Your Day in the Barrel

Roger Levin #1

by Alan Furst

What do you do when:
- It's kill or be killed
- The CIA makes you an offer yuo can't refuse
- There's $50,000 in the butter dish of your Winnebago
- You're being stalked through the streets of New York by a killer and it's
Your day in the barrel

180 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1976

About the author

Alan Furst is widely recognized as the current master of the historical spy novel. Born in New York, he has lived for long periods in France, especially Paris. He now lives on Long Island.

Night Soldiers novels
* Night Soldiers (1988)
* Dark Star (1991)
* The Polish Officer (1995)
* The World at Night (1996)
* Red Gold (1999)
* Kingdom of Shadows (2000)
* Blood of Victory (2003)
* Dark Voyage (2004)
* The Foreign Correspondent (2006)
* The Spies of Warsaw (2008)
* Spies of the Balkans (2010)
* Mission to Paris (2012)
* Midnight in Europe (2013)
* Under Occupation (2019)

Stand-alone novels
* Your day in the barrel (1976)
* The Paris drop (1980)
* The Caribbean Account (1981)
* Shadow Trade (1983)

For more information, see Wikipedia.

Reviews

[cool breeze · Rating 2 out of 5]

Alan Furst made a successful career as a writer of historical spy novels. But in this, his debut novel, he focuses on an ambitious young man, Roger Levy, a Jewish New Yorker from a well-to-do family, who has channeled his ambition into becoming a prosperous regional distributor of illegal drugs. They always tell new authors to “write what you know”, right?

The novel starts out quite promising in the first third, in which Levy sets the scene and describes his drug dealing lifestyle at length. It is so detailed and realistic that I have to think that Furst is writing from his own experience or that of someone he knew very well. Furst always was good at settings and characters. The book is set around 1970 and it does have the vibe of that unlamented era, ya dig?

Unfortunately, the second third initiates the suspense/thriller plot and the story bounces around somewhat haphazardly. Furst always stunk at plot, sometimes skipping it entirely. The final third slouches towards an unsatisfying anticlimax. The first third rated 4 stars, but the rest was just OK, 2 stars.

[Dave · Rating 2 out of 5]

An early Alan Furst novel. No WW2 Central European intrigue—just hippie pot dealing and paranoia. Some funny, clever stuff, but a bit antic and ultimately silly. Worth reading if you're a Furst completist or want a '70s literary artifact. Fans will enjoy the smarts, but will likely miss the sobriety of his more recent books.

[E · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wasn't really sure what to expect when picking up this book. It is Furst's debut novel, and somehow Elmhurst's library has managed to hold on to a first edition all these years (meaning enough people checked it out before Furst got famous to keep it in circulation; I find that hard to believe, but hey, what do I know).

It is quite different from Furst's Night Soldiers series. It is set in the late 1960s America. The first-person narrator is a smart hippie ("the way I dress, the hippies think I'm a businessman, and the businessmen think I'm a hippy") who deals drugs at several Pennsylvania colleges. Eventually he gets mixed up in (what seems to be) a CIA plot and has to extricate himself. All the cash he makes from drug dealing comes as a big help, I assure.

Furst wrote at the beginning of his career in a very different tone, although he had already honed his trait of never stopping to explain what's actually going on. He does well with an antihero protagonist (his Night Soldier heroes are almost nauseating in their reliability), so much so that I think this series stretched to three novels. And yes, I will be checking them out.

[Hari Brandl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fast moving (I read it within 2 days) and entertaining. Lots of action. Dialogues were sharp, sometimes funny. A little short on character development, but in the other hand there was no melodrama, or excessively adjectival or adverbial descriptions. Reminded me a little of Dashiel Hammett or Elmore Leonard, but definitely not as good. Will probably read more of Furst's early stuff.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun, if dated. It was interesting to read Furst's earlier work. The pacing of this book was phenomenal and it actually had a handle on just how little you need to really sustain a good thriller. I'm still more partial to the novels in the Night Soldiers cycle.

[Chuckdee · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fun, easy read

[Paul Downs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Furst claims that his early work is embarrassing - I disagree. I remember reading this book back in the 80s and enjoying it. Picked it up again and it was still fun. The prose has a lot more energy, more zing, than the elegant construction of the WWII novels. . Decent plot. Interesting characters. (A guy in trouble - a theme that will reappear in all of his work.) Worth looking at if you want to see where Furst came from.