Cam Reynolds has a simple job. Collect the
money owed to his boss, Tommy, Jr. He is the son of the legendary and now
deceased mob boss, Tom Colcetti. The kid may not value him as much as his
father did, but the kid is keeping the family business going and Cam still has
a job. Though it is not the job he wants as he feels that he should have moved
up by now. Junior has also made some changes that Cam does not approve of and
it looks like he won’t be moving upwards anytime soon. At forty two years old
he should be doing better than still having to go after guys to collect debts.
It is the job Cam has and he is
very good at it. Cam has a reputation for violently collecting monies owed
hence his nickname of “Crusher.” He has such a reputation that he rarely has to
get physical these days which are a good thing as the years are beginning to
take a toll. The latest dead beat who owes is a guy by the name of
Gomez. The man owes 10K and tried to run after getting a wakeup call
from Cam who happened to be sitting outside the guy’s place when he made the call.
After trying to run and being caught, some trunk therapy followed by quiet
contemplation of his circumstances should assist Gomez with his motivation to
pay up.
Unfortunately, things go wrong
and years of loyal service mean nothing. Gomez was connected and Cam got the
order to lay off after he had already started trunk therapy. Crusher screwed up
and now he is a dead man on the run. At least he thinks he has a sexually
willing travel companion in the mysterious woman he met in a Seattle area bar who
is willing to help him get out of town in exchange for a fee.
Author Michael Pool quickly pulls the reader into a classic noir
style set up where the antihero is on the run because things finally went
wrong. One little thing starts the collapsing domino chain and things escalate
rapidly in the wrong direction. Unlike his short story collection that I reviewed
back in January, New
Alleys For Nothing Men: Crime and Noir Stories, where some characters
are a bit more introspective, Debt Crusher is pretty much a straightforward
violent crime fiction novella. In some of those stories, the violence is
chained up and it takes time to be released. In this novella, the violence is a
major character and barely under control from the first page. Debt
Crusher quickly becomes one violent confrontation after another as Cam
does what it takes to not only honor his nickname, but to stay alive. If you
prefer animals in your stories, a read clean of graphic language, and the
violence to be off the page, this is most definitely not the read for you.
Debt
Crusher: A Novella
Michael
Pool
All
Due Respect Books (Imprint of Down & Out Books)
February
2018
ASIN#:
B079R7ZJGN
eBook
(also available in paperback format)
117
Pages
$4.99
Copy provide by the author for my use to read and review.
Kevin R. Tipple ©2018
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