Review: Two engaging reads for the price of one
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 10 27, 2012
"I'm a rumrunner and a bootlegger. Those are both criminal acts. I can't go to the police when someone steals my illegal liquor. It's up to me to protect my property and myself." - Mat HudsonWith PLAY HIM AGAIN, author Jeffrey Stone introduces us to a new serialized Tough Guy, Matt Hudson, a crook with a conscience.The year is 1928; the place is Los Angeles. Prohibition (1919-1933) grips the country and it's the Revenuers versus the Bootleggers, and the latter versus other Rumrunners. Though the filmThe Jazz Singer, the first feature-length movie with synchronized dialogue, was released only the previous year, silent flicks are still the norm.PLAY HIM AGAIN is basically a revenge thriller as Hudson endeavors to even the score after the brutal torture and murder of Danny Kincaid, a gifted con man and Mat's best friend since boyhood. But another element to the plot - a bit of storytelling genius on Stone's part - is the background surrounding the film industry's transition from silent films to "talkies." Some eighty years later, the evolution from one to the next might seem to contemporary moviegoers almost a given. But, for reasons probably not familiar to those outside the industry and film schools, it wasn't.Other reviewers have deducted points for the author's inclusion of extensive and detailed sidebars on the period's film industry. Indeed, at times it almost seemed as if the vengeance aspect of the story was but a subplot. However, as a lifelong resident of the Los Angeles area, and one who's always taken Tinseltown history for granted, the back story on the movie biz and its transition to motion pictures featuring synchronized dialogue was absolutely fascinating and had me doing Internet searches for more information on such people and places as Alla Nazimova, Pickfair, William Fox, the Roosevelt Hotel, Movietone News, and Charlie Chaplin Studios. Any book, fictional or otherwise, that engages my participation to that extent rates high in my appreciation.Oh, and the plot's suitably complex main thread is riveting also, though I do agree with other reviewers that the transition between characters in some of the action sequences is too abrupt and disorienting.It's worth noting that Hudson is no innocent choir boy; he's a self-admitted criminal capable of extreme violence. But, he apparently has a conscience. This should make him a compelling hero in future installments of the series. And I hope Stone continues with the Silver Screen backdrop.