From Publishers Weekly
The second in what Zeltserman calls his bad-ass out of prison trilogy, though less compelling than its predecessor, Small Crimes, is superior to his by-the-numbers Bill Shannon series (Bad Thoughts, etc.). In the nicely gritty opening section, South Boston thug Kyle Nevin, just out of prison after an eight-year stretch, has a long list of scores to settle, headed by his old boss, Red Mahoney, who he believes betrayed him. Nevin wastes little time before busting heads and jumping into the sack with a saleswoman with an appetite for bad boys. Hoping to solve his money problems with a kidnapping, Nevin persuades his brother to join him on condition that the victim not be harmed. Things head south rapidly after the child turns out to be a hemophiliac and dies after a tooth is extracted to be sent to the parents, and a treacherous middleman snatches the $2 million ransom. A slide into broad parody at the end doesn't do the forceful beginning justice. (Oct.)
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Review
"A doom-laden crime story that not only makes merry with the justice system, but also satirizes those bottom feeders in the publishing industry who would sign Osama bin Laden to a six-figure contract for his memoirs, if only they could figure out which cave to send their lawyers into. If there's any other young writer out there who does crime noir better than Zeltserman, I don't even want to know... I'd say Zeltserman can't top Pariah for its sheer diabolical inventiveness, but he probably will. And given that the corrupting vision of his work is so powerful, I ought to know better than to read the next novel he writes. But I probably will anyway." -- Maureen Corrigan Washington Post
"Pariah is the perfect pitch of reality, history crime, celebrity, plagiarism, and sheer astounding writing... If every writer has one great book in them, then Dave can rest easy" -- Ken Bruen
"Mean like bad whiskey and sophisticated like good scotch, Pariah is a rare find and a scorching read" -- Cortright McMeel
"This is a masterpiece" -- Seymour Shubin
"This fusion of hardboiled and bitter satire is brand new territory for noir and I suspect that it will be one of the most talked about novels of 2009" -- Ed Gorman
"This is a book that anyone with even the slightest interest in crime or thriller genres simply must get their hands on, as it's bound to have a huge impact on you" -- The Bookbag
"Small Crimes got a lot of attention for Dave Zeltserman in 2008. This year, Pariah should get even more. If you like hardboiled noir, this book's for you. ..(Pariah) is is fast, furious, and funny. If you have any interest in tough-guy noir, you'll want to get hold of this one as soon as you can" -- Bill Crider's Pop Culture Magazine.com
"For those who prefer the darker slice of life, Pariah will keep you glued to its pages. The chain reaction of Kyle Nevin's release from prison on the world around him is the stuff of nuclear explosions. Violent, sexual and relentless, there are no holds barred anywhere in this wonderful launch into evil. The meek beware ... be-very-ware" -- Charlie Stella
"White-knuckle ride... a cracking piece of hard-boiled noir... different kinds of venality are put wittily under the microscope as the book rattles along to its terrific conclusion Metro Its noir, its satire, and its Boston that you don't see on Cheers. Nicely done follow-up to SMALL CRIMES." -- BookBitch USA
"For readers looking for edgy crime fiction, PARIAH fills the bill." -- Booklist, USA
"Dave Zeltserman's Pariah is my pick for crime novel of the year. Tough, relentless, and packed with blunt force trauma... Like the late noir king Jim Thompson, and contemporary crime lords Jason Starr, Allan Guthrie, and Ken Bruen, Zeltserman takes readers on an uneasy ride inside the mind of a homicidal maniac. The story storms, pummels and stomps its way to a nasty ending, but it's the amoral, ruthless voice of Kyle that gives the book such outstanding quality. Pariah is a real winner." -- Hardfeelings blog USA
"Pariah is a suspense novel at its very best with a protagonist who is far, far over on the other side of the law. Zeltserman has outdone himself with this depiction of a near-psychopathic personality that is driven by its own strange set of moral principles. The portrayal rings too true." -- John A. Broussard
"I Love a Mystery blog, USA Pariah is all I know of bliss and lament. Bliss at reading a superb novel and lament at knowing that Dave Zeltserman has now raised the bar so high, we're screwed." -- Ken Bruen
"Best mystery of the year? Naaah -- crime writing is so diverse that handing out prizes is beside the point. But we can say this: If you like your crime so hard-boiled you need to bring a chainsaw to breakfast, if you like your morbidity wrapped in a witty and satirical package, if you like your noir (or neo-noir, okay) so black that the pages feel sooty -- then Dave Zeltserman is tops." -- B&N.com
"...just think about Dave Zeltserman, and what a fine addition to the local literary scene he's become Boston Globe Zeltserman's talents as a noir writer rise above the genre's conventions...Pariah is a page-turner, even more so than his earlier novel, Small Crimes Boston Globe Clear crisp prose; fearless portrait of amorality; smart plotting" -- Ed Siegel Boston Globe
About the Author
Dave Zeltserman lives in the Boston area with his wife Judy; is a die-hard Patriots and Red Sox fan; and when he's not writing crime fiction, he spends his time working on his black belt in Kung Fu.
From The Washington Post
From The Washington Post's Book World/washingtonpost.com Reviewed by by Maureen Corrigan What a sick puppy of a writer Dave Zeltserman is! I didn't think a suspense story could get any more dark and twisted than Zeltserman's pulp masterpiece of last year, "Small Crimes." In that nasty little immorality tale, a crooked ex-cop bent on redemption gets released from prison and finds out that nobody -- not his ex-wife, not his young daughters, not even his elderly parents -- wants him back. The kicker is that they're right. By the end of "Small Crimes," I was wrung out thanks to the ingeniousness of Zeltserman's nonstop plot twists and the stark meanness of his universe. Now comes "Pariah," a doozy of a doom-laden crime story that not only makes merry with the justice system, but also satirizes those bottom feeders in the publishing industry who would sign Osama bin Laden to a six-figure contract for his memoirs, if only they could figure out which cave to send their lawyers into. If there's any other young writer out there who does crime noir better than Zeltserman, I don't even want to know. As it is, I can barely handle reading him without altogether losing whatever faith I've got left in humanity. The antihero of this latest excursion into the underside is Kyle Nevin, a former heavyweight in the South Boston Irish mob. Eight years earlier, Kyle was set up by his former boss, Red Mahoney, to be murdered during a big bank heist; but fate smiled on Kyle, and another guy took the fatal bullet instead. Now, just released from eight years in the slammer, Kyle is out for revenge, sniffing out Mahoney the way a half-starved bloodhound would catch the scent of an underdone Big Mac. As is required in any work of crime noir worth its grit, we readers see the world through Kyle's bloodshot eyes. And here lies Zeltserman's particular brilliance: As a murderous sociopath, Kyle, like his predecessors in the Zeltserman lineup, is so boisterous in his self-justifications (for everything from breaking the little finger of a litterbug to kidnapping a sickly child to burning alive a close relative in his bed) that a reader can't help but laugh at the fervent illogic of it all. Here, for instance, Kyle describes the way he and his reluctant younger brother, Danny, steal a laptop from an unsuspecting "mark" who has just left an upscale Boston coffeehouse: "I grabbed for the laptop and as the mark realized what was going on and tried to pull back, Danny was out of the car and clocking him on the side of the head with the brick. . . . The reality of the situation, the guy was no more than a hundred and sixty pounds soaking wet, and a slap on the side of the head with an open palm would've done the trick, but I was glad to see Danny use the brick. Not that I cared whether or not some effeminate mochachino-swilling yuppie had his head bashed in, but that type of violence was what I needed to bring the old Danny back." In Kyle's perspective, the robbery serves as a terrific therapeutic exercise for Danny. And the really sick thing is that the scene is so brazenly buoyant that the reader gets carried along with the moment, too. Hooray! The Nevin Brothers are back! Bad luck for the yuppie who was just at the wrong place at the wrong time, but a good break for Danny and Kyle, who commit the assault in broad daylight on a Boston street, without any witnesses around. The thing about luck, though, is that it always changes. After that aforementioned kidnapping goes haywire, Kyle dodges another jail term with the help of a principled defense attorney who can barely stand to breathe in his tainted presence. Then, he's offered a fabulous book deal to write a true-crime "fictional novel" of how the kidnapping might have gone down. (Zeltserman is obviously exacting some comic revenge on members of the publishing profession who, like their mobster counterparts, are always trolling for "the big one" and training their beady eyes on the bottom line.) Kyle is set up with a book packager who's supposed to help him bang out the novel in two months. Oprah, the bestsellers lists, European book tours and Hollywood await. Trouble is, Kyle's luck turns. He comes down with a nasty case of writer's block. That's just the very beginning of a long, loopy downward slide into the abyss. I'd say Zeltserman can't top "Pariah" for its sheer diabolical inventiveness, but he probably will. And given that the corrupting vision of his work is so powerful, I ought to know better than to read the next novel he writes. But I probably will anyway. bookworld@washpost.com
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