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Riding the Rap

Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
1 of 1 copy available

"Wicked and irresistible....Elmore Leonard is a literary genius."
—New York Times Book Review

Before U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens began electrifying TV viewers across America (in the hit series Justified), he "starred" in Elmore Leonard's Riding the Rap—an explosive, twisty tale of a brazen Florida kidnap caper gone outrageously wrong. Chock full of wildly eccentric and deliciously criminal characters—including a psycho enforcer with a green thumb, a Bahamian bad man, and the beautiful, unabashedly greedy psychic Reverend Dawn—Riding the Rap dazzles with Leonard's trademark ingenious plot turns and razor-keen dialogue. Gripping, surprising, and unforgettable, it is a crime fiction gem that any thriller writer—from past masters John D. MacDonald, Dashiell Hammett, and James M. Cain to the bestselling mystery auteurs of today—would be thrilled to call his own.

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    • Publisher's Weekly

      May 1, 1995
      Simple scams usually turn complex in Leonard land, where the author can doubtless choreograph his scammers' moves in his sleep by now; indeed, much of Rap appears to be riding on automatic pilot. Nevertheless, even middling Leonard is as good as anyone else gets on a good day. This darkly witty page-turner returns to the vexed, triangular relationship of Florida marshal Raylan Givens, his girlfriend, Joyce, and her ex-lover, the aging bookie Harry Arno (all seen previously in Pronto). When Harry disappears while chasing down a tardy debtor named Chip Ganz, Joyce admonishes Raylan to investigate. It turns out Chip is a middle-aged pothead living in his mother's seedy beach mansion, whose stoned analysis of televised hostage situations has fueled a baroque kidnapping scheme, into which Harry has stumbled. Like many a Leonard bad guy, Ganz only talks a good game. It falls upon an ex-con and his preening psychotic cohort to execute the caper, with help from an alluring psychic. Raylan's probe takes him into a shadowy New Age subculture of Tarot readings and Hugger conventions, which Leonard limns with characteristic grit and black humor. Ultimately, however, the story lacks the high voltage of Leonard's best work.

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Mantegna's Bahamian and Latin accents for Louie Louie and Bobby Deo are masterful and entertaining. For Elmore Leonard fans, Mantegna's tough-guy narration is an audio delight. I.Z. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      April 29, 1996
      Leonard's latest, about a kidnapped bookie, spent two weeks on PW's bestseller list.

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  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

Languages

  • English

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