Writer friends I trust kept telling me to read Willeford—so when I finally did, picking up the third in the Hoke Moseley series, I at first wondered what the hell they were talking about. This book, and more notably, the character was going nowhere and not much was happening. Actually, nothing was happening. This book was a 2-star at most, and I thought about bailing. But I didn’t. And I don’t know why.

For sure the writing was top notch, sharp, clean, all the things I like. But when the so-called detective falls into a catatonic stupor, and the twinned storyline about some goofy senior citizen with marital problems seems to be going nowhere, I questioned what these other writers were talking about. When detective Hoke does come out of the trance, brought on by too much work, he decides to run an apartment building for his father, and to somehow simplify his life. Along the way we get to know about his daughters, one with an eating disorder, his ex-wife who is now married to a professional baseball player, his pregnant partner, and seemingly a bunch of stuff that doesn’t really matter. There is a long exchange with a tenant who studies Ethiopian horseflies, I kid you not.

The other mentioned storyline is just as meandering. Stanley Sinkiewicz the retired auto factory worker gets tossed in jail after a bogus charge, where he meets Troy Louden. There is some intrigue as we began to understand Troy is not playing with a full deck, or the cards he has are potentially really violent–that forced metaphor makes as much sense as the rest of the book. Later we meet a non-objective painter from the Bahamas, and a stripper with a horrific facial injury. Are you still with me?

The weirdest thing happened, though—with the slowest of burns, the tension grows, so much so I had to put the book down and take a break. I knew something bad was going to happen and it was going to be explosive. But holy crap, Willeford trusted his readers to stay with him a long time before things broke loose… or else he didn’t care. For the first several hundred pages, there really is no crime in this book. But for the last twenty-five, not only could I not put it down, the realization that all that came before mattered. And wow, does it explode.

This book cast a strange spell on me, and made me see crime fiction in a whole new light. The two-star book became a five, or if possible a six-star read. It's a novel that broke the rules and changed the game. Sadly, I doubt Sideswipe would get published in today’s market. It asks a lot of the reader... mainly patience. But if you stick with it, the resonance of this novel, and Hoke Moseley, will stay with you a very long time.
I am off to read everything Willeford has written.

This is the third of Willeford's Hoke Moseley books I've read and my favorite so far. At every turn, this book subverted my expectations, and I'm so glad it did. For most of the book, Hoke is shutting himself away from the world as he suffers burnout. But while he does that, the world outside his bubble continues as it always does with a criminal sociopath collecting an odd "family" around himself to pull off a simole crime tgat has horrifying results. Family is the main theme here, with the book contrasting the families around both the criminal and Hoke. Willeford drives the plot forward relentlessly, but leaves room for oddly touching moments of character development from both families. By the end of the book, Hoke is back on the job, but he's not the same character he was at the beginning.

There's one more book featuring Hoke, and I'm looking forward to reading it, but I'll also be sad that his story is over.

Giro di vita

Il Noir riempie le pagine e la vita di molti autori, anche quando credono di scrivere altro, perché è un'atmosfera, un mood.
Come il Blues. Due colori.

Willeford ci gira intorno a modo suo, in maniera molto personale e con l'indolenza di chi, al pari del suo sergente Hoke Moseley, non ha nulla da dimostrare. Non gli interessa.
In particolare qui, nel terzo capitolo della saga di Miami, imbastisce una storia dividendola in due dando il meglio proprio in quella senza il suo Moseley, che nel frattempo è andato fuori di testa e vuole lasciare la Polizia per fare l'amministratore di condominio. Che tipo.

Così, mentre il suo protagonista vive questo cambiamento, Willeford imbastisce una trama parallela partendo da un fatto che oserei dire comico se non fosse serio come quello dell'abuso di minori, e ci presenta il pensionato Stanley, il 'pittore' James, la sfigurata Dale, e soprattutto Troy, uno psicopatico con tendenze criminali che merita il posto d'onore, una personalità spiccata, seducente e pericolosa.

Quando le trame si uniscono, il Noir richiama Willeford tra le sue braccia e scatena le forze in poche efficaci pagine, come quei temporali brevi ma intensi che mica me l'aspettavo.
Poi torna la quiete, e il respiro.

Per il modo di incedere con cui è stato concepito, il romanzo può apparire lento, o addirittura noioso. Mica vero.

Willeford ha avuto una carriera militare ventennale e:
“Una buona metà degli uomini che si incontrano sotto le armi sono psicopatici. Esistono molti punti in comune fra la popolazione carcerarie e quella militare. È così che ho conosciuto tanti uomini come Troy”

Willeford's plots and characters are quirky, but engaging. This, the third book in the Hoke Moseley series, meanders through a burnout-breakdown on Hoke's part while developing slowly an independent plot line involving unlikely characters conspiring to rob a supermarket. The separate plot lines crash together in the end to provide an exciting, satisfying conclusion. Willeford is a master of suspense developed in a unique, strange way.

I'm not sure what's going on, but I think I've started to develop a little crush on Hoke Moseley. I know, right? I mean, he pees his pants within the first ten pages of this book. But I feel such a strong affection toward him for some reason.

The structure of this book is more similar to Miami Blues in that every other chapter is about Hoke, and the odd ones deal with another storyline about a criminal sociopath (Troy) who isn't Junior, but might as well be. I completely loved the way it all came together at the end. It's shitballs crazy awesome. And I love how even though throughout the plots of these books Hoke's life is fairly shitty, at the end he gets a nice little pick me up and you're ready to move on thinking the old guy is going to be okay.

My favorite thing about Willeford is the little details. The fact that Hoke tries to cheat at Monopoly. His recipe for beef stew. I love it all.

Not even an outlaw like Charles Willeford is immune to falling into the series trap. It's very clear that he's trying to recapture the magic of MIAMI BLUES with the cross-cutting perspective chapters. But Stanley, who is something of a fish-out-of-water type, is nowhere nearly as interesting as Freddy Freneger. The novel does have some punch and life in it with Mosley trying to reconcile living with his two daughters and his pregnant partner. But on the whole, this entry lacks the bite and acuity of previous offerings, the very reasons we read Willeford.

Weird book. Not sure that it qualifies as a mystery. Not much of a mystery to it. Just two stories that eventually intersect, with the detective in the story being the point of intersection.

i started slow on this book, but it grew on me in a big way. #3 of Hoke Mosely- in this one Hoke breaks down at work and stops everything - talking, moving - anything. So, he is taken to his father's house at the beach (Riveira). He slowly comes out of it and is said to have a mid-life crises and Hoke takes steps to "simplify his life" - no daughters, no real job, little food, etc. he manages his dad's condo bldg. The other side of the story (Willeford seems to go with the 2 unrelated stories that converge at the end model) is about Stanley Sinkowicz (a retired auto painter left by his wife after a false child molestation charge) who meets Troy Loudoun, a double talking career criminal. Troy devises and supermarket heist with Stanley, his deformed girlfriend and bad artist from Barbados. Suffice it to say, people die and Hoke gets mixed up with the looser gang. Happily Hoke is over his crises and headed back to Miami to take the Detective's exam.

This series is so good another excellent villain, and time period 80’s in south Florida is my jam

i read three books from Charles Willeford and this one bored me very quickly. Struggled to finish. Not much in the story, parallel stories. A big let down

Loved the movie Miami Blues. After re-watching it, inspired by the passing of Fred Ward, I looked in to it more and from there discovered it was based on a book. I am now finishing up the 4th of the Hoke series and enjoyed them all. As I was reading Sideswipe, I was reminded of another favorite book of mine, Confederacy of Dunces. I can't put my finger on it - whether it is the Troy character or Stanley or the oddity of them together that makes me chuckle a bit like when reading Confederacy of Dunces.

SIDESWIPE - DNF

I did not finish this book. I got to chapter 12, and I just couldn't go on. But I did skim to the end, just to verify I was right about things.

I've been reading all the Hoke Mosley books, some are great, some not so great. This book was terrible.

Sideswipe has many problems. Some people will think it doesn't age well. It has racist jokes from main characters, sexism, stereotypes, etc. None of that crap matters to me. That's not why I hate this book.

This book doesn't hold with the characters that have already been established. I understand, people can change - but not that much. I think if we we're all watching the new Star Wars, and Luke Skywalker was suddenly a drag queen, we'd all say, "Now hold on just a minute." And we'd all be right.

The characters have not changed for the better either. Instead of being a damaged, loveable loser, Hoke is now a selfish, sexist, asshole, with NO redeeming qualities. I love reading about flawed people, that's why I like noir. But if a book has not one person I can stand, there's a problem.

Hoke Mosley in the previous two books was a self made loser. He'd wear the same shirt for three days in a row, he'd refuse to take exams, so he wouldn't get promoted, and he lived in rat trap hotel because it was free. He didn't put pressure on himself - ever. He always did the bare minimum to get by, even when his daughters came to live with him. Hoke is not big on change, so having the responsibility of his daughters took some getting used to. But that's just it, once he got used to it, no problem. He decided to move in with his new partner, Ellita, because she would help him with his girls. With Hoke, it's always the path of least resistance.

If Hoke took pride in anything, it'd be his job. He's good at it, he knows it, and that's enough. He's not a type A, go-getter, so he doesn't have the stress that goes with it. These established facts are why this book doesn't work.

It begins with Hoke having a stress related nervous breakdown. Why? There's no major life stressor. He's got a new house, his girls are almost grown. He lives with his partner Ellita, who does most of the heavy lifting with his daughters, so again, I ask why? I'm thrown out, because this does not fit with the character. He also becomes a consummate asshole, who doesn't care if his daughters, his colleagues, or his family lives or dies. Who is this man? He's not Hoke Mosley.

There's a parallel story about an old man and a psychopath. I won't even bore you with the review of that. It's so far removed from what could actually happen in the real world, it's not worth reviewing.

There's another side plot about a man who's burglarizing condos. It's so telegraphed and trite, I could hardly believe his editor left it in.

I won't go into much of this, but in this book, Hoke's sexist views and remarks are predatory and offensive. In the last two books, you laughed at his ignorance. The joke was on him, he just didn't realize it. But in this book, you cringe at the things he says to the women around him. Also, every single woman in this book is a useless simp. His daughters, his partner, even side characters are all helpless and irritating. This is another change from the previous two books, and not for the better.

Summation: If you liked Miami Blues and New Hope for the Dead DON'T READ THIS BOOK! The characters are not the same as the first two books in this series. They are not likeable or believable. The stories are boring and telegraphed. There's not one well drawn or likable character in this book. Save your precious reading time for something that's worthy of you.