Synopses & Reviews
The classic novel from "America's best crime novelist" (
Time), with a new introduction by Dennis Lehane
George V. Higgins's seminal crime novel is a down-and-dirty tale of thieves, mobsters, and cops on the mean streets of Boston. When small-time gunrunner Eddie Coyle is convicted on a felony, he's looking at three years in the pen--that is, unless he sells out one of his big-fish clients to the DA. But which of the many hoods, gunmen, and executioners whom he calls his friends should he send up the river? Told almost entirely in crackling dialogue by a vivid cast of lowlifes and detectives, The Friends of Eddie Coyle is one of the greatest crime novels ever written.
Review
"Chilling...the most penetrating glimpse yet into what seems the real world of crime...positively reeking with authenticity!"--
The New York Times Book Review
Review
“Rings true as a police siren.”—
The Boston Globe“The best crime novel ever written--makes The Maltese Falcon read like Nancy Drew.”—Elmore Leonard
“Chilling . . . The most penetrating glimpse yet into what seems the real world of crime. . . . Positively reeking with authenticity.”—The New York Times Book Review
“Truly a bravura performance. Higgins is a master of colorful street language heard around Boston. Throughout the novel, without quaintness or self-parody, he is able to sustain long arias of criminal shoptalk. . . . A sophisticated thriller.”—Time
“First-rate, absolutely convincing, enormously readable.”—The Christian Science Monitor
“Simultaneously a brilliant thriller and a cold and convincing business prospectus of felony--a profession that traps both sides, gunmen and policemen, into ceaseless compulsory degardations.”—The New Yorker
“The most powerful and frightening crime novel that I have read this year. It will be remembered long after the year is over, as marking the debut of a fine original talent.”—Ross Macdonald
“The first thing to know about George V. Higgins The Friends of Eddie Coyle is that it directly entered the crime-fiction canon upon its 1970 publication. The second thing to know is that it holds up as both a writers-writer thriller and as popular pulp, with Dennis Lehane introducing Picadors new 40th-anniversary reissue of the novel by heralding it as ‘the game-changing crime novel of the last fifty years—a moderate claim compared to that of Elmore Leonard, who hails it as the best crime novel period.” —Troy Patterson, SLATE
“Weighed and calibrated like the barrel of a pistol. The fact that he's writing about crooks is crucial in some ways, incidental in others. The real subjects here are life's futility and its bleak humor… Elmore Leonard learned from this novel, likewise David Mamet and of course Quentin Tarantino, who saw the narrative virtue in marrying violence to comedies of manners…. Higgins took the tough-guy novel into areas of demented anthropology and re-created a genre.” —Richard Rayner, Los Angeles Times
Synopsis
The classic novel from "America's best crime novelist" (
Time), with a new
introduction by Elmore Leonard
Eddie Coyle works for Jimmy Scalisi, supplying him with guns for a couple of bank jobs. But a cop named Foley is on to Eddie and he's leaning on him to finger Scalisi, a gang leader with a lot to hide. And then there's Dillon-a full-time bartender and part-time contract killer--pretending to be Eddie's friend. Wheeling, dealing, chasing, and stealing--that's Eddie, and he's got lots of friends.
Synopsis
Eddie Coyle is a small-time punk with a big-time problem -- who to sell out to avoid being sent up again. Eddie works for Jimmy Scalisi, supplying him with guns for a couple of bank jobs. But a cop named Foley is onto Eddie, and he's leaning on him to finger Scalisi, a gang leader with a lot to hide. And then there's Dillon, a full-time bartender and a part-time contract killer pretending to be Eddie's friend. These and others make up the bunch of hoods, gunmen, thieves, and executioners who are wheeling, dealing, chasing, and stealing in the underworld of Eddie Coyle.
Synopsis
Picador celebrates the 40th anniversary of this seminal crime novel with a brand new reissue -- it has been called the very best of its genre by everyone from Elmore Leonard to George Will to Norman Mailer to Anthony Bourdain. A classic.
About the Author
George V. Higgins was a lawyer, journalist, teacher, and the author of 29 books, including
Bomber's Law,
Trust , and
Kennedy for the Defense.