Review: Neighborhood Mr. Fixit's grubby affair escalates to a Big Bang
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 02 24, 2013
Every morning when I awaken, I regret the fact that my world has become so devoid of heroic icons. Koufax and Drysdale haven't pitched in decades, Davy Crockett recently fell off his pedestal (David Crockett: The Lion of the West), the Wyatt Earp legend lost its luster some time ago (The Last Gunfight), and I just found out that Santa Claus is just a homeless derelict living on food stamps in Duluth. So, I reacted with tremulous hope when I discovered that author Steve George has presented the Sweaty Reading Masses with a new hero in DEAD BLOW HAMMER. So, what manner of man is this? A caped fighter of injustice? A square-jawed Western peace officer? A rakish secret agent? A world-weary police detective? Why, no. It's a ... grain commodities trader? With a side gig as a ... neighborhood Mr. Fixit? Say it ain't so, Steve!Minneapolis resident Jim Mann trades commodities out of his house. He's also his residential street's guy to call when something needs to be repaired or installed. His proficiency with tools has earned him a reputation for being "handy" and the nickname...Wait for it.Handy MannGet it?Jim has a tool in his arsenal that's recently been keeping his married neighbor, Angie, satisfied in the sack. (Ok, so maybe that's not so heroic. But even Superman lusted after Lois Lane, right?) Anyway, Jim's apparently at the top of Angie's list of handy men.But, things start to go wrong for Handy when he sees Angie being kidnapped out of her house by a mystery dude in a suit. And, shortly later, her house explodes. Perhaps Jim forgot to fix the gas leak last time he serviced Angie's hot oven.DEAD BLOW HAMMER is an engaging and amusing suburban whodunit, but not great. The reason I'm awarding five stars, not just four, is that the author has taken the time to think outside the box and create a resourceful hero that gives hope to the rest of us working shlubs that maybe we too can rise to the pinnacle of pluckiness before we die in obscurity. I mean, at one point Jim finds himself in a precarious situation from which a more conventional superhero would escape by using a bit of Semtex nestled inside the cap of his 007 Fountain Pen. But Jim uses a pencil, measuring tape and utility knife.Yup, I may have to acquire the next in the series,Mimsy (A Handy Mann Novel).