“The back of Cruez’s right hand gleamed with gun oil. Crease knew that he could walk right up to the monster and shoot him in the heart and Tucco would just smile about it.”
Crease is am undercover narcotics cop whose life is falling apart, returns to the town of his childhood where his father, the sheriff, fell to disgrace. He’s been gone fifteen years and now he suddenly needs to know what happened the night his father fell.
Remember, if you are interested in this book, click the mouse on the book cover to order it from your local CLEVNET library.
TITLE:
THE FEVER KILL
WRITER:
by Tom Piccirilli
GENRE:
Noir, Thriller.
DESCRIPTORS:
Crime, Criminals, Police, Undercover Police, Sheriff, Drugs, Prostitution, Organized Crime, Revenge, Love, Desire, Greed, Mystery, Insanity, Murderers,
CHARACTERS
Crease, An undercover cop who is tainted.
Joan, Crease’s meek wife.
Stevie, Crease’s son who may also have the fever kill.
Mimi, Joan’s hard edged sister — Crease adopted some of her kids.
Tucco, A powerful vice-lord that Crease has been working for/reporting on.
Morena, Tucco’s woman who is also the only woman Crease loves . . . or wants.
Rebecca Fortlow, Once Crease’s lover, now she’s a woman who wants the money.
Jimmy Devlin, A poor schmuck who once tormented Crease but has turned out to be a loser.
Sheriff Edwards, He’d like to think he runs Hangtree but he’s gone to seed.
Mary Burke, The kidnapped girl that Crease’s father accidentially shot.
SUMMARY:
For seven years Crease brought his alcoholic father home until the last night of his life, when he admitted to Crease that he probably shot Mary Burke the day he was supposed to ransome her from the kidnappers. He had intended to steal the money himself but it all went wrong, leaving a girl dead and the money missing.
Crease was quickly shown the way out of town and he was gone for fifteen years. Now he’s returning. An undercover cop, he proved to be so good at his job because he was bent. He killed for Tucco and enjoyed the life as the drug lord’s right hand man . . . until he went after Tucco’s woman. His life, never stable to begin with, began crashing down when Morena announced she was pregnant with Crease’s child.
Tucco knows and now its only a matter of time before Crease has to face his former friend — an encounter that could spell his end. With the end of his life looming before him, Crease runs back to Hangtree to find out what really happened the night Mary Burke was killed.
APPEAL:
The story is told in third person, past tense but told strictly from Crease’s point of view. We get his thoughts and his outlook on things — such as his disdane for Jimmy Devlin’s attempt to knife him, right before he disarms the punk.
The Fever Kill is a grim noir tale — the protagonist is a bent cop who participates in criminal activities as he gets close to the drug lord Tucco. He left a wife and kid then struck up an obsessive affair with Morena, Tucco’s woman. He is not a nice guy but he does have a code of honor. He is bent but not a total criminal. But he has spent his undercover life becoming addicted to living life on the edge — the very extreme edge.
Crease is a complicated character. Most of the time even he doesn’t know why he does the thing he does. And there is the matter of the Fever kill — that fever that washes through him, sure signal that violence will soon follow. Crease is full fleshed out and many of the other characters feel real too. Piccirilli has a talent for creating memorable characters with just a few lines.
READALIKES:
If you enjoy The Fever Kill, try The Cold Spot and The Coldest Mile. Check out Piccirilli’s earlier noir novel The Midnight Road, about a Child Protective Services investigator who was revived after being dead only to find that the people around him are now dying.
I learned about Tom Piccirilli when he was writing horror full-time. He was one of my favorite horror authors — and hey, I’m following him into the thriller genre! I read A Choir of Ill Children twice and own several copies (two mass market editions with different covers and the hardcover edition with the dragonfly boy painting). If you’d like to try some smart, scary horror fiction, besides Choir, I’d recommend The Dead Letters, Headstone City, November Mourns and the Stoker Award winning The Night Class.
Comments on this entry are closed.