Penguin Modern Classics – Crime & Espionage

It is 1941 and Germany has won the war. Britain is occupied, Churchill executed and the King imprisoned in the Tower of London. At Scotland Yard, Detective Inspector Archer tries to do his job and keep his head down. But when a body is found in a Mayfair flat, what at first appears to be a routine murder investigation sends him into a world of espionage, deceit and betrayal.

These three stories--'Picket Line', 'Chick Killer' and 'Ice Man'--show Elmore Leonard at his most terse and harsh, able to conjure up a sense of profound unease and injustice in just a few words.

The main story 'Picket Line' describes a tense stand-off between migrant workers in Texas, police and labour organisers in a brilliantly orchestrated series of arguments and negotiations, with the potential for terrible violence lurking in every exchange. 'Chick Killer' and 'Ice Man', set in Florida and California are two riffs on the thing that made Leonard great: his extraordinary ear for creating dialogues of negotiation, where the stakes could not be higher for the loser.

Detroit businessman Harry Mitchell is a self-made man, happily married for over twenty-two years and a pillar of the community. But then he slips - he meets a young 'model' and begins an affair. One night he arrives at his girlfriend's apartment and finds more than he bargained for. Two masked men have caught his misdemeanours on camera and now they want a cool hundred grand. But they've picked the wrong man, because Harry Mitchell doesn't get mad - he gets even.

The last time Florida motel owner George Moran was in the Dominican Republic he was in a uniform and people were shooting at him. Years later he's back looking for a girl he lost - and finding one he'd be better off without. Mary de Boya may be beautiful, but she's also the wife of a former death squad general in exile with mob connections. So much for the trip down memory lane - now Moran finds himself in a cat's cradle of drug deals, swindles, vengeance and murder.

Clement Mansell knows how easy it is to get away with murder. The crazed killer is back on the Detroit streets - thanks to some nifty courtroom moves by his lawyer - and this time he's feeling invincible enough to execute a crooked Motown judge. Homicide Detective Raymond Cruz thinks the 'Oklahoma Wildman' crossed the line long before this latest outrage, and he's determined to see that the psycho does not slip through the legal system's loopholes a second time. But that means a good cop is going to have to play somewhat fast and loose with the rules - in order to manoeuvre Mansell into a showdown that he won't be walking away from.