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cseibs's review
1.0
The most I can say for this book is that it helped to pass the time on a long train trip. Pelicanos created an eminently unlikeable protagonist and a forgettable plotline. It seems Pelicanos' idea of setting and local color involves giving turn by turn directions at least once a chapter, which I found irritating and superfluous to the story. Furthermore, I found it insulting and outrageous that Pelicanos would repeatedly use a Marine's service in Iraq as an excuse to act like a complete reprobate. There was no movement, no net gain or loss at the novel's end, and it left me with a bad taste in my mouth.
dantastic's review
4.0
When an imprisoned drug dealer hires Spero Lucas to find out who's been stealing his product, Spero takes the case. Can Spero recover the stolen weed and collect his forty percent?
The Cut is a breezy crime tale that reads as smoothly as an Elmore Leonard. Pelecanos makes Washington DC as much of a character as Leonard does with Detroit and Miami. Spero Lucas is a compelling lead, an ex-marine who works as an investigator. The drug case he's taken quickly spirals out of control. However, the case wasn't as interesting to me as Spero himself.
Spero's a complicated man and no one understands him but his woman. Or maybe I'm thinking of someone else. At any rate, I liked the idea of an Iraq war veteran who's having trouble adjusting to normal life. His tastes in food and Jamaican music further endeared him to me. The guys he goes up against are pretty well drawn as well, particularly the Holley family. Pelecanos' bad guys have relatively reasonable motivations and come off as real people rather than caricatures.
One thing I really liked was that Spero's brother is an English teacher and has his students read crime books, like Richard Stark's The Hunter and Unknown Man #89 by Elmore Leonard. That's a class I would have loved taking back in the day. Spero listening to Ernest Ranglin and King Tubby also sweetened the deal the for me.
That's about all I have to say. If I had to complain about something, it would be that I wanted the book to be about twice as long. I'll be reading more Pelecanos in the near future.
Also posted at Shelf Inflicted
The Cut is a breezy crime tale that reads as smoothly as an Elmore Leonard. Pelecanos makes Washington DC as much of a character as Leonard does with Detroit and Miami. Spero Lucas is a compelling lead, an ex-marine who works as an investigator. The drug case he's taken quickly spirals out of control. However, the case wasn't as interesting to me as Spero himself.
Spero's a complicated man and no one understands him but his woman. Or maybe I'm thinking of someone else. At any rate, I liked the idea of an Iraq war veteran who's having trouble adjusting to normal life. His tastes in food and Jamaican music further endeared him to me. The guys he goes up against are pretty well drawn as well, particularly the Holley family. Pelecanos' bad guys have relatively reasonable motivations and come off as real people rather than caricatures.
One thing I really liked was that Spero's brother is an English teacher and has his students read crime books, like Richard Stark's The Hunter and Unknown Man #89 by Elmore Leonard. That's a class I would have loved taking back in the day. Spero listening to Ernest Ranglin and King Tubby also sweetened the deal the for me.
That's about all I have to say. If I had to complain about something, it would be that I wanted the book to be about twice as long. I'll be reading more Pelecanos in the near future.
Also posted at Shelf Inflicted
librariandest's review
2.0
I think I expected something more literary, so I was disappointed by the stock characters and all the paragraphs full of boring (to me) details. Honestly, why name every street Spero takes to get from location to location? Does anyone doubt that you know the names of streets in Washington, Mr. Pelecanos? And why name every brand of every piece of clothing worn? Why name every musician Spero listens to? All of this came off as so much name dropping to me, as clunky as a paid product placement. If you took out all of these annoying, pointless details the book would've been a lot shorter and probably better.
The mystery itself wasn't bad. It surrounded a supposedly non-violent marijuana dealer who wanted Spero Lucas, a late-twenties war vet and unlicensed investigator, to track down some lost packages. During his investigation, which he conducts largely by iPhone (as we're told again and again--why not just say phone?), Spero exercises a lot, hangs out with other veterans, and beds beautiful women in a decent but emotionally empty way.
I liked the stuff about Spero being adopted by a Greek couple and being raised Greek along with other adopted siblings. The scenes with Spero and his family actually explored some interesting relationships and had a little character development. For the most part, though, Spero is your typical mass market hero: tough, troubled, and the only female characters in his world are his mother and the hot women he sleeps with.
The mystery itself wasn't bad. It surrounded a supposedly non-violent marijuana dealer who wanted Spero Lucas, a late-twenties war vet and unlicensed investigator, to track down some lost packages. During his investigation, which he conducts largely by iPhone (as we're told again and again--why not just say phone?), Spero exercises a lot, hangs out with other veterans, and beds beautiful women in a decent but emotionally empty way.
I liked the stuff about Spero being adopted by a Greek couple and being raised Greek along with other adopted siblings. The scenes with Spero and his family actually explored some interesting relationships and had a little character development. For the most part, though, Spero is your typical mass market hero: tough, troubled, and the only female characters in his world are his mother and the hot women he sleeps with.
bryce_is_a_librarian's review
4.0
George Pelecanos is arguably the only genuine optimist that crime fiction has produced.
Pelecanos's books all have the bedrock conviction that racial harmony is inevitable, there is benevolent God watching over the universe, and that goodness is the instinctual, baseline mode of most people.
This can make his fiction almost startling when compared to his contemporaries and predecessors. They're expressed more fully in novels like The Turnaround and The Sweet Forever, but they serve as the sturdy bedrock of The Cut, underscoring the potential of the novel even as it doesn't quite live up to it thanks to slow plotting, (The Double pays off on the promise in spades).
Other less rare pleasures are in the book as well, Pelecanos writes D.C. as well as a city can be written about, and no one does the fuck up anti hero better than he does.
Now bring on book three already. Damnit.
Pelecanos's books all have the bedrock conviction that racial harmony is inevitable, there is benevolent God watching over the universe, and that goodness is the instinctual, baseline mode of most people.
This can make his fiction almost startling when compared to his contemporaries and predecessors. They're expressed more fully in novels like The Turnaround and The Sweet Forever, but they serve as the sturdy bedrock of The Cut, underscoring the potential of the novel even as it doesn't quite live up to it thanks to slow plotting, (The Double pays off on the promise in spades).
Other less rare pleasures are in the book as well, Pelecanos writes D.C. as well as a city can be written about, and no one does the fuck up anti hero better than he does.
Now bring on book three already. Damnit.
johnnyb1954's review
3.0
I agree with the complaints about the overworked specific details of clothes brands, music, street names, food eaten. It was annoying. I did like the Spero, his brother, and the young student he befriended. The plot was fine and I enjoyed the book. The resolution is a let down because Spero is supposedly taking responsibility to solve it on his own but needs an unplanned turn of events to actually make it work