The Long Firm by Jake ArnottMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
This an amazing read. Jake Arnott takes the reader deep into the seedy underbelly of 60's London... "lairy" blokes getting "aggro" in dark dives... Mad Harry, a gangster's gangster ("I'm not gay, I'm homosexual!") with a thing for the soft, young gay-boys out looking for danger, and trying to make a dishonest dollar honest... bent coppers dipping their greedy paws in for a share.
The Long Firm is a collection of five stories, with intertwining characters and new faces in each "chapter". Each chapter brings people and events to their inevitable conclusion, not predictably, but with a certainty and finality that makes one wonder if those poor souls lives were really about choices, or if their destinies were foretold long ago, and all they can do is let the "fates" do as they must, because... "our wills are not our own... we are shaped and ruled by forces we are barely capable of understanding, and virtually powerless, to change." Do we really have no control? Does society make us what we are, and when it sees the truth, turns a blind eye and deaf ear?
THE LONG FIRM was another recommendation from my dear friend, Paul D Brazill... and, I will say this once again...
You will not go wrong with one of Paul's recommendations! Thank you, Paul.
And... Thank you, Mr Arnott... for a superb story!
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Smashing review, Ronnie. Arnott himself seems to have led an interesting life-he used to be a rent boy. There was a pretty damned good BBC version of The Long Firm with Mark Strong as Harry, about five years ago, I think.
ReplyDeleteThank you very much, Paul! You know... I wondered that about Jake... the way he wrote... very interesting! I'll have to check around seems as if everything is being put on DVD these days... I wouldn't mind seeing that.
ReplyDeleteSounds very interesting, will have to check it out.
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