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Cheapskates
Reese Waters is barely a day out of Fishkill Penitentiary before his world is spinning crazily out of his control, in this shrewd new crime novel from Charlie Stella.
An unlikely hero—formerly a New York city bus driver and now an ex-con—Reese wants only to do the right thing by his prison buddy Peter Rizzo. He just doesn’t expect the right thing to entail $50,000 in cash, a funeral, a couple of hitmen, and the mean-spirited schemes of Rizzo’s congenitally greedy ex-wife.
Headstrong, principled, edgy, and a bit naïve, Reese stumbles into the hard-boiled heart of Stella’s fast-paced, fast-talking, continually unpredictable plot. Yet even when Reese finds himself facing down Mafia consigliere Jimmy “Wigs” Valentine (he’s got a lot more wigs than scruples) or parleying with a Nation of Islam splinter group or stymieing the homicide investigation of two NYPD detectives, Reese doesn’t falter. Because he made Pete a promise.
It’s a promise that more than several ruthless, grasping, and increasingly dangerous cheapskates don’t want Reese to keep. For they’re all after the money, which is all at the same time a divorce settlement, an unhonored debt, a dead man’s ransom, a shakedown, a killer’s fee, and a mere fifty Gs. What they will do for it, in Stella’s dynamite climax, gets as wild as the ride of a renegade bus running loose through a nighttime shoot-out in the narrow streets of Lower Manhattan.
An unlikely hero—formerly a New York city bus driver and now an ex-con—Reese wants only to do the right thing by his prison buddy Peter Rizzo. He just doesn’t expect the right thing to entail $50,000 in cash, a funeral, a couple of hitmen, and the mean-spirited schemes of Rizzo’s congenitally greedy ex-wife.
Headstrong, principled, edgy, and a bit naïve, Reese stumbles into the hard-boiled heart of Stella’s fast-paced, fast-talking, continually unpredictable plot. Yet even when Reese finds himself facing down Mafia consigliere Jimmy “Wigs” Valentine (he’s got a lot more wigs than scruples) or parleying with a Nation of Islam splinter group or stymieing the homicide investigation of two NYPD detectives, Reese doesn’t falter. Because he made Pete a promise.
It’s a promise that more than several ruthless, grasping, and increasingly dangerous cheapskates don’t want Reese to keep. For they’re all after the money, which is all at the same time a divorce settlement, an unhonored debt, a dead man’s ransom, a shakedown, a killer’s fee, and a mere fifty Gs. What they will do for it, in Stella’s dynamite climax, gets as wild as the ride of a renegade bus running loose through a nighttime shoot-out in the narrow streets of Lower Manhattan.
- GenresCrime
293 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2005
1 person is currently reading
40 people want to read
About the author
Charlie Stella
23 books27 followersCarmelo Stella is an author long familiar with the street life of New York City, which figures substantially in his writing. His work includes plays, performed off-off-Broadway, his debut novel called Eddie's World and Jimmy Bench-press, also published by Hale. He lives in New Jersey.
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
December 12, 2012
I’ve been through a period of grieving these last couple of months and it hasn’t been easy.
One thing that was radically affected was my ability to concentrate upon any fiction longer than around a thousand words.
What I needed to conquer the reader’s block was a book that would grab me from the start, would work as a page-turner, had sharply drawn characters and kept a really high standard of quality writing.
I tried 3 or 4 before finding my solution and in the end it was Charlie Stella’s Cheapskates that whisked me back to reader heaven.
I’m grateful to Mr Stella for that.
‘Cheapskates’ is a fantastic read.
Early on, the book visits a prison cell where a couple of inmates of very different personalities are housed just before their release.
The thing they have in common is a strong sense of justice and a need to see the right thing done.
For one of those inmates, Peter Rizzo, he’s all set to retrieve money from his ex-wife who owes him 50k plus interest.
Cellmate Reese Waters is a placid man, a drummer and a reader and something of a sage. He’s done his best to talk Rizzo after going after the cash and has persuaded his friend to allow him to act as a go-between in order to save Rizzo from a parole violation.
When the pair get out from Fishkill and go their separate ways, they agree to meet up and work things out.
Reese goes along to meet Rizzo’s ex as planned. She’s as much of a cheapskate as he’s been told and he takes an instant dislike for her when she gives him the brush-off.
What Reese doesn’t know at that point is that the ex has had Rizzo bumped off, using connections to the mob via her lover Jimmy Valentine.
From then on the plot gathers apace and really thickens.
Reese needs to see justice done. The cops get involved, the mob do what they can to tie up loose ends before they’re indicted for one thing or another, there’s a drunken bus driver, a mean old man who eats discount cakes all week for lunch, there’s a radical Muslim brotherhood offering muscle, a discredited officer from the organised –crime squad and there are solicitors with hearts and without.
It’s a tangled web they all weave and it’s clear from the beginning that some of them are going to get caught up by their own dealings.
What’s not so clear is who that’s going to be.
Stella works the plot like a master plate spinner. The points of view change at regular intervals and this is managed with immense skill.
The plot thickens at every turn and the twists make this interesting from start to finish.
I loved many things about Cheapskates.
Firstly, the characters are diverse and very-well defined. They come from different backgrounds entirely and Stella uses the differences in ways that play with stereotype as much as they buck the obvious to find the unique. What this allows is for changing the angle of story-telling with ease as the people involved are immediately recognisable.
Next there is the mob background. I can’t help it, I’m a sucker for a good gangster tale. What makes it all the better is that it feels like Stella has been there and lived the life. It has a real authenticity to it all that you won’t often find in fiction.
There’s the dialogue. It’s a pleasure all on its own.
And there’s the humour. Amidst all of the serious plays is a really dry comedy that provided another dimension. I like to laugh and I laughed a lot – with people like the ones on these pages, it would be difficult to keep a straight face.
The overall work is a piece of class. If the book was in the mafia it would be the Godfather. And you’d better believe that, believe me.
One thing that was radically affected was my ability to concentrate upon any fiction longer than around a thousand words.
What I needed to conquer the reader’s block was a book that would grab me from the start, would work as a page-turner, had sharply drawn characters and kept a really high standard of quality writing.
I tried 3 or 4 before finding my solution and in the end it was Charlie Stella’s Cheapskates that whisked me back to reader heaven.
I’m grateful to Mr Stella for that.
‘Cheapskates’ is a fantastic read.
Early on, the book visits a prison cell where a couple of inmates of very different personalities are housed just before their release.
The thing they have in common is a strong sense of justice and a need to see the right thing done.
For one of those inmates, Peter Rizzo, he’s all set to retrieve money from his ex-wife who owes him 50k plus interest.
Cellmate Reese Waters is a placid man, a drummer and a reader and something of a sage. He’s done his best to talk Rizzo after going after the cash and has persuaded his friend to allow him to act as a go-between in order to save Rizzo from a parole violation.
When the pair get out from Fishkill and go their separate ways, they agree to meet up and work things out.
Reese goes along to meet Rizzo’s ex as planned. She’s as much of a cheapskate as he’s been told and he takes an instant dislike for her when she gives him the brush-off.
What Reese doesn’t know at that point is that the ex has had Rizzo bumped off, using connections to the mob via her lover Jimmy Valentine.
From then on the plot gathers apace and really thickens.
Reese needs to see justice done. The cops get involved, the mob do what they can to tie up loose ends before they’re indicted for one thing or another, there’s a drunken bus driver, a mean old man who eats discount cakes all week for lunch, there’s a radical Muslim brotherhood offering muscle, a discredited officer from the organised –crime squad and there are solicitors with hearts and without.
It’s a tangled web they all weave and it’s clear from the beginning that some of them are going to get caught up by their own dealings.
What’s not so clear is who that’s going to be.
Stella works the plot like a master plate spinner. The points of view change at regular intervals and this is managed with immense skill.
The plot thickens at every turn and the twists make this interesting from start to finish.
I loved many things about Cheapskates.
Firstly, the characters are diverse and very-well defined. They come from different backgrounds entirely and Stella uses the differences in ways that play with stereotype as much as they buck the obvious to find the unique. What this allows is for changing the angle of story-telling with ease as the people involved are immediately recognisable.
Next there is the mob background. I can’t help it, I’m a sucker for a good gangster tale. What makes it all the better is that it feels like Stella has been there and lived the life. It has a real authenticity to it all that you won’t often find in fiction.
There’s the dialogue. It’s a pleasure all on its own.
And there’s the humour. Amidst all of the serious plays is a really dry comedy that provided another dimension. I like to laugh and I laughed a lot – with people like the ones on these pages, it would be difficult to keep a straight face.
The overall work is a piece of class. If the book was in the mafia it would be the Godfather. And you’d better believe that, believe me.
June 9, 2009
Charlie writes the best dialogue I've read in crime fiction, bar none.
October 4, 2020
My favorite Charlie Stella novel so far. Just great crime fiction, gritty, funny and real as hell.
October 19, 2024
Another great read,
from one of the most
underrated writers
of crime fiction.
Mobsters and stale pastries,
Ex-con looking to set things right,
in a very wrong world.
from one of the most
underrated writers
of crime fiction.
Mobsters and stale pastries,
Ex-con looking to set things right,
in a very wrong world.
February 28, 2025
This was great! The dialogue is excellent and the characters were outstanding. A true character driven story!
October 7, 2013
Cheapskates is Charlie Stella’s fourth novel. I want to say it’s his best, but my opinion of which of his books is best is closely tied to which one I’ve read most recently. They all have multi-dimensional, tight plotting and fly-on-the-wall dialog. The characters are all bent to some degree, each in his or her own way, even when they’re legit. That’s not the same as saying all the books are the same, except when comparing relative quality.
Peter Rizzo and Reese Waters are friends in Fishkill Penitentiary, scheduled for release on the same day. The two got tight when Peter protected Reese during a gang fight and was shanked for his trouble. Neither is a hard-core criminal—it can be argued whether they’re criminals at all. Now they’re about to get out and Peter has developed an unhealthy obsession with fifty thousand dollars his ex-wife cheated him out of. He doesn’t want revenge or violence. He just wants his money.
Unknown to Peter, Janice, his ex, has taken up with Jimmy Valentine, consiglieri to the Vigneiri crime family. Janice knows every fold and crease of every bill that’s ever passed through her hands. There’s no way she’s giving up fifty large. She has plans for Peter when he gets out.
Stella has a gift for knowing exactly how much writing to do. The story and characters are plenty to maintain interest. The players are who they are, helped—or done in—by their own traits. No one’s stupid. No one is as smart as they think they are, either. Things are in play only the reader is fully aware of. The characters react to the bits they know, filtered through their personal strengths and weaknesses. The climactic scene, told from multiple, overlapping points of view, is virtuoso writing, as it needs to be to keep all the balls in the air.
The key to telling a story well is to make as much of it as the characters do. I recently read a review of the movie 42 that identified the problem with most biopics as the characters speak and act as if they know a movie is being made and they need to make sure everyone gets the import of what is going on. Good point. People rarely know where their comments and daily actions stand in the context of history. A Brazilian friend of mine who had never seen a baseball game before was ecstatic over the pre-game warm-ups; “they never drop the ball!” To me, meh. I can catch. What’s the big deal?
To a fiction writer, this means not to overemphasize comments or emotions the character isn’t likely to think much about in the moment. A housewife talking about the best way to boil an egg so the shell doesn’t stick may make an instructional point; she’s not going to get moist about it. If the characters tend to be cops or criminals, violence and harsh language are likely to be all in a day’s work. Write it that way. Purple prose is not required to describe a hit man putting three in some poor jerk’s chest. The hit man doesn’t feel any emotion; the victim doesn’t have time. There’s no need to drag it out, and over-the-top writing would only gild the lily. A man was killed. For money. Any reader who can’t pick up on the inhumanity without being told how to feel has problems we can’t address in a blog.
Stella’s solution is simple: trust the reader.
..It was a navy blue Chrysler. An old man with gray hair was driving. He motioned at [ ]to come closer as he held up a piece of paper.
“You know where this address is?” the driver asked. He was holding the paper awkwardly with his left hand.
[ ] froze where he stood, about five yards from the driver’s door, but it was already too late. The driver braced the silencer against his left elbow to steady his aim. He fired three times in quick succession. All three bullets found their mark.
[ ] barely heard the phutlike sound. His eyes opened slightly between the first and second shots. He was already dead on his feet before the third one exploded through his chest.
(Yeah, like I was going to tell you who this is getting clipped. )
That’s it. A man is gone. The killer doesn’t feel much different from the victim, who doesn’t feel anything. You can feel however you want. You’ve been told what happened, and how. That’s everything you need.
Cheapskates is also laugh out loud funny at times. Janice’s father is a construction millionaire who lives on out-of-date pastries. The banter between the cops is always spot on, and there is a lot to smile at done by people who would see you laughing and say, “What?”
It’s hard to pick one best thing about Cheapskates. Good thing you don’t have to. Read it all.
(Full disclosure: Charlie Stella and I are good friends. To say he has been encouraging and supportive of my writing is like saying Warren Buffett makes a nice living.)
Peter Rizzo and Reese Waters are friends in Fishkill Penitentiary, scheduled for release on the same day. The two got tight when Peter protected Reese during a gang fight and was shanked for his trouble. Neither is a hard-core criminal—it can be argued whether they’re criminals at all. Now they’re about to get out and Peter has developed an unhealthy obsession with fifty thousand dollars his ex-wife cheated him out of. He doesn’t want revenge or violence. He just wants his money.
Unknown to Peter, Janice, his ex, has taken up with Jimmy Valentine, consiglieri to the Vigneiri crime family. Janice knows every fold and crease of every bill that’s ever passed through her hands. There’s no way she’s giving up fifty large. She has plans for Peter when he gets out.
Stella has a gift for knowing exactly how much writing to do. The story and characters are plenty to maintain interest. The players are who they are, helped—or done in—by their own traits. No one’s stupid. No one is as smart as they think they are, either. Things are in play only the reader is fully aware of. The characters react to the bits they know, filtered through their personal strengths and weaknesses. The climactic scene, told from multiple, overlapping points of view, is virtuoso writing, as it needs to be to keep all the balls in the air.
The key to telling a story well is to make as much of it as the characters do. I recently read a review of the movie 42 that identified the problem with most biopics as the characters speak and act as if they know a movie is being made and they need to make sure everyone gets the import of what is going on. Good point. People rarely know where their comments and daily actions stand in the context of history. A Brazilian friend of mine who had never seen a baseball game before was ecstatic over the pre-game warm-ups; “they never drop the ball!” To me, meh. I can catch. What’s the big deal?
To a fiction writer, this means not to overemphasize comments or emotions the character isn’t likely to think much about in the moment. A housewife talking about the best way to boil an egg so the shell doesn’t stick may make an instructional point; she’s not going to get moist about it. If the characters tend to be cops or criminals, violence and harsh language are likely to be all in a day’s work. Write it that way. Purple prose is not required to describe a hit man putting three in some poor jerk’s chest. The hit man doesn’t feel any emotion; the victim doesn’t have time. There’s no need to drag it out, and over-the-top writing would only gild the lily. A man was killed. For money. Any reader who can’t pick up on the inhumanity without being told how to feel has problems we can’t address in a blog.
Stella’s solution is simple: trust the reader.
..It was a navy blue Chrysler. An old man with gray hair was driving. He motioned at [ ]to come closer as he held up a piece of paper.
“You know where this address is?” the driver asked. He was holding the paper awkwardly with his left hand.
[ ] froze where he stood, about five yards from the driver’s door, but it was already too late. The driver braced the silencer against his left elbow to steady his aim. He fired three times in quick succession. All three bullets found their mark.
[ ] barely heard the phutlike sound. His eyes opened slightly between the first and second shots. He was already dead on his feet before the third one exploded through his chest.
(Yeah, like I was going to tell you who this is getting clipped. )
That’s it. A man is gone. The killer doesn’t feel much different from the victim, who doesn’t feel anything. You can feel however you want. You’ve been told what happened, and how. That’s everything you need.
Cheapskates is also laugh out loud funny at times. Janice’s father is a construction millionaire who lives on out-of-date pastries. The banter between the cops is always spot on, and there is a lot to smile at done by people who would see you laughing and say, “What?”
It’s hard to pick one best thing about Cheapskates. Good thing you don’t have to. Read it all.
(Full disclosure: Charlie Stella and I are good friends. To say he has been encouraging and supportive of my writing is like saying Warren Buffett makes a nice living.)
August 26, 2008
The Queen of Mean
You know, life really isn't fair. Talented writers - really talented writers - like Charlie Stella languish in back rooms and low shelves while hacks like James Patterson make everybody's bestseller list.
"Cheapskates" is another crime fiction jewel from the wily Stella, a clever and darkly humorous tale of crooked deeds and undying, if misplaced, loyalty. Reese Waters and Peter Rizzo are roommates - roommates at upstate New York's Fishkill penitentiary. Reese has served his time, and upon his release, he promises Rizzo he'll do what he can to recover $50,000 his ex-wife chiseled from him. If the well-meaning Reese thinks he's getting the runaround from the pathologically greedy ex-wife, Janice Barrett and the low-rent New York gangsters her contractor dad and brother hang out with, he finds that life can get really ugly when buddy Rizzo turns up murdered.
What separates "Cheapskates" - and Stella - from the mob is the cast of offbeat characters that breeze through the pages of his novels. There's Jimmy "Wigs" Valentine, the slime ball Mafioso with lots of disguises but zero class. Then you have Micheal Barrett, the sixty-eight year-old self-made millionaire, who is so cheap that he stocks up on day-old and damaged Entenmann's pastry that he eats for breakfast - and lunch - all week long. Or Arlene Belzinger, the tough-as-nails NYPD detective with a body and attitude to match. But the real star here is Janice Barrett, a bitch in every one of the meanest ways the name conjures. A woman so miserable that Rizzo pines, "Sometime I think that if I ever got cancer, I'll run her over on the way to chemo." Combined with her cheapskate father and slacker brother, Stella creates a whole new dimension to the dysfunction family. Couple this cast with Stella's own brand of slick, hip dialogue and you've got some of the most engaging fiction of vice and corruption this side of Elmore Leonard.
So do yourself a favor - get off the well beaten track and get introduced to Charlie Stella. The Goodfellas and Godfathers have never been so entertaining.
You know, life really isn't fair. Talented writers - really talented writers - like Charlie Stella languish in back rooms and low shelves while hacks like James Patterson make everybody's bestseller list.
"Cheapskates" is another crime fiction jewel from the wily Stella, a clever and darkly humorous tale of crooked deeds and undying, if misplaced, loyalty. Reese Waters and Peter Rizzo are roommates - roommates at upstate New York's Fishkill penitentiary. Reese has served his time, and upon his release, he promises Rizzo he'll do what he can to recover $50,000 his ex-wife chiseled from him. If the well-meaning Reese thinks he's getting the runaround from the pathologically greedy ex-wife, Janice Barrett and the low-rent New York gangsters her contractor dad and brother hang out with, he finds that life can get really ugly when buddy Rizzo turns up murdered.
What separates "Cheapskates" - and Stella - from the mob is the cast of offbeat characters that breeze through the pages of his novels. There's Jimmy "Wigs" Valentine, the slime ball Mafioso with lots of disguises but zero class. Then you have Micheal Barrett, the sixty-eight year-old self-made millionaire, who is so cheap that he stocks up on day-old and damaged Entenmann's pastry that he eats for breakfast - and lunch - all week long. Or Arlene Belzinger, the tough-as-nails NYPD detective with a body and attitude to match. But the real star here is Janice Barrett, a bitch in every one of the meanest ways the name conjures. A woman so miserable that Rizzo pines, "Sometime I think that if I ever got cancer, I'll run her over on the way to chemo." Combined with her cheapskate father and slacker brother, Stella creates a whole new dimension to the dysfunction family. Couple this cast with Stella's own brand of slick, hip dialogue and you've got some of the most engaging fiction of vice and corruption this side of Elmore Leonard.
So do yourself a favor - get off the well beaten track and get introduced to Charlie Stella. The Goodfellas and Godfathers have never been so entertaining.
October 10, 2009
A good book, but it all seems so familiar. It's not really Stella's fault, but he puts himself in a tough position. When writing about wiseguys from New Jersey, an author is always in danger of caricature. Even if the reality is close to the stereotype.
Even the structure of the book feels like 1990s Pelecanos (before his books started to become so spare they're almost not there), with four or five storylines linked by a shared event, coming together for the big finale. However, in CHEAPSKATES, the story coasts to the end, rather than hitting the gas. The momentum even and paced.
The book is fun. The characters are fun. The dialogue is fun. Comfort reading.
Even the structure of the book feels like 1990s Pelecanos (before his books started to become so spare they're almost not there), with four or five storylines linked by a shared event, coming together for the big finale. However, in CHEAPSKATES, the story coasts to the end, rather than hitting the gas. The momentum even and paced.
The book is fun. The characters are fun. The dialogue is fun. Comfort reading.
October 22, 2015
Charlie Stella is a worthy heir to some of the genre's masters. I definitely got a George V. Higgins vibe, as well as Vincent Patrick, but Stella's work bears his own imprint. He comes up with great characters: the ways the title cheapskates pinch pennies are a delight, and the pairing of Reese and Laney develops in ways I did not expect. The mob is a well-worked patch of turf, but even though things are familiar there, they're not trite.
Stella also excels with dialogue and makes outstanding use of New York city locations, including some less familiar corners of Brooklyn.
Stella also excels with dialogue and makes outstanding use of New York city locations, including some less familiar corners of Brooklyn.
June 17, 2011
There's a very cool stream of consciousness vibe to the book. Each chapter is broken up into little character vignettes, like a cop show, a Law & Order. You drop into all these pieces of the narrative and just ping back and forth. I rather liked that.
Want to read
October 30, 2007recommended
September 22, 2008
I liked this book featuring ex cons, New Jersey gangsters and an alcoholic bus driver......
May 9, 2009
a real modern type goodfella read. I enjoyed it. Charlie Stella is a fantastic writer. He catches the moods of the city.
April 18, 2011
Loved it! Awesome writing that made me feel as if I was in the story, Pitch perfect dialog.
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews