The Town Book

Before he was a terrible actor and a mediocre comedian, Dane Cook was an above-average comedian. Back then, he had a funny bit about what all men wanted: a pet monkey, and to participate in a heist. I've never wanted a monkey; I'm too realistic for that. They smell, they fling their feces, and there's always the possibility they will tear the flesh from your still-living face. A heist, though…That's a little more interesting. There is something undeniably seductive about the planning, intricacy, and payoff of a well-executed heist. That said, I won't be quitting my day job.

Usually, when I think of the heist genre, I think of movies. Heists lend themselves to films, from great movies (Heat), chatty movies (Heist), confusing movies (Mission: Impossible), and disappointing movies (The Score). When I picked up Chuck Hogan's Prince of Thieves, I wondered if the heist genre could translate to the page. The answer: sort of.

I'm calling Prince of Thieves a heist story because - despite Hogan's aspirations for a psychological thriller - it relies on every heist cliché in the book. It has a crook with a heart of gold named Doug MacRay. Doug was a former hockey star who threw away his career because of alcohol and a bad temper. Now he's in AA and there are numerous scenes in the book with portentous discussions about addiction (rather than adding complexity, these scenes were awfully preachy). Oh, did I forget to mention this about Doug? He's looking for one last score.

His band of merry men include the psychopath (Jem), the tech guy (Dez), and the fourth leg, who's there to balance the table (Gloansy). These guys are childhood friends from the Charlestown area of Boston, which forces you to compare this book, unfairly to Dennis Lehane's Mystic River. According to Hogan, the Charlestown area, or "The Town" as it's called by its untraveled citizens, is the armored car and bank robbery capitol of America. Or at least it was in the 90s, when this book is set (in case you forget it's set in the 90s, there are dozens of 90s pop culture references strewn throughout).

Facing off against this crew is - you got it - a dogged law enforcement officer. In this case, it's FBI Agent Adam Frawley. Also thrown into the mix is a local gang leader who runs a floral shop, and Jem's sister, Krista, who is in love with Doug.

Also, there's Clare Keesey. She's the branch manager at a bank that the crew hits early in the book. They take her as a hostage, and then let her go. And then Doug starts dating her. This isn't really a cliché, I suppose, it's just ridiculous. Prince of Thieves goes to great lengths trying to make us believe this relationship, but it fails. You know how they say you can't start a relationship based on a lie? Well, that's true, especially when the lie is "No, I totally didn't take you hostage in that bank heist I pulled off!" Unfortunately, this relationship is the bedrock of the book, because it's where Doug gets his motivations. Accordingly, Doug's actions towards the end of the book veer towards "huh?"

As if this wasn't bad enough, Hogan half heartedly adds a further complication to the Doug/Clare relationship. That comes from Agent Frawley, who decides he wants to date Clare as well. Insert eye roll.

Overall, I really disliked the way that Hogan treated Frawley in the book. He's supposed to be the hero, or at least, a likeable foil. Instead, the things he does makes him an ass. Part of his catalogue of misdeeds includes breaking and entering, illegal search and seizure, and dating a material witness. The only thing he doesn't do is use the US Constitution as a napkin to wipe his mouth after breakfast at a local Dunkin' Donuts.

The defense of a book like this is that it's supposed to be "fun." Most of the time, when I hear that, I assume that "fun" is a euphemism for intellectual laziness, or dearth of creativity, or crap story punctuated by explosions. But Prince of Thieves isn't supposed to be fun, I don't think. It actually reaches for seriousness, darkness, and resonance; it just fails.

That's not to say Prince of Thieves is without merits. (Though its title is without merit). The best character is The Town itself. Hogan invests a great deal of time explaining its history, geography, and effect on its residents. Some of the most fascinating scenes explores the gentrification of such an old, immigrant-based working class neighborhood. In those scenes, I would compare this favorably to Richard Price's Lush Life. Furthermore, Hogan is a talented writer. There are some groaner lines, to be sure, but he does a pretty good job with the dialogue, and I enjoyed the witty banter between the four old friends.

I also appreciated the fact that Hogan didn't dwell on the last big score. There isn't a scene in which the main character lays everything out, and explains how they're going to have to simultaneously reroute the computers, switch out the tapes on the security cameras, and tango across a room full of laser beams. Instead, you don't find out how they're carrying out the heist until they're doing it.

The heist story is a closed universe. It is a house already built. Once inside, you can change the furniture, paint the walls, add a deck, but you have to stay within the structure. That means one of two things: your protagonist is riding off to the sunset, or he's going to the grave. In Prince of Thieves, you can sense Chuck Hogan straining at these limitations, without ever managing to exceed them.