Les Edgerton - The Perfect Crime

PRAISE FOR LES EDGERTON

JUST LIKE THAT is yet another Les Edgerton winner. Mr. Edgerton in his prison memoir conjures up in honest, Bukowski-esque prose a mad dog life lived behind and beyond the bars of institutional correctional facilities. Literatures version of Johnny Cash, America has yet another gifted bard to sing the blues of time served. I have long believed Mr. Edgerton to be an American original, who has for too long remained one of our best kept literary secrets. As a publisher I want to put to print whatever he writes, as a reader I want to devour the pages, as a writer, Id be happy to pilfer just a few of his lines.

Cortright McMeel, author of SHORT ; publisher, Bare Knuckles Press and Noir Nation Magazine.

(For Mondays Meal)

The sad wives, passive or violent husbands, parolees, alcoholics and other failures in Leslie H. Edgertons short-story collection are pretty miserable people. And yet misery does have its uses. Raymond Carver elevated the mournful complaints of the disenfranchised in his work, and Edgerton makes an admirable attempt to do the same. He brings to this task an unerring ear for dialogue and a sure-handed sense of place (particularly New Orleans, where many of the stories are set). Edgerton has affection for even his most despicable charactersboring Robert, who pours scalding water over his sleeping wife in The Last Fan; Jake, the musician responsible for his own daughters death in The Jazz Player; and Tommy in I Shoulda Seen a Credit Arranger, whose plan to get hold of some money involves severing the arm of a rich socialitebut he never takes the reader past the brink of horrible fascination into a deeper understanding. In the best story, My Idea of a Nice Thing, a woman named Raye tells us why she drinks: My job. Im a hairdresser. See, you take on all of these other peoples personalities and troubles and things, 10 or 12 of em a day, and when the end of the day comes, you dont know who you are anymore. It takes three drinks just to sort yourself out again. Here Edgerton grants both the reader and Raye the grace of irony, and without his authorial intrusion, we find ourselves caring about her predicament.

Denise Gess, The New York Times Book Review

Edgerton establishes the kind of convincing, and wrenching, interiority with his characters achieved by only the most adept fiction writers.

Peter Donahue, Sam Houston State University

This is good fiction; Edgerton writes lean and nasty prose.

Dr. Francois Camoin, Director, Graduate School of English, University of Utah and author of Benbow and Paradise, Like Love, But Not Exactly, Deadly Virtues, The End of the World Is Los Angeles and Why Men Are Afraid of Women

Les Edgerton is much more than a fiction writer or a story teller. When you read his work, your ears prick up, your eyes go wide, and your spine tingles. You get the sense that Edgerton has been there, lived the lives of his characters, fought their fights, cried their tears, placed their bets, drank their Wild Turkey, smoked their cigarettes. He writes with a stunning accuracy, a convincing authority and a stark reality. At the same time, he strikes a balance between beautsensitivity and humor. Edgerton isnt concerned with keeping your interest. He wants to reach into your heart, tear it out, hold it for you while its still beating!

Vincent Zandri, Bestselling author of The Innocent , The Remains, and Godchild

the characters in Edgertons world bite down hard and grind up one another with their back teeth. Their authenticity is palpable as soft-shelled clams; these are sad, mean, fully human characters who long for connection almost as fiercely as they fear it.

Melody Henion Stevenson, Author of The Life Stone of Singing Bird

Edgertons best stories are uncompromising in their casual amorality. They stare you down over the barrel of a gun, rip you up whether or not the trigger gets squeezed.

Diane Lefer, Creative writing teacher at UCLA and on the MFA in Writing Faculty at Vermont College. Author of The Circles I Move In and has received fellowships from the NEA as well as five PEN Syndicated Fiction prizes

Les Edgerton creates a vivid and compelling world. We feel the rhythm of his language and live in the skins of his characters. Altogether, a memorable experience.

Gladys Swan, Faculty member, Missouri University and on the MFA in Writing faculty at Vermont College. Author of A Visit To Stranger, Do You Believe in Cabeza de Vaca? and other novels and collections

Edgerton draws memorable portraits of these dangerous and unpredictable characters

Library Journal

Theres no question that Leslie Edgerton loves to write... he does it so well! Edgerton deals with people often called losers in a wonderfully poignant way and his affection for his characters gives strength to this collection of stories, one of which has received the Booker nomination. Join our support of this fine writer which Arts Indiana Magazine calls one of Indianas best writers.

Borders Bookstore Newsletter, September 27, 1997

Les Edgerton writes like a poet with a mean streak, and his prose goes down easy and smooth like good liquor as it carves up your insides.

Henry Perez Bestselling Author of Mourn the Living and Killing Red

Hes got a story to tell you so get ready; its coming at you fast. Get ready

Linwood Barclay

tense and hard hitting

Paul D. Brazill

DEDICATION

For my readers. Without readers, writing is like having sex with yourself. The feedback you get for your performance is ultimately flawed. For Bob Parker, my guru on all things electronic and explosive. Bob helped me immensely in making the crime accurate. Hes the one who came up with the idea for a climbers harness to hook the wiring for the bomb inside so it couldnt be taken off without exploding the bomb. When I was finished, Bob read it and proclaimed it, indeed, the perfect crime. He told me I could either do the crime myself or publish it and that Id probably make a lot more money if I did the crime. Its been tempting, but Im going with publication. Well see Bob also said it was a template for a perfect crime and that I should leave out or change at least one element so my outlaw friends couldnt follow it and Ive done that. I initially wrote this back in the mid-90s and at the time I came up with the idea no one had ever tried anything like this. Since then, at least a couple of folks have and they all got caught. And, they were caught for things they could have avoided if this book had been out then Sorry, guys you should have waited

For my superb agent, Chip MacGregor, whos the best. For my publisher, Aaron Patterson, who saw this as a book readers would enjoy. For my brothers behind bars and particularly the guys in Pendletonthis ones for you. And, as always, for my wife Mary and my three wonderful kids, Mike, Sienna and Britneyyou guys rock.

CHAPTER 1

GOING OUT TO HIT the bricks one morning after roll-call, one of the guys on Grady Fogartys bomb squad unit cracked, Jesus! You look like a friggin mob guy, Fogarty!

Grady cracked right back. Yeah, and you guys all look like Columbo. How bout I introduce you to my tailor? Give me a chance to unload my polyester stocks first, though. I dont want to get caught short when the market tumbles like it is if you clowns ever check out a mirror.

That had been a few years back. Before the almost-routine burglary in progress call that turned his life upside-down. Where he lost the eye. From that point, his very appearance seemed to deteriorate. It was positively amazing what a little chunk of lead that weighed less than half an ounce could do to a mans life. Before the shooting, his compadres on the Dayton police force had joked about Gradys clothes fetish, referring to the Brooks Brothers suits he favored. Internal Affairs might have shown a little more interest in his wardrobe if he hadnt had such a squeaky-clean reputation. And the fact it was widespread knowledge that he obtained his suits at cost from a grateful clothier. A store owner whose daughter Grady had saved from certain rape one night, responding to screams coming from an alley off Grafton Avenue.