She Rides Shotgun

This originally appeared at The Irresponsible Reader.
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This is one of those books where you want to sit and talk about it for a couple of hours – recapping and dissecting the events, analyzing, and speculating about what happens after the book ends; or you don't want to say anything beyond “just read it, I don't want to ruin anything for you.” I could absolutely relish the former, but I'm going to hew closer to the latter. Harper's better to read on this than me, anyway.

So, here's the official blurb to keep me from slipping:

Eleven-year-old Polly McClusky is shy, too old for the teddy bear she carries with her everywhere, when she is unexpectedly reunited with her father, Nate, fresh out of jail and driving a stolen car. He takes her from the front of her school into a world of robbery, violence, and the constant threat of death. And he does it to save her life.

Nate made dangerous enemies in prison—a gang called Aryan Steel has put out a bounty on his head, counting on its members on the outside to finish him off. They've already murdered his ex-wife, Polly's mother. And Polly is their next target.

Nate and Polly's lives soon become a series of narrow misses, of evading the bad guys and the police, of sleepless nights in motels. Out on the lam, Polly is forced to grow up early: with barely any time to mourn her mother, she must learn how to take a punch and pull off a drug-house heist. She finds herself transforming from a shy little girl into a true fighter. Nate, in turn, learns what it's like to love fiercely and unconditionally—a love he's never quite felt before. But can their powerful bond transcend the dangerous existence he's carved out for them? Will they ever be able to live an honest life, free of fear?

She Rides Shotgun is a gripping and emotionally wrenching novel that upends even our most long-held expectations about heroes, villains, and victims. Nate takes Polly to save her life, but in the end it may very well be Polly who saves him.

Two Crime Writers And A Microphone

The book opens with Crazy Craig Hollington, the leader of Aryan Steel, calling out a hit on a man, his wife and their child - all from his Supermax cell at Pelican Bay State Prison. The language is all prison patois and rumbles along with a syncopated menace. This is going to be fun.

The dead man walking is Nate McClusky, out after a five year prison term but marked for death when he kills Craig's brother in prison. He doesn't get to his wife in time but manages to grab his 11 year old daughter Polly. They're on the run but they're not laying low and instead are hitting Aryan Steel hard in an attempt to get their hit lifted.

The whole book feels like the non-mutant version of Logan. Hugh Jackman as Nate McClusky, Dafne Keen as Polly, the girl with the gunfighter eyes and the stuffed teddy bear she expertly pantomimes. And it works so well.

Crooked cops, drug mules, prison hits, the story is lean and ripped, moves fast and hits hard. How this doesn't get made into a movie I don't even know.