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booklvrkat's review against another edition
5.0
A bouncer, stripper, hooker, some mob guys, feds and of course, a whole LOT of guns. Moses MacGuire didn't know what was coming the day Kelly called for help, but he went to her rescue anyways. In walks Cass with a whole different story of what's going down and the ball rolls downhill faster from there. This is a fast paced, keep you on the edge of your seat, great story.
Off the beaten track for what I normally read, I was quite surprised. I'm definitely reading the next story.
Off the beaten track for what I normally read, I was quite surprised. I'm definitely reading the next story.
laplaine's review
2.0
Had high hopes given how fondly others had rated this work, after reading I prefer Charlie Huston to Josh Stallings. And the use of IP address to track down a key part of the story was very factually incorrect.
ianayris's review against another edition
5.0
Blimey. Where to start? I'd heard great things about Josh Stallings and his debut novel, BEAUTIFUL, NAKED & DEAD. Great things. And when I eventually got round to reading it, I realised why.
BEAUTIFUL, NAKED & DEAD is narrated by the protagonist - Moses McGuire - battle-scarred veteran of the Beirut streets of the late seventies, now a bouncer in an LA strip club, with a penchant for drugs, alcohol, and lap dances.
One you could take home to your mum, ladies.
Added to this, Moses has almost no sense of humour, is so dour he called almost be Scottish (apologies to my Scottish friends, there) and spends much of the book not caring whether he lives or dies.
When we first meet Moses, he's not in the best of places . . .
'As an adult I have found that a barrel in your mouth forces you to pause, take a moment, ask that all important question. How did my life get this fucked? If I don?t need anyone, why am I so lonely? At least I like to think it was that deep, fact was I had a bone numbing hangover, a throbbing head and a fur covered tongue. The gun was on my dresser and if I had any aspirin they were all the way in the bathroom.
Thumbing back the hammer of my snub nose Smith & Wesson .38, it clicked into place. Three pounds of pressure on the trigger would drop the hammer onto the primer, igniting the 4.5 grains of smokeless gunpowder. The resulting explosion would drive 158 grains of lead at 1085 feet per second out of the barrel, plowing up through my pallet, through my brain and out the back of my skull. Sure, it seems like a lot of complex engineering just to end one life, but it was the simplest thing I could come up with at the time. Idiot. All I had to do was hang around lon enough and people would line up to do the job for me.'
As a reader, I like to be able to emotionally invest in a character. Even if the character doesn't care about themselves, I need to care. And I cared about Moses from the very first. You see, Stallings has this way of writing, this brutally stunning way with words that rips a character right open in front of you - shows you it all - blood dripping, heart beating, the darkness aflame. What you get when you peer into the spaces between the terse words of Moses McGuire is the sort of man who will throw himself in front of a cannon to save those he loves.
Indeed, he spends much of the book doing so.
The heart that beats within Moses McGuire is strong is strong enough to beat for a thousand broken people. This, people is not the pantomime heroics of a Jack Reacher.
Moses McGuire is the real deal.
The book itself rips along at a breakneck speed, taking in the seedy side of LA Raymond Chandler could only dream of putting into words. Stallings is much closer to a James M.Cain than a Raymond Chandler, in my opinion, and his gritty evocation of the seedy side of the LA underbelly beats Chandler's brilliant one liners hands down, as far as I am concerned.
Since I have started taking my own writing seriously, I find it very hard to read a book without that little editor in me thinking 'why did he use that word' or 'that doesn't make sense' or 'it would have been so much better if . . .' etc. I'm forever tripping up on misused or overused words, plot holes, rubbish descriptors, weak characters, etc. In most books, I find something. In some, loads. In BEAUTIFUL, NAKED & DEAD, I found nothing.
If the days of our lives moved along on wheels of justice, Moses McGuire would be the leader of the free world, and Josh Stallings would be its poet laureate.
BEAUTIFUL, NAKED & DEAD is brutal and it is magnificent.
And you need to read it.
NOW.
BEAUTIFUL, NAKED & DEAD is narrated by the protagonist - Moses McGuire - battle-scarred veteran of the Beirut streets of the late seventies, now a bouncer in an LA strip club, with a penchant for drugs, alcohol, and lap dances.
One you could take home to your mum, ladies.
Added to this, Moses has almost no sense of humour, is so dour he called almost be Scottish (apologies to my Scottish friends, there) and spends much of the book not caring whether he lives or dies.
When we first meet Moses, he's not in the best of places . . .
'As an adult I have found that a barrel in your mouth forces you to pause, take a moment, ask that all important question. How did my life get this fucked? If I don?t need anyone, why am I so lonely? At least I like to think it was that deep, fact was I had a bone numbing hangover, a throbbing head and a fur covered tongue. The gun was on my dresser and if I had any aspirin they were all the way in the bathroom.
Thumbing back the hammer of my snub nose Smith & Wesson .38, it clicked into place. Three pounds of pressure on the trigger would drop the hammer onto the primer, igniting the 4.5 grains of smokeless gunpowder. The resulting explosion would drive 158 grains of lead at 1085 feet per second out of the barrel, plowing up through my pallet, through my brain and out the back of my skull. Sure, it seems like a lot of complex engineering just to end one life, but it was the simplest thing I could come up with at the time. Idiot. All I had to do was hang around lon enough and people would line up to do the job for me.'
As a reader, I like to be able to emotionally invest in a character. Even if the character doesn't care about themselves, I need to care. And I cared about Moses from the very first. You see, Stallings has this way of writing, this brutally stunning way with words that rips a character right open in front of you - shows you it all - blood dripping, heart beating, the darkness aflame. What you get when you peer into the spaces between the terse words of Moses McGuire is the sort of man who will throw himself in front of a cannon to save those he loves.
Indeed, he spends much of the book doing so.
The heart that beats within Moses McGuire is strong is strong enough to beat for a thousand broken people. This, people is not the pantomime heroics of a Jack Reacher.
Moses McGuire is the real deal.
The book itself rips along at a breakneck speed, taking in the seedy side of LA Raymond Chandler could only dream of putting into words. Stallings is much closer to a James M.Cain than a Raymond Chandler, in my opinion, and his gritty evocation of the seedy side of the LA underbelly beats Chandler's brilliant one liners hands down, as far as I am concerned.
Since I have started taking my own writing seriously, I find it very hard to read a book without that little editor in me thinking 'why did he use that word' or 'that doesn't make sense' or 'it would have been so much better if . . .' etc. I'm forever tripping up on misused or overused words, plot holes, rubbish descriptors, weak characters, etc. In most books, I find something. In some, loads. In BEAUTIFUL, NAKED & DEAD, I found nothing.
If the days of our lives moved along on wheels of justice, Moses McGuire would be the leader of the free world, and Josh Stallings would be its poet laureate.
BEAUTIFUL, NAKED & DEAD is brutal and it is magnificent.
And you need to read it.
NOW.
ctgt's review against another edition
4.0
I tossed the nasty plastic gun to the big boy and watched them drive away, wondering what the hell was wrong with the youth of today. Hell, when I was their age, I never would have let some old fuck get the drop on me.
Stallings has been on my radar for a couple of years now and I'm finally getting around to reading this first Moses McGuire book. This is the type of story where there are no good guys, you have Moses
I was a ship without a rudder, and a questionable moral compass to guide me
I hated computers, they made me feel stupid and old. I was an analogue man living in a digital age
and a few other characters who have a redeeming quality or two and then you have the bottom feeders. Two bit hoods, local mob and crooked cops.
In between drinking and contemplating suicide, Moses works at the local strip club as a bouncer and finds a couple of toughs trying to shake down some of the girls.(See above quote) He heads to the local mob boss, Don the Pope Gallico to make sure he's not stepping on any toes before he rousts the guys.
The Pope;
These Armenian pricks have some balls, huh? If it was ten years ago, I'd just take them off the count and call it a day. New York wants us to make peace. They're trying to strike a deal with the Russians. This is the golden age of mergers, huh kid?
and
Now this crap in my territory. If it's sanctioned, bodies got to drop. Let a man shit on your lawn, he'll be screwing your wife by nightfall.
Moses has a strange sort of big brother relationship(with unrealized hopes of more)with Kelly, a waitress from the club and after receiving a call from her and later discovering what happened to her, he decides his mission in life is to right those wrongs done to her.
Booze, sex, violence and drugs fuel this story that moved at a great clip and introduced some great new characters. I'll definitely be checking out more of this series. Recommended for crime or thuglit lovers.
A shower, a cup of coffee and some food in that order, and death to anyone who tried to stop me.
Stallings has been on my radar for a couple of years now and I'm finally getting around to reading this first Moses McGuire book. This is the type of story where there are no good guys, you have Moses
I was a ship without a rudder, and a questionable moral compass to guide me
I hated computers, they made me feel stupid and old. I was an analogue man living in a digital age
and a few other characters who have a redeeming quality or two and then you have the bottom feeders. Two bit hoods, local mob and crooked cops.
In between drinking and contemplating suicide, Moses works at the local strip club as a bouncer and finds a couple of toughs trying to shake down some of the girls.(See above quote) He heads to the local mob boss, Don the Pope Gallico to make sure he's not stepping on any toes before he rousts the guys.
The Pope;
These Armenian pricks have some balls, huh? If it was ten years ago, I'd just take them off the count and call it a day. New York wants us to make peace. They're trying to strike a deal with the Russians. This is the golden age of mergers, huh kid?
and
Now this crap in my territory. If it's sanctioned, bodies got to drop. Let a man shit on your lawn, he'll be screwing your wife by nightfall.
Moses has a strange sort of big brother relationship(with unrealized hopes of more)with Kelly, a waitress from the club and after receiving a call from her and later discovering what happened to her, he decides his mission in life is to right those wrongs done to her.
Booze, sex, violence and drugs fuel this story that moved at a great clip and introduced some great new characters. I'll definitely be checking out more of this series. Recommended for crime or thuglit lovers.
A shower, a cup of coffee and some food in that order, and death to anyone who tried to stop me.
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