Critique du Library Journal

Block is one of the best American crime writers. His Matt Scudder tough guy stories, Bernie Rhodenbarr comic burglar yarns, and early hard-boiled tales are uniformly excellent. Block tried something different in this 1976 novel inspired by the 1958 Charles Starkweather murder spree. For unexplained reasons, 22-year-old Jimmie John Hall begins roaming the American West shooting people. Along the way, he is joined by teenager Betty Dienhardt, who is eager to escape an unhappy home life. The writing, as always, is excellent, especially in Jimmie John's accounts of two incidents toward the end, but Block seems more concerned with sociology than psychology. That such stories of serial killers have become more commonplace undercuts some of Block's dramatic tension. Award-winning narrator Alan Sklar employs a slightly sing-song approach, with inflections rising at the ends of sentences for no obvious reason, further weakening the novel's impact. Only Block devotees are likely to be interested.-Michael Adams, CUNY Graduate Ctr. Lib. (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.