Cocktail Talk: Man On A Leash

Charles Williams, the hard-boiled, pulpy, mystery, thriller-y writer, has shown up on this blog before a few times in Cocktail Talk posts. With good reason, as he’s one of the best 1950s/60s writers in all the genres mentioned. I’m always pretty excited to track down one of his books I haven’t read – his plots are crisp, his language is entertaining and right on, and his characters aren’t afraid of a good drink. Recently, I picked up his book Man on a Leash, which is about a young-ish guy trying to track down what happened to his recently-murdered and very larger-than-life father, and then getting into all kinds of predicaments himself. And having a Bloody Mary or two (not the normal drink, really, for pulp-ish books). Which is the where the first quote below comes from. The second has nothing to do with drinks, but is just a darn sweet quote. I’ve begun quoting it, actually, every day at work.

‘It sounds a little kooky, out here in the sagebrush, but would you believe a rescue at sea?’ She glanced at her watch and stood up. ‘But I’ve got to run. If you’ll stop by when you get through here, I’ll hammer together a couple of Blood Marys and a bit of lunch and tell you about it.’

Brubaker got up and began to pace the office. ‘Jesus Christ, when I think that I could’ve been a pimp or a geek in a sideshow, biting the heads off chickens!

— Charles Williams, Man on a Leash

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Cocktail Talk: Death of a Red Heroine

It’s rare, in the mystery book genre, to find a protagonist that drinks. Oh, wait, you see that all the time. What’s really rare is a protagonist that writes poetry, or reads poetry, or reads at all, really. However, in Qiu Xiaolong’s wonderful Death of a Red Heroine, the main character, Chief Inspector Chen is a writer as well as a cop, and is always sprinkling in lines from classic Chinese poems into his conversations and thoughts. And, the mystery itself is good, while the setting and surroundings (late 80s China) are describing in a manner that’s both poetic and immersive. Add in a sidekick (Detective Yu) who’s got some sass in him and a whole host of intriguing surrounding characters (there’s even one called Overseas Chinese Lu) and intricate food descriptions and the following quote and you’ll be able to guess that I strongly suggest you read the book, for gosh sakes.

Behind him, across Zhongshan Road, stood the Peace Hotel with its black-and-red pinnacled roof. He had fantastized about spending an evening there in the jazz bar, in Wang’s company, with the musicians doing a great job with their piano, horns, and drums, and the waiters, starched napkins over their arms, serving Bloody Marys, Manhattans, Black Russians . . .

—Death of a Red Heroine, Qiu Xiaolong

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