Roger Smith (1) (1960–)

This thriller is not so much a roller coaster ride as a free fall - there are no "ups". Beginning with Jack Burn, an American who was involved in a bank robbery in Milwaukee that resulted in the death of a police officer. Never mind that he was a reluctant participant, he is now on the run. And he has run, together with is 4-year old son and heavily pregnant wife, to Cape Town, South Africa. Of course, with the millions from the bank robbery (he was reluctant to participate in the robbery, show more but all too willing to accept the booty), they live comfortably and peacefully in the most exclusive part of town. The rest of the city is a cess pool. Crime and corruption are rampant. So bad, in fact, that the new house being built next door to the Burn's has an overnight security guard to watch the property when there are no workers on site. This guard, an ex-con gang member trying to go straight, sees quite a lot - including the 2 men from a rival gang entering the back of the Burn's house just as they are sitting down to dinner. But they don't come back out. He hears a shot, then later an ambulance drives up and takes Mrs Burn away. Mr Burn and the boy follow in their car and all is quiet. For a while.

Meanwhile, Inspector Rudi Barnard, the most disgusting and corrupt character I've come across in a long time, is looking for these same 2 intruders - wanting to collect his share of the money from their drug sales. When he doesn't find them where they should be, he begins to become suspicious. Later, their car is discovered on the street next to the Burn house and Barnard begins to investigate Jack.

There are no nice people in this book. Everyone has something to hide, but Smith does a good job making several of them sympathetic, in spite of their backgrounds. I found myself rooting for both Jack and the night watchman. As I said, Barnard was a filthy, disguisting person - and Smith never let us forget it - commenting in every scene about his obesity, or halitosis, or corruption, or racist beliefs, or something. A very satisfying villian. The setting is grim, but Smith is South African and makes it believable - however awful. The book reads quickly, and is hard to put down. Kind of like a traffic accident - there's nothing you really want to see, but you can't keep from looking all the same. Very good for what it is - a fast paced thriller, with lots of violence, strong language, and drug use. show less

The bad guys abound in Wake Up Dead. Even people you do not expect are violent, savage people who aren't above torture, sodomy, and other nefarious activities. But that is life in South Africa's Cape Town. Gun runners, drug fiends, gangsters, petty thieves, prostitutes, doctors who keep amputated body parts in the freezer, and just plain greedy individuals all prowl the pages of Wake Up Dead. Disco, Afrika, Piper, the cannibal, Maggot...they all have a score to settle with someone. At the show more center of the story is Roxanne Palmer, a beautiful American ex-model now married to a criminal. Everyone needs something from Roxy. Money her gun-running dead husband owes Billy Afrika. Piper needs Roxy to lead him to Afrika to finish a botched murder attempted when they were children. Disco thinks Roxy will lead him to a boatload of cash so he can steal to support his out of control drug habit. Throw in a serial killer lobbing off blonde heads and you have yourself a thriller. There is so much violence in Wake Up Dead I lost track of the dead, but I enjoyed Roxy's strength. I cheered for her redemption. show less

[Wake Up Dead] needs burying.

The book world doesn’t need another thriller, laced with foul language, blood, and graphic violence, hoping to garner praise as “gritty” or “visceral.” Good thrillers are grounded in reality. And good, gritty noir writing subtly exposes the darkness of the human soul. [Wake Up Dead] is neither realistic nor subtle.

Billy Afrika, a mercenary capable of the inhuman feat of knocking out 400 push-ups every morning, hits his home-town streets of Cape Town, show more South Africa, in search of Joe Palmer, a gun-runner who owes him money. Roxy, Joe’s wife, ruins any chance for Billy to collect when she shoots Joe between the eyes, using a gun left behind when she and Joe are car-jacked. The car-jackers, Disco and Godwynn, are none too happy to be pinned with a murder they didn’t commit, and they set out to exact revenge on Roxy, or at least earn a little more money from her. The pimple ridden detective investigating the murder, Ernie Maggott, suspects Roxy is the killer and begins haunting her. Billy, still hoping to cash in, signs on as Roxy’s one-man, personal security detail, trying to protect her from all of them.

These characters feel like they were pulled from a 1980s B-movie that loops late night on free cable. Even the character names scream midnight, drive-in movie popcorn. The dizzying plot turns will make your head spin, until the last few pages, where the finale threatens downright whiplash.

The prose of the book matches the fantasy and cheese of the plot and characters. Women are found “battling jeans that sliced into her flesh like a delicatessen blade into cold cuts.” Another clothing war was alliteratively described this way, “The bottle blonde battled brutally tight” jeans. Comparing people’s skin or body parts also seems to be a favorite, so that one character had “brown skin tinged gray like meat gone rancid” and another had “skin the color of strong tea left to stand.” At some point, Roxy notices two men staring at her with eyes “like oily kalamata olives.”

To be fair, I know how hard it is to tell a story, how difficult it is to put words to paper. I frequently hear stories about struggling writers, endlessly sending manuscripts to editors and agents only to be met with an equally endless string of rejection notices. But I can’t recommend this book to anyone. I wouldn’t have made it past the first ten pages if I hadn’t promised to write a review.

1 bone! show less

Another book from LT early reviewers, "Mixed Blood" was more than a read-and-toss thriller, it reached me at intellectual and emotional levels as well. Mixed Blood is a solid thriller with the plot, action, and violence that make this type of thriller enjoyable. But while I thoroughly enjoyed it as a thriller, there is something much more that makes it stand out for me. This is the role South Africa plays in the story. Cape Town itself is a character in the story. I enjoyed Mixed Blood as a show more straight-up thriller and also for the intense sense of place that Roger was able to weave into the story. Recommended highly for readers who like thrillers and don't mind a bit of stomach churning violence. Looking foward to reading more of Roger Smith's books. show less