Boise Longpig Hunting Club
Nick Kolakowski
Down & Out Books
ISBN-10: 1948235137
ISBN-13: 978-1948235136
320 pages
August 2018
$3.99/$14.95
In his May 2017 interview with Writer's Bone, Nick Kolakowski states, “I feel that crime fiction is a real exploration of the human animal. . . you want a peek at the beast that lives within us, crack open a crime novel.”
Kolakowski gets right down to that brutal beast within us in Boise Longpig Hunting Club. This relentless, fast-paced novel expands his sharp and gritty short story that first appeared in Thuglit Issue 21 titled “A Nice Pair of Guns.”
Rough guy and Iraq War Vet Jake Halligan is an Idaho bounty hunter who encounters every breed of low-life on a daily basis. He is a straightforward man with simple desires: work hard and enjoy life in rural southern Idaho, his space apart from the rest of the human race. He likes to spend time fishing after a rough week of rounding up criminal degenerates, bail-jumpers, and wacked-out drug addicts, and he is not averse to ending his day with few beers while he appreciates “the moments of order and justice that life can bring with hard work.”
But Jake’s life is anything but simple. He is a bounty hunter, and disliked by both the bail jumpers he chases, and the local cops. He is working hard on a second attempt at marriage with his ex-wife Janine, a worthy endeavor, but fraught with obstacles. And then there is his little sister Frankie, an illegal arms dealer, and a bad-ass crime queen who likes to solve problems with heavy artillery and explosions.
On a larger scale, Jake witnesses the vanishing and reshaping of the beautiful rugged southern Idaho countryside under an invasion of rich Californian and Texans, “potato kings, microchip executives, fast-food chain owners famous for tits labor laws violations, and other captains of industry, grabbing up the open land.” Giant McMansions and ugly malls with chain stores and Olive Gardens sprout upon formerly rugged, remote countryside. Kolakowski provides a brief but insightful passage of Jake and Janine are reluctantly about to meet their rich new neighbors.
We pulled into the long driveway of a two story McMansion with a commanding view of the river, its windows ablaze with light. These houses had sprung up across southern Idaho in recent years, bought by rich Californians or Texans in the market for a second or third home. They might have enjoyed the state’s low taxes and stunning landscape, but I often wondered what they thought about living next door to folks who barely scraped by?
The action intensifies when a body shows up in Jake’s gun safe. Jake can’t figure out if it is a warning, because the list of people who might want to send him a message is long: street level thugs, meth-heads, Aryan Nation, even local law enforcement. They all carry some level of grudge against him or his family. The mystery of who is behind the killings deepens until Jake, Janine and Frankie finds themselves in a survival death-match reminiscent of The Most Dangerous Game.
Kolakowski writes in an unswerving and straightforward style reminiscent of old school crime writers Raymond Chandler, and James M. Cain with this fast-paced, dark storyline and sharp dialogue. His dry humor shines in brief descriptions such as “a guy so muscular that. . . he looked like a half pound of rocks squeezed into a condom.” Despite the complex themes that mirror the difficulties prodding America today, Kolakowski is neither preachy nor heavy handed. He skillfully tackles the vast divide between those who have, and those who have-not, then dives deep into what could happen when money is plentiful, and the value of life is nonexistent. The bad guys may not look like bad guys at first “they look like a bunch of fat white men, but trust me when I tell you they can fuck up your shit better than anyone, because they can do it in broad daylight without worrying about any consequences.”
Jake and Frankie Halligan are the antidote to entitlement. Their banter is sharp, quick and funny, particularly during the moments of intense action where Frankie reminds Jake, “Our family, we don’t fold under pressure, we die with our teeth in our last enemy’s throat.” Which is not meant to imply that they are as cold-hearted and ruthless as their enemies. To the contrary, when Jake overhears a conversation by his captors, he responds in a real and gut-wrenching way.
Over the roaring river I caught the words “welfare” and “deadbeat,” followed by “drinking problem.” When he turned and pointed in my direction, and the men around him laughed, I knew he was talking about me. “I got a job,” I muttered. “I’m not a deadbeat.” A small, wounded part of me needed to voice that. Out of all the things that had happened to me over the past day or so—wounded, kidnapped, placed at the center of this sick little game—somehow this hurt the worst. I had done my best to make something of myself in this world, whatever my mistakes.
Boise Longpig Hunting Club combines the best of both crime and thriller. The body count goes high, and the gun count goes even higher. It is filled with chaos, suffering, and memorable characters with awesome names like Zombie Bill, Monkey Man, the Viking, Fred the Nazi Marlboro Man. It is a fast-paced story that gets right to the point and holds the reader captive until its explosive finish.
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