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Daniel Port #1
Dig My Grave Deep
Rabe, Peter
143 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1956
3 people are currently reading
60 people want to read
About the author
Peter Rabe
112 books15 followersPeter Rabe aka Peter Rabinowitsch, was a German American writer who also used the nom de plumes Marco Malaponte and J.T. MacCargo (though not all of the latter's books were by him). Rabe was the author of over 30 books, mostly of crime fiction, published between 1955 and 1975.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
November 6, 2022
Peter Rabe wrote six books in his Daniel Port series, about a mobster who retires and continues to have adventures. The books in the series include Dig My Grave Deep (1956), The Out is Death (1957), Its My Funeral (1957), The Cut of the Whip (1958), Bring Me Another Corpse (1959), and Time Enough to Die (1959), all written at the height of Rabe’s crime writing career.
In Dig My Grave Deep, Daniel Port finds out how difficult it is to walk away from the mob and remain on decent terms with his former employers. Trying to gracefully retire from business, but caught between two warring mobs and the greedy politicians, he tries one clever plan after another to keep his mob solvent till he can walk away. To complicate matters, he gets involved with two young Spanish siblings, one of whom is eager to work his way into the mob, too eager in fact, and the other one, the sister, who Port can’t take his eyes off of, although she doesn’t want to be involved with any one like that.
The plot may not be all that complicated, but this book is simply dark, tough-guy mobster action outplotting each other with meanness and violence. It seems to move forward at a furious pace even without the use of literary descriptions or such. Rabe really excels at portraying these tough mobster types and some of the political hijinks are clever.
In Dig My Grave Deep, Daniel Port finds out how difficult it is to walk away from the mob and remain on decent terms with his former employers. Trying to gracefully retire from business, but caught between two warring mobs and the greedy politicians, he tries one clever plan after another to keep his mob solvent till he can walk away. To complicate matters, he gets involved with two young Spanish siblings, one of whom is eager to work his way into the mob, too eager in fact, and the other one, the sister, who Port can’t take his eyes off of, although she doesn’t want to be involved with any one like that.
The plot may not be all that complicated, but this book is simply dark, tough-guy mobster action outplotting each other with meanness and violence. It seems to move forward at a furious pace even without the use of literary descriptions or such. Rabe really excels at portraying these tough mobster types and some of the political hijinks are clever.
January 18, 2016
Pulpy Tagline:
"He wanted out of the big rackets—and the boys said okay—feet first!"
Oh man, this one was hard to get through! This was one of the most difficult times I've had reading something that I was actually interested in. I was attracted by the reputation of pulp author Peter Rabe, the nifty title, and the awesome cover. The story of a gangster who's lost the taste for the bad life and having to fight to get out from under his mob bosses isn't the most original of plots, but if done well, could be pretty great. But jeez, all the shady deals with crooked politicians and pages-long talks about wards and taxes and properties just bored me to tears. And the book is only like 150 pages! I feel like I'm getting increasingly impatient while reading now that I've seen what could be done when great, efficient writers take the helm, and this book might be an unfortunate victim of that impatience. To add to that, the writing was glaringly awkward, clunky, dated, and sometimes downright confusing. I read a review where someone mentioned that Rabe learned English as an adult and knowing that now, that might be a big factor in the writing style. Granted, the problems that I had got better as the book went on but ultimately it still wasn't very enjoyable. But Rabe was a very popular pulp novelist and a Gold Medal star and I have some other attractive books by him, so I'll give his work another try. Maybe this wasn't the one to start with...
Oh man, this one was hard to get through! This was one of the most difficult times I've had reading something that I was actually interested in. I was attracted by the reputation of pulp author Peter Rabe, the nifty title, and the awesome cover. The story of a gangster who's lost the taste for the bad life and having to fight to get out from under his mob bosses isn't the most original of plots, but if done well, could be pretty great. But jeez, all the shady deals with crooked politicians and pages-long talks about wards and taxes and properties just bored me to tears. And the book is only like 150 pages! I feel like I'm getting increasingly impatient while reading now that I've seen what could be done when great, efficient writers take the helm, and this book might be an unfortunate victim of that impatience. To add to that, the writing was glaringly awkward, clunky, dated, and sometimes downright confusing. I read a review where someone mentioned that Rabe learned English as an adult and knowing that now, that might be a big factor in the writing style. Granted, the problems that I had got better as the book went on but ultimately it still wasn't very enjoyable. But Rabe was a very popular pulp novelist and a Gold Medal star and I have some other attractive books by him, so I'll give his work another try. Maybe this wasn't the one to start with...
April 28, 2015
A tough read. The characters are all flawed and not very likable. The lead actor is a fixer for a ward boss and the story evolves around his efforts to leave the employ of this man but with a firm control of his crooked holdings. This loyalty is the main driving force of the story. This character is used in two other books as he tries to live a quieter or at least less noticeable life. The author is known for his uncompromising tales of unlikable people just trying to get by.
May 11, 2018
If you look at the setting for this novel, you'll see definite similarities between it and the basic set up of the Coen Brothers' classic, Miller's Crossing. The main character, Daniel Port, is a fixer in the employ of the chief crime boss in town, much like Gabriel Byrne's character, Tom, is in the film. Both stories begin with the crime boss on shaky ground in terms of his holding onto power in the town, and only Port can see his friend out of this mess, much in the way Tom's the only one with the vision to know that his friend and boss, Leo, can't get through the current mess without help. Meanwhile, a rival is making moves to wrest control, and he wants Port to switch sides, much in the way Johnny Caspar attempts to coerce Tom to betray Leo. Throw in a tumultuous relationship with a woman who it's suggested has sexual feelings for her brother, a brother who is a double-crossing scumbag (much in the way the weasel, Bernie, suggests his sister Verna taught him the art of lovemaking in Miller's Crossing), and you've got a book that's too similar to the film for the Coen Brothers to be unaware of it.
Of course, beyond the setting, there's little else the two have in common. The other complaints here, that Dig My Grave Deep is boring, are not unfair. Even someone who loves crime and gangster novels like me, who would watch these old masters type out recipes for cornbread if he could, found parts of this book hard to finish without skipping pages. It turns out to be a satisfying enough read, but it's not going to make any of my favorites lists. This is mostly because the book doesn't do much. How Port handles his business is probably quite similar to the way a real fixer would do go about his routine, but while it's probably exciting as a concept, it's boring to read. Also, Rabe explains too much of what's going on in the heads of his characters for there to be too much mystery or excitement, yet he leaves out huge swaths of information that might help us understand a little better what is going on. Rabe makes more about Port's obsession with drinking cold coffee than he does what the whole plot means, and in doing so, it's easy not to care if he succeeds or fails. Had Rabe addressed these issues, it would have likely gotten a four-star rating, but as such, it lands on a very shaky three-star instead.
Of course, beyond the setting, there's little else the two have in common. The other complaints here, that Dig My Grave Deep is boring, are not unfair. Even someone who loves crime and gangster novels like me, who would watch these old masters type out recipes for cornbread if he could, found parts of this book hard to finish without skipping pages. It turns out to be a satisfying enough read, but it's not going to make any of my favorites lists. This is mostly because the book doesn't do much. How Port handles his business is probably quite similar to the way a real fixer would do go about his routine, but while it's probably exciting as a concept, it's boring to read. Also, Rabe explains too much of what's going on in the heads of his characters for there to be too much mystery or excitement, yet he leaves out huge swaths of information that might help us understand a little better what is going on. Rabe makes more about Port's obsession with drinking cold coffee than he does what the whole plot means, and in doing so, it's easy not to care if he succeeds or fails. Had Rabe addressed these issues, it would have likely gotten a four-star rating, but as such, it lands on a very shaky three-star instead.
October 29, 2019
EXTREMELY BORING
December 20, 2011
Small time crooks or city politicians? You decide in this pulpy page turner where the desire to get out of the city wards is thwarted by the greed and corruption of others. A change of pace for this type of book and not too shabby either.
March 25, 2012
I really wanted to like this more than I actually did. Still a good read, though.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews