Karen hoped she'd be able to tell about it later. The conversation in a trunk full of handcuffs and tactical gear with a bank robber escaped convict who wondered if it would be different if they'd met in a bar. Like a first date, getting to know one another. Her dad would love it. "And then what happened?"
That was a good question.
All these years, and I'd never read an Elmore Leonard novel. I worked in a bookstore all through college and I would see the covers in the mystery section and wonder for a moment if they were any good. But I never got around to picking one up. I took a class about writing dialogue a few months ago, and the teacher recommended Leonard's work highly. My very nice sister then purchased me two of his novels for Christmas - this one, and Get Shorty, which is now in the stack of to-reads.
It's a plot straight out of a romantic comedy crime movie - boy breaks out of prison, boy meets girl who is a federal marshal, boy kidnaps girl, and falls in love with her while they're both stuffed in the trunk. Will the boy turn to the straight and narrow to win the girl? Will the girl chuck it all and run away with the bank robber? Or will she just arrest him?
I went through a period of reading every Carl Hiaasen novel I could get my hands on (except the one about golf - not even Carl can get me to read about golf), and I see why Elmore Leonard is usually considered to be in the same category. Bumbling criminals who aren't really that bad, even if a little nutty, an improbable love story, and plenty of humor. At the moment, though, Carl is still my favorite in the genre.
The only problem with this one was that it wasn't quite convincing. I'm willing to suspend my belief for just about any story - bank robbers, ghosts, unicorns - but I never quite saw the point in the book where Karen Sisco turns from being afraid of Jack Foley, or of simply wanting to arrest him, to falling in love with him. Maybe I just saw it from the point of view of a woman - if I'm locked in a trunk with a guy who busted out of prison, who keeps running his hand down my leg and talking about how it would be different if we had met in a bar, no matter how witty and charming he is, I'm out of there the minute I can run. It was just a given that she would fall for him, but there wasn't anything there to say why - what was it about this guy?
What I said before about this being the plot of a romantic comedy crime movie? It was made into one, starring Jennifer Lopez and George Clooney in the late 90's. I have it on reserve at the library. It must be one of the lesser Lopez films, somewhere after The Wedding Planner and The Cell (which is one of the most twisted, visually beautiful movies I've ever seen) - so I hadn't heard of it until I read this book. I'll check in after I watch it and let you know if she manages to do Leonard proud. IMDB says Catherine Keener and Don Cheadle have parts in it, so it can't be all bad, can it?
I look forward to reading some more of Elmore Leonard's novels. His work is widely renowned, and I'm hoping Get Shorty will be the one to convince me.
