Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #77344 in Books
• Published on: 2003-07-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 272 pages

Synopsis
Organised crime, gangland turf war, hijacking, shoot outs, betrayal and violent death provides the backdrop to this riveting new novel Checkers - co-authored by Alex Wheatle and Mark Parham. As with his other critically acclaimed books (East of Acre Lane and Brixton Rock) Wheatle uses the south London landscape as the backbeat for this modern day tale of gangland crime in inner city London, while Parham depicts the East End in with an authentic cutting edge. In Checkers, the pair have put together a page turner of a novel which tells the story of ambitious crime boss Careful Eddie Maynard, who entices two opposing gangs to work together to high-jack a plane containing contra band over the Thames Estuary. The touch paper is lit on the night of the hijacking when Maynard is later found dead - and the contra band is nowhere to be found...what happened to the gangland boss and, more importantly, where is the missing contra band? It is at this point that Wheatle and Parham set the scene for turbulent retribution with a turf war like no other. After all, When South and East London collide, there can be no prisoners- only corpses.

Customer Reviews

Black and white gang warfare that isn't black and white.
Ecellent! Okay, I'm not a big fan of crime novels but this book was good because it used all the traditional crime themes in a realistic way rather than just cliches. Reading this book is going to be a shock for the kind of people who think crime is somehow glamerous, the diamonds that the two gangs are pursuing are the only sparkley thing you'll find in these pages. It's a multiauthor and I was a bit worried that I'd see the joins in the writing, but no fears there as it was seamless. Oh, and you know those trite blurbs that say "I couldn't put it down"? Well I pretty much couldn't put it down, sorry!

"checkers"
A very well written book. Very brutal and violent, portraying to the provincial city dweller like me a side of london i thought i knew about. This book is like a train, with momentum being built up throughout the book, with the ending like a 'runaway freight train'. I really liked this book, if you like books of this genre then i would highly recommend it!!!!