The Barnes & Noble Review
September 2000

Elmore Leonard Does It Again!

Without a doubt, Elmore Leonard is not only one of the most accomplished authors around, he's inarguably the coolest. Dubbed "the greatest crime author of our time, perhaps ever!" by the notoriously hard-to-please New York Times, Leonard follows the phenomenal success of Be Cool with his 36th novel, Pagan Babies. And it emerges as Leonard's funniest straight-faced novel to date — with its most devilish, irresistible hero.

Leonard at His Best

Some years ago, Elmore Leonard offered an interviewer a memorably succinct description of his distinctive technique, stating, "I just try to leave all the boring parts out." During the course of a career that has spanned nearly 50 years and has produced more than three dozen books, he has held to this aesthetic principle with remarkable consistency. Anyone wanting to see how he does it should check out Leonard's latest. It's called Pagan Babies, and it's a textbook example of how to write fiction that is spare, fresh, funny, and absolutely boredom-free.

Pagan Babies opens in present-day Rwanda, a nation still haunted by the genocidal tribal conflicts of the mid-1990s, conflicts that resulted in the wholesale slaughter of some 800,000 Tutsi natives. At the center of the narrative is "Father" Terry Dunn, an American missionary who may or may not be a legitimately ordained Catholic priest and who is himself haunted by the memories of atrocities committed within his church. Terry's tenure in Rwanda comes toanabrupt end when he hears the confession of an unrepentant murderer and exacts an extreme — and lethal — form of penance. Immediately afterward, he leaves Africa and returns — for the first time in more than five years — to his home in Detroit and to the various complications — some new, some old — that are waiting for him there.

To begin with, Terry — who has had a checkered, distinctly nonpriestly career — must finally face a five-year-old indictment for cigarette smuggling and tax fraud. With the help of his brother Fran, a successful personal injuries lawyer, he cons the local district attorney — a devout Catholic — into dismissing all charges. In the process, Terry meets — and falls in love with — a former legal investigator named Debbie Dewey, whose own career is at least as colorful as Terry's.

When we first encounter her, Debbie is working as a stand-up comic in an entry-level Detroit comedy club. She is hungry — even desperate — for success and recognition, having just served a three-year prison term for aggravated assault. Debbie's assault conviction — which forms the basis for one of her more colorful comic monologues — was the result of a spontaneous attempt to run down the lowlife former boyfriend who lied his way into her life, then cleaned out her savings account before moving on to his next victim. When, shortly after her release, Debbie discovers that this larcenous ex-boyfriend (Randy Agley) is now a wealthy and successful restaurateur, she devises a scheme to divest Randy of a large portion of his newly acquired money. At this point, she enlists the assistance of her newfound friend and lover, Terry Dunn.

Initially, the scheme involves a staged "slip and fall" designed to net an out-of-court settlement of $250,000, to be divided equally between Debbie and Terry, who is acting on behalf of the orphaned children of Rwanda. However, since Pagan Babies is an Elmore Leonard novel, nothing goes off exactly as planned. Complications inevitably arise as a large cast of secondary characters interpose themselves between Debbie, Terry, and their projected payoff. Included among them are a number of figures from Terry's days as a part-time cigarette smuggler, an aging Mafia don with medical and legal problems, and a dimwitted hit man named Searcy J. Bragg, a.k.a. Mutt.

Pagan Babies is pure, high-grade Elmore Leonard, a first-rate entertainment that is alternately horrifying and hilarious, touching and grotesque. Leonard's cool, laid-back narrative voice, his pitch-perfect ear for dialogue, and his characteristic ability to populate his stories with a varied and convincing assortment of characters are on full display throughout, from the opening sequences in war-torn Rwanda to the surprisingly moving conclusion. Like the best of Leonard's earlier fiction — Glitz, Get Shorty, Freaky Deaky, City Primeval — Pagan Babies is hip, smart, and artfully composed, the unmistakable product of a modern master of the form.

—Bill Sheehan

Bill Sheehan reviews horror, suspense, and science fiction for Cemetery Dance, The New York Review of Science Fiction, and other publications. His book-length critical study of the fiction ofPeter Straub, At the Foot of the Story Tree, has just been published by Subterranean Press (www.subterraneanpress.com).

Buscemi offers a standard, dry reading of Leonard's sly new tale, which is appropriate (though his attempt at producing African accents is unconvincing) for the opening scene: Rwanda after its rabid interethnic violence. Unordained priest "Father" Terry Dunn ministers to the local congregants (47 of whom were slashed to death) and shacks up with his housekeeper until he decides to take matters of justice into his own hands. Having arrived in Africa on the lam from a criminal charge in the U.S., Terry returns home to Detroit under similar circumstances. But Buscemi's tone never becomes as lithe as Leonard's tale does in Detroit; his best effort at atmosphere is the smart-alecky tone he gives to Terry's confederate Debbie Dewey, an aspiring stand-up comic just released from prison for having tried to run over the ex-boyfriend who scammed her out of thousands of dollars. Debbie intends to scam him back and joins up with Terry, who has his own shady operation. Debbie's ex fronts for the mob and is in cahoots with a witless hit man called Mutt, who in turn allies himself with an ex-smuggling partner of Terry's. Everyone tries to protect his or her own interest in the rapidly circulating money. One can't help feeling that the abridgement has cut out some vital material before Terry's final return to Rwanda. All in all, though, this is a hugely entertaining story by Leonard--albeit one conveyed only moderately well by Buscemi. Simultaneous release with the Dell hardcover (Forecasts, July 3). (Sept.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.

Coming on the heels of his second Chili Palmer novel (Be Cool), Leonard's latest effort seems to have some pretty straight-laced characters. However, a well-developed story and Leonard's trademark dry wit compensate for the lack of a force like Chili. Father Terry Dunn, an American priest working in Rwanda, is forced to return to the United States after exacting penance from a group of local Hutu murderers. Upon returning to Detroit, ostensibly to raise money for African orphans, he becomes involved with Debbie, a recently released ex-convict hoping to strike it rich as a stand-up comedian. A plan for both Terry and Debbie to attain the riches they desire soon gives way to a mix of deceit and false loyalties. Once again, Leonard proves his mastery at creating likable if very flawed characters, and nobody presents the running of the con game better than he does. His fans will enjoy his latest, making it essential for all public libraries. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 5/1/00.]--Craig L. Shufelt, Gladwin Cty. Lib., MI Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.\

Father Terry Dunn knows it is time to leave the Rwanda massacre. His church contains forty-seven corpses turning to "leather". Although Terry is hiding as a priest, he cannot take any more of the killing fields. He kills several of the culprits but flees home to Detroit. He originally fled to avoid jail time. Debbie Dewey has just left prison after three years for trying to run her former husband over with a car. Debbie wants to become a stand-up comic until she meets Terry still masquerading as a priest. They are immediately attracted to one another and he brings her into his current con, bilking wealthy patrons in a save the Rwandan children cause which is another name for his wallet. She ups the ante by persuading him that her ex and the mob boss he is tied to is the perfect pigeon. Pagan Babies is more than vintage Leonard. This novel is classic Leonard wildly destroying moral barriers. The story line is entertaining, never eases up, and contains Mr. Leonard's graphic but picturesque prose that shows he is quite a talent. The characters are typical of Mr. Leonard's novel as they run the full spectrum of sleaze, in other words likable to detestable parasites. This tale is superb reading for those fans that enjoy something different along the lines of a fabulously written crime drama heavily spiced with the absurd.
—Internet Book Watch

Pagan Babies has the same fast pace, crackling dialogue and dark ironies we've come to expect from every Elmore Leonard novel for the last 20 years...the book as a whole is a sharp exploration of loyalty and disloyalty, trust and betrayal.
—New York Times Book Review

God bless Elmore Leonard...In his wildly entertaining new novel, Leonard proves that he's still a criminal mastermind...You can't help but feel a visceral thrill...
—Entertainment Weekly

… the pieces of this crime tale begin falling into place so handily that Mr. Leonard might as well have hung a "Virtuoso at Work" shingle on his door...As it moves entertainingly up the gangland food chain, escalating from tax-free cigarettes to mob hits and a scam to extort damages from Randy's restaurant, the story trots out an irresistible array of lowlifes.
—The New York Times

Despite the un-Leonard setting that initiates the story line--the Hutu massacre of Tutsis in Rwanda--Leonard fans will love this book. The action soon returns to Detroit, with a charity fundraising scam taking center stage. There is never a shortage of oddball, sleazy characters in a Leonard novel. The convoluted plot introduces a wide variety of bad guys, all intent on making a dishonest dollar. Ron McLarty gives the work a calm and understated reading that conveys the author's style and direction without getting in the way of the story. His individual voices do not span a large range, but they are always distinguishable. His pace maintains the suspense, holding the listener's attention to the last plot turn. R.E.K. © AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine