Bill James latest book,
"First Fix Your Alibi" is a labyrinth of lameness which takes its
readers on an abysmal journey to drossy town.
James managed to make
having sex with a 19-year-old college woman boring. The love life of Denise,
the college lady and one of the main policemen, Harpur was as interesting as watching
the 10-72 Philadelphia 76ers pregame show. Each and every character was more
drab then the next and the story-line was as intriguing as shopping for toilet
tissue.
The one good thing
about this novel was that it was less than a 190 pages, granted a 188 pages too
much, but it was a fast read. “First Fix Your Alibi” uses the basic plot of the
1951 Alfred Hitchcock movie, “Strangers On a Train,” which James makes clear.
Drug lord, Mansel
Shale sets out to avenge the shooting death of his wife Naomi and son Laurent.
A possible police cover-up to the murders may be one reason the killers have
never been found, and when all is said and done the final outcome of the story
is a deleterious display of dismay.
I give this new novel
one and a half stars as opposed to minus five stars simple because I learned a
new word, the above; deleterious which is an adjective meaning harmful to body
and mind. I also gave it an extra half star because some of the stuff I couldn’t
understand was not the authors fault because “First Fix Your Alibi” is a
follow-up to a crime series of books featuring the detectives Desmond Iles and
Harpur.
