Playboy a Miami

by Charles Willeford, Fabio Zucchella (Translator)

A Miami, tra giovani single piuttosto ben messi, non è difficile godersi la serata a suon di biliardo, strafottenze, scommesse assurde.
Ma se una scommessa porta te e i tuoi tre amici “giusti” nel posto sbagliato, per esempio un cinema drive-in, nel momento sbagliato...
Se, poniamo, vi ritrovate in macchina il cadavere di una minorenne che, rimorchiata dal più ganzo al drive-in, è appena morta di overdose, non è detto che tu o i tuoi fantastici soci facciate la cosa giusta.
Non è detto che, messo alle strette, uno di voi non cacci tutti definitivamente nei guai, magari premendo il grilletto e mandando al creatore un tizio che sfruttava la ragazza.
E se anche tutto andasse per così dire liscio, nessuno vendicasse quelle morti, nessuno sbirro vi sbarrasse la strada, non è detto che questo significhi che la passerete liscia.
Meglio tenere gli occhi bene aperti, invece.
Non è detto che la minima ulteriore cazzata non scateni un uragano.
Quando si comincia a vivere sul filo del rasoio, è difficile che la lama prima o poi non sfoderi un taglio netto e micidiale…
Playboy a Miami è un romanzo spietato, lucido, incalzante sulla bestialità della vita umana nelle metropoli americane.
Una folgorante gimcana sulla sottile linea oscura che separa una vita agiata, rispettabile, “regolare”, da un inferno in cui è fin troppo facile districarsi, incredibilmente impuniti, con cinica eleganza.

Genres: Fiction, Crime, Mystery, Noir, Thriller, Pulp, 20th Century

320 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1993

About the author

Charles Willeford was a remarkably fine, talented and prolific writer who wrote everything from poetry to crime fiction to literary criticism throughout the course of his impressively long and diverse career. His crime novels are distinguished by a mean'n'lean sense of narrative economy and an admirable dearth of sentimentality. He was born as Charles Ray Willeford III on January 2, 1919 in Little Rock, Arkansas. Willeford's parents both died of tuberculosis when he was a little boy and he subsequently lived either with his grandmother or at boarding schools. Charles became a hobo in his early teens. He enlisted in the Army Air Corps at age sixteen and was stationed in the Philippines. Willeford served as a tank commander with the 10th Armored Division in Europe during World War II. He won several medals for his military service: the Silver Star, the Bronze Star, two Purple Hearts, and the Luxembourg Croix de Guerre. Charles retired from the army as a Master Sergeant. Willeford's first novel "High Priest of California" was published in 1953. This solid debut was followed by such equally excellent novels as "Pick-Up" (this book won a Beacon Fiction Award), "Wild Wives," "The Woman Chaser," "Cockfighter" (this particular book won the Mark Twain Award), and "The Burnt Orange Heresy." Charles achieved his greatest commercial and critical success with four outstanding novels about hapless Florida homicide detective Hoke Moseley: "Miami Blues," "New Hope for the Dead," "Sideswipe," and "The Way We Die Now." Outside of his novels, he also wrote the short story anthology "The Machine in Ward Eleven," the poetry collections "The Outcast Poets" and "Proletarian Laughter," and the nonfiction book "Something About A Soldier." Willeford attended both Palm Beach Junior College and the University of Miami. He taught a course in humanities at the University of Miami and was an associate professor who taught classes in both philosophy and English at Miami Dade Junior College. Charles was married three times and was an associate editor for "Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine." Three of Willeford's novels have been adapted into movies: Monte Hellman delivered a bleakly fascinating character study with "Cockfighter" (Charles wrote the script and has a sizable supporting role as the referee of a cockfighting tournament which climaxes the picture), George Armitage hit one out of the ballpark with the wonderfully quirky "Miami Blues," and Robinson Devor scored a bull's eye with the offbeat "The Woman Chaser." Charles popped up in a small part as a bartender in the fun redneck car chase romp "Thunder and Lightning." Charles Willeford died of a heart attack at age 69 on March 27, 1988.

Reviews

[David Putnam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved this book but I'm a big Willeford fan. Crazy title and cover that doesn't really match the book.

[Jamie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tarantino meets Seinfeld. More a character piece than anything, this is the tale of four kibbitizing bachelor buddies in the swinging seventies who seem to find trouble, through no real fault of their own. Hardly tragic or dark, but shocking in how the mundane can instantly turn for the worse, even deadly, from a bad decision or just plain bad luck. Willeford deftly captures both the camaraderie of the relationships as well as the stresses and strains placed on them by the hairy circumstances they find themselves in, all while striking a casual and often amusing tone. It's an odd balance, but one Willeford has been able to pull off again and again.

[Melki · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was excited to read this one as I was very impressed with Pick-Up, the first book I read by Charles Willeford. And, though this one doesn't feature the classic noir feel of the aforementioned book, it's still worth a read.

Willeford 's tale is set in the swingin' seventies (before herpes raised its ugly head), and is more a tale of playboys on the make than a crime novel. I was somewhat horrified by the way the four male characters talk about women (though maybe it's very realistic - I don't know. I don't know if I want to know.) Some of it makes a former president's "locker room talk" seem tame by comparison.

The book at first seems like an interconnected series of short stories, but they do finally get around to discussing the thing that happened in Part One. AND, Willeford wraps things up with what's got to be one of the most PERFECT endings ever.

This is the July read for the Pulp Fiction Group - https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/...

Join us if you'd like . . .

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Willeford has long been considered the master of the Miami noir tale. He has a knack for creating some rather twisted characters with human foibles. The "Shark-Infested Custard" is a dip into the swinging singles scene of Miami in the early 1970's. The scene, at least to start, is a giant singles apartment complex - no families allowed. "They won't let two men share an apartment." But, the "rules are relaxed for women, and two women are allowed to share one apartment."

It's the perfect place for men on the prowl and there are so many stewardesses and nurses bunked up there that a guy can't help but score. This story is told from various points of view among four young men who have made their home in this complex- Larry Dolman the ex- cop, Hank Norton the pharmaceutical sales rep, Eddie Miller the pilot, and Don Luchessi, who sells silverware for an old British firm. They work as little as possible, spend hours at the pool, and on martinis.

But, this is a Willeford novel, so there is a dark underside that pops up. It pops up when the men make a bet about whether Hank can pick up a "broad" (that's the lingo) at the toughest place in Miami- a drive-in theater since what woman would go there except on a date, and he comes out with a drug overdosing fourteen-year-old. Even the guys are creeped out

And there are other hints that the dating scene might not be what the television shows make it out to be: when one of them finds a woman through a dating service and another walks out of a party with her, what could possibly happen except six frustrating weeks of dating and never getting very far and all of a sudden the irate husband shows up and starts shooting. Meanwhile, Don is locked into a marriage with a woman he can't stand and eventually he tries running off with his daughter and hiding out from the wife.

This isn't anything like the noir novels that made Willeford a cult favorite or the Hoke Mosley crime stories that made him famous towards the latter part of his career. But, there is something a little bit twisted and different about life in a Willeford novel and this isn't just a story about young men on the prowl or coming of age. The writing is smooth and professional and Willeford ropes the reader in pretty deeply before letting out hints that all might not be what it seems on the surface. Being young and single and successful might be something, but you also gotta know how to dispose of bodies, how to deal with sharpshooting irate husbands, and when to leave town.

So are the young men featured in the story the "sharks" swimming around in the custard? Or is their illusion of what life is the sweet sugary custard and the reality that they experience is a pool filled with sharks at every turn? It is easy to find them amoral hedonists, but they really don't go looking for trouble. It just sort of finds them. They are not really that much more predatory or cruel than most other people or are they?

[WJEP · Rating 5 out of 5]

Four pals are driven out of Miami for differing nefarious reasons. So many surprises. I was not prepared for the abrupt criminality. I was also not prepared for the exhaustive descriptions of the characters and circumstances. I always figured that great writers must have superhuman powers of observation. Willeford proves it here with this feat of writing.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okay, so I loved this, but I can't decide whether to give it three or four stars. It lost some steam towards the end, and also I felt like a book that's told from the perspective of four different people needs to make a stronger and more successful effort to differentiate their voices.... BUT, this ruled and I really did enjoy reading it. For some reason it reminded me of Jacqueline Susann, but for/about men instead of women, and set in the seventies.

I recently got into a really embarrassing fight with a stranger on facebook when I overreacted to moralizing about my refined sugar consumption and other vices; I count books like this among the things I love that are shameful and likely giving me cancer. Recently I've stalled out on books with any nutritional value or moral virtue, and The Shark Infested Custard was the perfect antidote to that, basically a KFC Double Down topped with whipped cream and washed down with scotch. If you've recently quit smoking, drinking, sex, pills, or pretty much anything else fun, this might be a good read because a) it feels deliciously bad for you and b) it makes all those things I just listed seem totally gross.

In case you did not, as I didn't, "get" the title, The Shark Infested Custard takes its title from what Willeford calls an "old Miami riddle": "What is sweet, bright yellow, and extremely dangerous?" Apparently there is also a British kiddie TV show called this, after the same joke, which seems odd considering how well the title worked to convey the lethal sleaze of 1970s Miami.

Aw, hell, I'm giving this thing another star because I really did enjoy it. The best thing about the book is that it's from the point of view of these completely screwed up, horrible, unsympathetic guys, but it never breaks character or winks or gets meta for even a moment, and so you really do see things from their perspective. I would guess that most of the people whom I like and respect would really hate this book and, by extension, would hate me for liking it, so I don't recommend it unless you're a bad person or have at least got a wide unsavory streak.

-----------------------------------

I'm only on page thirty, but this is one of the most fucked-up books I've started in kind of a long time.

In other words, so far it's pretty awesome. I've already learned a new (to me) term, "strange," my new favorite-ever slang for pussy, and one of the main characters' outfits was described like this:

Hank came into the living room, looking and smelling like a jai-alai player on his night off. He wore white shoes with leather tassels, and a magenta slack suit with a silk blue-and-red paisley scarf tucked in around the collar. Hank had three other tailored suits like the magenta -- wheat, blue, and chocolate -- but I hadn't seen the magenta before. The high-waisted pants, with an uncuffed flare, were double-knits, and so tight in front his equipment looked like a money bag. The short-sleeved jacket was a beltless, modified version of a bush jacket, with huge bellows side pockets.

Don was the only one of us with long hair, that is, long enough, the way we all wanted to wear it. Because of our jobs, we couldn't get away with hair as long as Don's. Hank had fluffed his hair with an air-comb, and it looked much fuller than it did when he slicked it down with spray to call on doctors.

"Isn't that a new outfit?" Eddie said.

"I've had it awhile," Hank said, going to the table to build a drink. "It's the first time I've worn it, is all. I ordered the suit from a small swatch of material. Then when it was made into a suit, I saw that it was a little too much." He shrugged. "But it'll do for a drive-in, I think."

"There's nothing wrong with that color, Hank," Don said. "I like it."

Hank added two more ice cubes to his Scotch and soda. "It makes my face look red, is all."

"Your face is red," I said.

"But not as red as this magenta makes it look."

"When you pay us off tonight," Eddie said, "it'll match perfectly."

Unfortunately, I can't tell you the really fucked-up stuff, because that would be spoiling. But hopefully you've gotten a taste of its obvious awesome.

[Jayakrishnan · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book from which Tarantino lifted Vincent Vegas gun accidentally going off on Marvin scene.

[Carla Remy · Rating 3 out of 5]

05/2020

From 1972
When this is good it is very good. Unfortunately, it happens in only a quarter of the novel. Brilliant, boring, strange.

[Brian Fagan · Rating 3 out of 5]

If someone reads this book and doesn't think of Elmore Leonard's novels, he or she hasn't read Elmore Leonard. The setting and the substance are pure Leonard. I'll give Willeford (on my first foray into his work) credit for a great imagination and for his no bullshit realism. But Willeford seems less focused on the crime and its aftermath than Leonard always is. Willeford wrote The Shark-Infested Custard in 1993, but it feels as if it's set in the 70's, with the sexual revolution fresh in the air, and with something of a psychedelic plot line that wanders significantly. But it's always entertaining.

Four Miami bachelors live separately in a "singles" apartment building. As the story gets underway, a drugged-out teenage girl dies in their midst, and in their efforts to deal with the body quasi-responsibly, someone else gets killed. After that dramatic opening scene, I expected the rest of the story to focus on the aftermath of those tragedies. It does, but in a very roundabout and indirect way. I have to say I prefer Elmore Leonard's grittier and perhaps more cohesive and, to me, satisfying way of telling a crime story.

[Peter Landau · Rating 4 out of 5]

The four stories about four Miami, Florida, friends could have been 400. I would have followed them anywhere. Where they took me was immoral, unethical, but never unpleasant. They're such good company for a group of psychopaths. Not that they seemed like madmen: all were hardworking professionals (though they weren't really), all were decent members of society (though they weren't really) and were fun-loving loyal friends (those they weren't really). The writing is rich in detail, those details of a Day-Glo past that would be overdose-inducing if rendered visually, and flat of affect, which pulled me willingly along for the ride even when it turned down dark corners. There's humor. There're mini-essays on underarm hair on women and diet and why Miami is paradise on early (though it isn't really), which makes each page dense with intelligence and entertainment. Charles Willeford is this the first time I've read you? It won't be the last!

[Ed · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written in the 1970s and published posthumously in 1993, this ambitious Florida novel was Mr. Willeford's longest book (per the rear cover's copy). The loose plot follows the fates of four male friends as they cover up a murder, chase skirts, and get each others backs. Cast in a noirish tone, Custard offers a great deal more. It's social gaze at surviving in hot, nasty Florida, entertaining us with the story's wicked, satirical, and humorous turns. I've read a few of Mr. Willeford's books and still like the Hoke Moseley quartet and Burnt Orange Heresy a bit more, but this vintage crime novel ranks as a gem of its own.

[Nick LeBlanc · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some people mistake first person narratives as the voice of the writer. Those people also usually think that the characters represent ideas the author actually believes and wants to express as his own. Then, there are people who actually know how to read. These people know that characters, even the POV character are not the author and that with good authors, sometimes the discomfort the author is giving you through a POV character is the point. If you don’t get that or don’t believe that, don’t read Willeford, and especially do not read this book.

Willeford puts you right inside the head of true sociopaths with zero schlock. These are not redeemable characters and you are not supposed to like them. This is probably how these behave in reality. We all know someone like them.

The prose is dry and funny, with some laugh out loud passages and other sections that become more chilling every time you think about them. Willeford knows people and knows characters and assumes you’re already in on the joke.

His descriptions of food and people are often equally hilarious and disgusting (this goes for all of his novels). He seems to have a deep knowledge of strange and very human character traits that normally one wouldn’t think would appear (false teeth, body odor that makes a guy horny, strange jobs). His characters love to order hamburgers. They also like to speak in medium size monologues telling people what to do. He’s not for everyone, but man I like to read it. I would almost call it satire but it isn’t really that, and it’s definitely not crime/detective fiction but it isn’t NOT that. Definitely mischaracterized and under appreciated.

But anyway, Miami is the custard and men like our four protagonists are the sharks. Good stuff.

[Ben Samson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was fucking sick. Very psychologically rich, as if Dostoyevsky wrote a crime novel. Perfect critique of these kind of guys. Incredible, crackling dialogue which contrasts so nicely with the chillingly flat affect of the prose itself.

[Vytas · Rating 3 out of 5]

A slice of sin city life that has great style, but goes four separate directions and the point where they’d meet up seems never to arrive. But on the very last page it does, and Willeford’s vision is a grim one - a hell’s labyrinth of palms, heat, condos and swimming pools.

[Adam3million · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ben was right about this one. I can’t necessarily endorse his plan to move to Miami and model his life off these guys (stewardae beware), but it was a great book.

[Jason McCracken · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 mates, 4 stories, 4 "Holy Fuck" moments. I'd describe it as Charles Willeford does Raymond Carver.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

Charles Willeford felt that The Shark-Infested Custard was his masterpiece. The novel centers around four men who become friends because they all live in a Miami apartment building that caters to singles. Beyond this, the main things they have in common are a creepy crassness and an interest in the finer points of getting laid. Willeford described The Shark-Infested Custard as "a fairly nasty picture of so-called ordinary young men who are making it down here." Thus, the challenge facing Willeford as a writer was to give his readers sufficient reason to want to spend 263 pages' worth of time with such an unpleasant group of protagonists. For a noirish novel, the obvious strategy would have been to hook readers with a strong narrative drive, but Willeford's episodic storytelling pointedly refuses to do this. (Perhaps it was this vaguely arty storytelling decision, in combination with the vaguely arty decision to use multiple first-person narrators, that deluded Willeford into his high opinion of this book.) Failing this, the author might try to give the book some sort of substance as sociological document, exploring the nature of a society that produces "ordinary young men" like these. But the novel does not seem especially interested in this, either. In the end, the problem with The Shark-Infested Custard is that it does not seem interested in much of anything other than itself.

[J Benedetti · Rating 4 out of 5]

I fucking adore Willeford (avatar = hint) it's his encyclopedic knowledge of the minutiae of life in the US (under capitalism?) coupled with such a keen eye for human detail and always this otherness, an openness in his books that makes all his characters no matter how unbelievable and unpredictable their actions appear entirely convincing.

He can for example spend three pages discussing how a tax-deductible PR report altered the sales plan of a trans-atlantic silverware company before seamlessly going into how this is now affecting the robbery choices of one of the protagonists...he is fucking great. (um, I liked the book)

[Kurt Reichenbaugh · Rating 3 out of 5]

An odd novel about 4 unpleasant sleazebags in '70's Miami. Odd in that these are four guys no one in their right mind would want to be stuck with for any length of time longer than it takes to shoot a game of 8-Ball. That said, it is an interesting depiction of 70's mores within the more savage of the singles. Willeford doesn't pull punches and stays true to his characters. For that I admired it.

[Gert De Bie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Charles Willeford kan schrijven, daar hoeft u niet aan te twijfelen en The Shark-Infested Custard was een leuk tussendoortje dat we met smaak en vlot verorberden, al blijven we op het eind van de rit toch een beetje op onze honger zitten.

Larry, een ex-agent die bij National Security werkt, piloot Eddie Miller, verkoper Don Luchessi en medisch vertegenwoordiger Hank Norton wonen in hetzelfde appartementsblok in Miami, zijn beste maatjes en delen een voorliefde voor pool spelen, drinken en vrouwen.
In vier delen, telkens vertelt uit het perspectief van één van de vrienden, neemt Willeford ons mee naar een aantal pittige sleutelmomenten in de heren hun onderlinge relatie en levens. Sleutelmomenten op leven en dood, die de vrienden merkwaardig lichtvoetig passeren.

De sfeer is broeierig en het vergt van de lezer weinig inspanning om het kleurrijke, ietwat lege bestaan aan de kusten in Florida voor de geest te halen. In die setting werkt de pen van Willeford en de opgebouwde spanningsboog net goed genoeg om je aan het lezen te houden, maar op het eind van de rit heb je 4 sympathieke kortverhalen gelezen die degelijk maar niet uitmuntend zijn.

Willeford heeft ons wel voldoende gecharmeerd om 'Miami Blues' op onze leeslijst te houden.

[Tentatively, Convenience · Rating 4 out of 5]

review of
Charles Willeford's The Shark-Infested Custard
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - December 8-9, 2023

YET-ANOTHER author I got interested in while reading Lee Server's Encyclopedia of Pulp Fiction Writers. I was most interested in Willeford's The Burnt Orange Heresy but somehow I got this one instead. Even tho I found the writing itself to be somewhat generic I will say that Willeford has.. that special something, a sense of cynical 'dark' humor that's, ahem, 'well developed' - like the jaw muscles on an alligator.

Money's always a good thing to get into trouble w/:

"It started out as a kind of joke, and then it wasn't funny any more because money became involved. Deep down, ntohing about money is funny."

[..]

"Dade Towers is a singles only apartment house, and it's only one year old. What I mean by "singles only" is that only single men and women are allowed to rent here. This is a fairly recent idea in Miami, but it has caught on fast, and a lot of new singles only apartments are springing up all over Dade County. Dade Towers doesn't have any two-or three-bedroom apartments at all. If a resident gets married, or even if a man wants to bring a woman in to live with him, out he goes, They won't let two men share an apartment, either. That's a fruitless effort to keep gays out." - p 11

Imagine naming yr kid "Money". It wd really be a curse. Now imagine naming yr kid "Money Singles Only". They'd probably get plenty of one dollar bills given to them but it'd still be a curse. But what about Miss Moneypenny?

"["]The easiest place to pick up a fast lay in Miami is at the V.D. clinic."" - p 17

Ok, that's funny - but having been in V.D. clinics before it's hard to imagine making the moves. The hardest place?

""I don't get it," Don said. "What's so hard about picking up a woman at a drive-in, for Christ's sake? Guys takes women to drive-ins all the time—"

""That's right," Hank said. "They take them there, and they pay their way in. So what are you going to do? Start talking to some woman while she's in her boyfriend's car, while he's got one arm around her neck and his left hand on her snatch?"" - p 19

Good point there, Hank. This guy really knows what he's talking about. I go to the drive-in all the time & I cdn't pick up a tire iron there. So they decide to go to the drive-in.

""Jesus," Don said, rattling the paper. "At the Tropical Drive-In they're showingfive John Wayne movies! Who in hell could sit through five John Waynes for Christ sake?"

""I could," I said.

""Me, too," Eddie said, "but only one at a time."" - p 23

Hank makes a bet that he can pick up someone to fuck at the drive-in. He succeeds.

"She was about thirteen or fourteen, barefooted, wearing a tie-dyed T-shirt, and tight raggedly-cuffed blue jeans with a dozen or more different patches sewn onto them. On her crotch, right over the pudenda, there was a patch with a comic rooster flexing muscled wings. The embroidered letters, in white, below the chicken read: I'M A MEAN FIGHTING COCK." - p 27

The tragedy starts here. Hank moves on.

"If I had known she was married, I would have made my plans accordingly. She was the most desirable woman I had ever met, and because I wanted her so badly, I had apparently overlooked the telltale signs of her marriage. She had fooled me from the beginning, and for no discernible reason.

"The entire pattern was senseless and illogical, beginning with the electronic dating service, "Electro-Date." - p 54

There're plenty of twists in this novel & there's a pattern to them. That was one of the most fun things about it for me. Here's where one of them started:

"There were more than twenty cars parked on Don's lawn and along the curb and on neighboring lawns by the time I got to his house for his birthday party. The quiet of the suburban neighborhood was bothered by gibbering drums which pulsed above the shattering rise and fallof voices from the poolside patio. I learned later that some maniac had given Don a birthday present of three LPs of the authentic tribal drums of Africa." - p 74

"The musk smell on Jannaire was faint, because her own smell, or reek, to be more exact, of primeval swamp, dark guanoed caves, sea water in movement, armpit sweat, mangroves at low tide, Mayan sacrifical blood, Bartolin glands, Dial soap, mulberry leaves, jungle vegetation, saffron, kittens in a cardboard box, Y.W.C.A. volleyball courts, conch shells, Underground Atlanta, the Isle of Lesbos, and sheer joy—Patou's Joy—overpowered the musk oil. I was overwhelmed by the nasal assault, overcome by her female aroma, and although I could not, at the time, define the mixture—nor can I know, exactly—there wasn't the faintest trace of milk. Here was a woman." - p 78

Did I saw the writing was generic? I beg to differ w/ myself. That description of a woman that Hank's attracted to is EXCEPTIONAL.

""Mary Jane isn't a drug," she protested.

""I know the arguments. And I can counter every one you bring up too. But in my job, with drugs of every kind available to me, I leave them strictly alone. They scared us badly during training. I'm even nervous about taking an aspirin. And aspirin can be dangerous too. In some people, it burns holes through the stomach lining."

"I lit her a cigarette. She inhaled deeply, held it in, and said through closed teeth, "What's a detail man?"

""Drug pusher. I'm a pharmaceutical salesman for Lee Laboratories, and my territory includes Key West, Palm Beach, and all of Dade County. I'm supposed to see forty doctors a week and tell them about our products. I brief them, or detail one or more of our products, so they'll know how to use them."" - p 82

I find Hank refreshing as a character. I detest the pharmaceutical industry & think it's one of the biggest threats to health. To have Hank refer to himself as a "drug pusher" is, therefore, pleasing to me. Furthermore, to have him be someone who warns against drug use is also pleasing. This type of characterization is a sign of the subtlety of Willeford's perception.

"My adjustment year in Miami, after getting out of the army, had been a grim and confusing period. I had hated Pittsburgh, a cold and miserable city, and I had made no sfriends among its residents. I drank and ran around with some of the other officers from the Recruiting Station, and our conversations were usually centered on what we were going to do and where we were going to go after we got out of the service. It had never entered my mind to go home to Michigan. Dearborn, if anything, was a colder and more miserable city than Pittsburgh, and with fewer opportunities." - p 117

It's always interesting to read about the city that I've lived in or am currently living in, as the case is. At age 70, it's quite likely that I'd move from PGH to somewhere warm on an ocean if I cd afford to do so, wch I can't. I can barely afford to live here. Oh, well. If there're any women out there who want to invite me to join them in their tropical paradise feel free to propose something lacivious to me.

"The features were A Hard Man's Good to Find and Coming Attractions, and they were both one-hour films." - p 151

'Urban development' as typical racist shit:

"When Don had first moved into the warehouse office there had been seventy of these clapboard houses along Fair Alley, as it was called by the black residents (although there was no such street or alley listed on the city map), but fifty of them had been torn down, ten houses at a time, as new "Little HUD" housing had been constructed. The black residents had been "relocated," as the officials put it, in Liberty City, Brownsville, and Coconut Grove." - p 194

I was installing an exhibit about the presidents of the US at a museum when a newspaper photographer took my picture & asked me what my name was. I was quick-witted enuf to reply "Leon Czolgosz" but I stumbled slightly over the spelling. That might've given me away - at any rate my picture & the hoped-for caption didn't appear in the article.

"But who remembered Leon Czolgosz, or if they did, how many people could spell his name? Don could, and he had won a few bucks in bars by betting he could spell it. How many people, in fact, remembered or knew that Czolgosz had assassinated McKinley? Or knew that McKinley, because he had been assassinated, now had his picture on the $500-bill?" - p 196

There, I've managed to review this bk w/o telling you very much about it at all. No appreciable spoilers in this review, no sireebob! I liked this & I'm going to read The Burnt Orange Heresy if it's the last thing I ever do!

[CD Wilsher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Charles Willeford wrote “The Shark-Infested Custard” in 1975 but couldn’t get it published because it was considered too depressing; in fact, it’s pretty close to perfect.

Willeford is best known for his Hoke Moseley novels which were published in the 1980s. The Moseley novels are more police procedural than noir (but, nevertheless very good), but “The Shark-Infested Custard” is pure noir.

There are four protagonists. The novel is divided into four interlocking stories, each with one of the four as the protagonist. Each is reasonably successful. Don Lucchesi is the Florida representative for a silverware company. Eddie Miller is a pilot for an airline, Hank Norton is a salesman for a drug company, and Larry Dolman is a low-level executive for a private security company. All make pretty good money and they all receive promotions during the course of the book. They are also typical noir protagonists. Each is flawed and because of his flaw he makes a mistake, which leads to more mistakes, confusion ensues, and the consequences are horrendous.

When we first meet them they are all single (Don is separated) and living at a singles apartment complex in Miami. All fancy themselves to be lady’s men, with Hank being the lead dog. He makes a bet that he can even pick up a woman at a drive-in. He does so and before you know it, two people are dead. By the end of the novel, two more will be dead.

How are these men flawed? They’re all casual racists and not so casual misogynists. Women are strictly pieces of meat to these guys. A woman’s appeal is strictly physical. How long are her legs? How large are her breasts? How does she smell? And they’ll think nothing of cheating on a wife or girlfriend or simply walking out on them if they think something better has come along.

Some critics have called the four protagonists sociopaths, but they’re not. They’re relatively successful. They’re conscientious when it comes to their jobs and their friends (and for Don, his daughter). They’re just typical male specimens of that period that came after the sexual revolution and before AIDS. They’re part of the “Me Generation.” They’re into self-fulfillment and self-actualization and self-realization. They’re strictly into doing their own thing. They’ve got their own bag. Dig it?

In other words, they’re extreme narcissists.

Williford said, “The Shark-Infested Custard” "says a good deal about the brutalization of urban life—at least in Miami. It’s written in the hard-boiled tradition of James M. Cain, Horace McCoy, and I suppose, it is a fairly nasty picture of so-called ordinary young men who are making it down here. But such was my intention . . .”

Calling the protagonists sociopaths misses the point. A sociopath is exceptional, a clinical case, somebody out of the ordinary. These four aren’t out of the ordinary; they’re representative.

They’re not sociopaths, just pretty horrible people.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

The subtitle "A Novel" isn't quite a goddamn lie, but it's close. It's more like a set of four semiconnected short stories / novellas centered on a group of four guys making the most of the singles lifestyle in 1970s Miami. A pharmaceutical salesman, a private security operative, an airline pilot and the henpecked middleman for a luxury silverware firm, they run the gamut from cocksure shitheels to hopelessly deluded fuck-ups.

Abandoning wives and lovers, committing grand theft, covering up the overdose death of a teenage girl picked up at a drive-in as the result of a bull-session bet... these smarmy yet oddly sympathetic jackasses keep digging their own holes deeper and deeper as they're drawn into crimes acutely satirizing the freewheeling morals of the swingin' '70s. The casual, nigh-sociopathic misogyny on display is fairly unnerving, until it slowly becomes apparent how their disregard for women is catching up to them, exiling them one by one from their Florida paradise to a purgatorial existence in a Chicago suburb.

The plotting is a little sloppy at times, but Willeford's gleefully subversive take on the crime novel is in fit form. As in his best works, it all unravels like a grotesque shaggy dog story, building up to a typically twisted punchline. Solid stuff, but definitely not for all tastes.

[Verge LeNoir · Rating 3 out of 5]

Four self-absorbed, womanizing, borderline sociopathic bachelors inhabit this novel. There's raunchy sexual content, burst of violence and sprinkles of racism. Set in the Miami of the 1970's which makes some details seem dated. Best enjoyed by middle-aged men and I get the sense that women will not find this novel cute, endearing or funny.

An oddly structured novel, with lots of descriptive filler as though the author just wanted to hit a word count; then again lots of authors seem to do that--which bugs me.

Didn't love it, didn't hate it. I really like the author but I think this is one of his weakest.

[Andy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this book but I didn't love it. A bunch of uber-macho single guys all kick back with BBQ and brewskis at the same swinging singles apartment building in Florida. One's an airline pilot, one sells real estate, another's a surgeon, etc. whatever.
We get to experience their trials and tribulations with evil hippie White Trash drug dealers who don't know how to treat a dame the way they only know how, with their polyester jumpsuits, feathered hair, and vinyl cowboy boots.
Half the time I wanted to laugh and the other half I just wanted it to be over. A good book shouldn't do that!

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite a shift from his tighter genre-observant Hoke Moseley novels, SHARK reads like some of Willeford's other writing (e.g., BURNT-ORANGE HERESY) that exploreS the lives of outcasts and sociopaths. This novel,a sort of seedy neon Miami extreme of that type, is neither a traditional noir nor a play on the conventions of noir, but it's a compelling read anyway. The novel feels fragmentary--or a bit unfinished--and I have wondered about the circumstances of its publication. I found it a good, if idiosyncratic and nasty, piece of work.

[Andrea · Rating 4 out of 5]

Completely chilling, more in the contrast between its banality and the casual violence, though the violence is real enough in this humid Miami of the lower white-collar worker with aspirations and rampant masculinity. Interchangeable stewardesses abound, nubile sex-starved Cubans too, the man certainly has one use for women. But it's a hard book to put down; the characters may be unlikeable but they are certainly unforgettable. And the neighborhood grocery store owner with 27 hits under his belt? Pure genius.

[M.G. Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Leisure suits and swinger life...take a trip back to the seventies with Willeford's classic. I love this one. Reminds me of a more laid back version of Ellis' American Psycho, only these guys are a little more likeable and realistic. Good ole American consumerism and fashion sense thinly veil an inner soullessness that quickly lashes out into homicide. But these guys aren't serial killers, heck no. Just regular normal guys out for a good time. Likeable creeps all too similar to real people. Yikes. That's bleak, M.G.!

[Andy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mine seems to be the minority opinion here on Goodreads, but that's okay. I think this novel is brilliant and here's why: Willeford gives us a very tense situation between four friends after making a bet with one another. Then we get a look at each of these guys individually, learning why they act and live the way they do. As these four sections sheds light on each character, we begin to understand how they became friends, why they've stuck together, and how the implications of their predicament are so potentially devastating. Amazing stuff.

[Martha · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's a very well-woven story that rewards patience because it doesn't really start to come together until about 2/3 of the way through. It's also quite cutting and clever at times, which is appealing. That said, none of the four central characters is remotely appealing (by intent, one assumes), and the casual racism and rampaging misogyny are pretty hard to take, even if they are somewhat accurate representations of mid-1970s attitudes.