Prince of Thieves by Chuck Hogan
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Frequently, I am the one to tell Sarah that I
have discovered a new mystery/thriller writer I like, so when she asked me if I had read Chuck Hogan’s new book, I quickly said "yeah, I love Chuck Logan, and his new one about the ex-Twin Cities cop taking down some terrorists in North Dakota is great." She took little time to point out "it's Hogan, with an "H" like the golfer." I'd never heard of Chuck Hogan or his two earlier novels. Sarah was right-on with this one. Hogan's (that's with an "H") new book Prince of Thieves is a great discovery. This is a dark story of four Charlestown, Mass. Irish guys who, like their fathers before them, have followed a path in and out of Walpole in the pursuit of the ever-bigger armed robbery. The "brains," Doug MacRay, turns out to have a sentimental side that takes the story from a drug and alcohol-fueled crime saga to an interesting cross-cultural love story. Hogan has a flair for dialogue and metaphor that rivals even that of the late, great George V. Higgins; and the comparison is apt as Hogan does Boston in this book as well as Higgins did it in all of his. Maybe I'm just a sucker for a difficult love relationship, maybe I have spent too much time in Boston, maybe I am too much of a Red Sox fan, or maybe I am just taken with a writer who can make almost stereotypical low-lifes so real you kind of want them to make it... which of course they don't. Review by Bruce Jacobs, August 19, 2004 |