodka to kill him. A former boxer with a crooked
nose, once a high-powered industrial engineer, he's a tough
guy who gives
off "don't come near" vibes to keep intimacy at bay.
The death of his next-door neighbor, a cranky old
woman he and his father before him had helped out over the years,
forces
him
to take a more active role in life. Regina Broadhurst died
when she slipped and hit her head in the bathtub, and he
winds up
as the administrator of her estate when no one else steps
up. Acquillo
soon discovers that Regina has been living rent-free on some
of the world's priciest real estate. When he tries to find
out who
actually owned her house, a hood takes a chunk out of him
as a warning to quit snooping. Which, of course, he doesn't.
The Last Refuge has some of the best characters
I've come across in a mystery in a long time, especially the
women
and the dog,
named Eddie Van Halen. Even the secondary characters' traits
seem to develop out of their natures, rather than being
applied like
a label or a mere description. And although a hard-bitten
loner isn't exactly a new idea in mysteries, Knopf manages
to make
Acquillo come across as a Chandleresque icon rather than
a stereotype.
The plot also shows real finesse, with good
writing and a fine self-deprecating sense of humor on each
page. This
is
a real
guy's book, so think Father's Day, but The
Last Refuge deserves lots
of women readers, too.
