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Sinner Man
LAWRENCE BLOCK’S FIRST CRIME NOVEL—
LOST FOR NEARLY 50 YEARS!
To escape punishment for a murder he didn’t mean to commit, insurance man Don Barshter has to take on a new identity: Nathaniel Crowley, ferocious up-and-comer in the New York mob. But can he find safety in the skin of another man...a worse man...a sinner man...?
Long before he became the award-winning creator of Matthew Scudder (A WALK AMONG THE TOMBSTONES) and an MWA Grand Master, Lawrence Block penned this tough, unforgettable crime novel, his very first. But as he describes in a new afterword, the book wound up published only eight years later, under a different title and a fake name—and was then lost for half a century. Now appearing for the first time under Block’s real name, with revisions by the author, SINNER MAN is revealed as a powerful work by a young novelist destined to become one of the giants of the mystery genre.
First publication in almost 50 years—and first ever under author’s real name!
Lawrence Block is one of the most acclaimed living crime writers, having won every major award in the genre (including 5 Edgar Awards) and been named a Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America
Block’s novel A WALK AMONG THE TOMBSTONES became the movie starring Liam Neeson
LOST FOR NEARLY 50 YEARS!
To escape punishment for a murder he didn’t mean to commit, insurance man Don Barshter has to take on a new identity: Nathaniel Crowley, ferocious up-and-comer in the New York mob. But can he find safety in the skin of another man...a worse man...a sinner man...?
Long before he became the award-winning creator of Matthew Scudder (A WALK AMONG THE TOMBSTONES) and an MWA Grand Master, Lawrence Block penned this tough, unforgettable crime novel, his very first. But as he describes in a new afterword, the book wound up published only eight years later, under a different title and a fake name—and was then lost for half a century. Now appearing for the first time under Block’s real name, with revisions by the author, SINNER MAN is revealed as a powerful work by a young novelist destined to become one of the giants of the mystery genre.
First publication in almost 50 years—and first ever under author’s real name!
Lawrence Block is one of the most acclaimed living crime writers, having won every major award in the genre (including 5 Edgar Awards) and been named a Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America
Block’s novel A WALK AMONG THE TOMBSTONES became the movie starring Liam Neeson
240 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1960
79 people are currently reading
929 people want to read
About the author
Lawrence Block
757 books3,006 followersLawrence Block has been writing crime, mystery, and suspense fiction for more than half a century. He has published in excess (oh, wretched excess!) of 100 books, and no end of short stories.
Born in Buffalo, N.Y., LB attended Antioch College, but left before completing his studies; school authorities advised him that they felt he’d be happier elsewhere, and he thought this was remarkably perceptive of them.
His earliest work, published pseudonymously in the late 1950s, was mostly in the field of midcentury erotica, an apprenticeship he shared with Donald E. Westlake and Robert Silverberg. The first time Lawrence Block’s name appeared in print was when his short story “You Can’t Lose” was published in the February 1958 issue of Manhunt. The first book published under his own name was Mona (1961); it was reissued several times over the years, once as Sweet Slow Death. In 2005 it became the first offering from Hard Case Crime, and bore for the first time LB’s original title, Grifter’s Game.
LB is best known for his series characters, including cop-turned-private investigator Matthew Scudder, gentleman burglar Bernie Rhodenbarr, globe-trotting insomniac Evan Tanner, and introspective assassin Keller.
Because one name is never enough, LB has also published under pseudonyms including Jill Emerson, John Warren Wells, Lesley Evans, and Anne Campbell Clarke.
LB’s magazine appearances include American Heritage, Redbook, Playboy, Linn’s Stamp News, Cosmopolitan, GQ, and The New York Times. His monthly instructional column ran in Writer’s Digest for 14 years, and led to a string of books for writers, including the classics Telling Lies for Fun & Profit and The Liar’s Bible. He has also written episodic television (Tilt!) and the Wong Kar-wai film, My Blueberry Nights.
Several of LB’s books have been filmed. The latest, A Walk Among the Tombstones, stars Liam Neeson as Matthew Scudder and is scheduled for release in September, 2014.
LB is a Grand Master of Mystery Writers of America, and a past president of MWA and the Private Eye Writers of America. He has won the Edgar and Shamus awards four times each, and the Japanese Maltese Falcon award twice, as well as the Nero Wolfe and Philip Marlowe awards, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Private Eye Writers of America, and the Diamond Dagger for Life Achievement from the Crime Writers Association (UK). He’s also been honored with the Gumshoe Lifetime Achievement Award from Mystery Ink magazine and the Edward D. Hoch Memorial Golden Derringer for Lifetime Achievement in the short story. In France, he has been proclaimed a Grand Maitre du Roman Noir and has twice been awarded the Societe 813 trophy. He has been a guest of honor at Bouchercon and at book fairs and mystery festivals in France, Germany, Australia, Italy, New Zealand, Spain and Taiwan. As if that were not enough, he was also presented with the key to the city of Muncie, Indiana. (But as soon as he left, they changed the locks.)
LB and his wife Lynne are enthusiastic New Yorkers and relentless world travelers; the two are members of the Travelers Century Club, and have visited around 160 countries.
He is a modest and humble fellow, although you would never guess as much from this biographical note.
Born in Buffalo, N.Y., LB attended Antioch College, but left before completing his studies; school authorities advised him that they felt he’d be happier elsewhere, and he thought this was remarkably perceptive of them.
His earliest work, published pseudonymously in the late 1950s, was mostly in the field of midcentury erotica, an apprenticeship he shared with Donald E. Westlake and Robert Silverberg. The first time Lawrence Block’s name appeared in print was when his short story “You Can’t Lose” was published in the February 1958 issue of Manhunt. The first book published under his own name was Mona (1961); it was reissued several times over the years, once as Sweet Slow Death. In 2005 it became the first offering from Hard Case Crime, and bore for the first time LB’s original title, Grifter’s Game.
LB is best known for his series characters, including cop-turned-private investigator Matthew Scudder, gentleman burglar Bernie Rhodenbarr, globe-trotting insomniac Evan Tanner, and introspective assassin Keller.
Because one name is never enough, LB has also published under pseudonyms including Jill Emerson, John Warren Wells, Lesley Evans, and Anne Campbell Clarke.
LB’s magazine appearances include American Heritage, Redbook, Playboy, Linn’s Stamp News, Cosmopolitan, GQ, and The New York Times. His monthly instructional column ran in Writer’s Digest for 14 years, and led to a string of books for writers, including the classics Telling Lies for Fun & Profit and The Liar’s Bible. He has also written episodic television (Tilt!) and the Wong Kar-wai film, My Blueberry Nights.
Several of LB’s books have been filmed. The latest, A Walk Among the Tombstones, stars Liam Neeson as Matthew Scudder and is scheduled for release in September, 2014.
LB is a Grand Master of Mystery Writers of America, and a past president of MWA and the Private Eye Writers of America. He has won the Edgar and Shamus awards four times each, and the Japanese Maltese Falcon award twice, as well as the Nero Wolfe and Philip Marlowe awards, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Private Eye Writers of America, and the Diamond Dagger for Life Achievement from the Crime Writers Association (UK). He’s also been honored with the Gumshoe Lifetime Achievement Award from Mystery Ink magazine and the Edward D. Hoch Memorial Golden Derringer for Lifetime Achievement in the short story. In France, he has been proclaimed a Grand Maitre du Roman Noir and has twice been awarded the Societe 813 trophy. He has been a guest of honor at Bouchercon and at book fairs and mystery festivals in France, Germany, Australia, Italy, New Zealand, Spain and Taiwan. As if that were not enough, he was also presented with the key to the city of Muncie, Indiana. (But as soon as he left, they changed the locks.)
LB and his wife Lynne are enthusiastic New Yorkers and relentless world travelers; the two are members of the Travelers Century Club, and have visited around 160 countries.
He is a modest and humble fellow, although you would never guess as much from this biographical note.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 181 reviews
December 8, 2016
Between this and Resume Speed I’ve read two Lawrence Block stories in the last week that were about men leaving town and taking on new identities. But even if Mr. Block had a dozen more books coming out soon about guys hopping busses and trains for further misadventures under fake names I’d still cheerfully read them.
Don Barshter is your run-of-the-mill insurance salesman in a small city in Connecticut, but he’s bored with his life and drinking too much. One night he tries to end an argument with his wife with a brisk slap, but the silly woman falls wrong and ends up dead. Don’s first instinct is to call the cops to turn himself in because it’s 1960 and accidently killing your wife during a fight isn’t that big of a deal, but then he decides to seize the chance to reinvent himself instead.
After stashing the body in a closet and emptying his bank accounts Don is off to exotic Buffalo under the name Nat Crowley, but what should a wife murdering insurance agent pick as a new career? Organized crime seems like a lucrative field with growth opportunities that won’t bother with a lot of background checks so he starts hanging out in bars and rubbing elbows with gangsters while beating up the occasional Canadian tourist to establish his credentials as a rough customer. Soon enough Nat is in with the local mob, but can he ever truly escape his past by engaging in even worse acts?
This is billed as Block’s first crime novel, and in an afterword he explains that while it’s actually the first one of the genre he wrote it wasn’t the first one he published. In fact, he tells a fascinating story about how it got lost in the shuffle of the many books he was churning out for the paperback publishers of the day under various pen names, and while he got paid for it he’d never gotten a copy and had only vague memories of the story. It was a chance conversation with some fans on Facebook that led to him finally learning the title and name it was released under.
It’s a testament to how much material Lawrence Block has written in his life that he has entire books that he thought were lost, but this isn’t just a gimmick trading off the idea that it’s a young Block’s first mystery novel. It’s an incredibly solid and fascinating piece of work that starts out as a plot driven story about how a guy could leave one life and start another on the run. Then it turns into a serious noir that has a lot to say about how you may be able to change your name, but you’re still gonna be stuck with what you’ve done and who you are.
Block also drew on his days as a soft core porn writer to incorporate some steamy sex scenes in the best tradition of the pulp paperbacks, but even those turn into something deeper and darker with Nat’s relationship to the gangster savvy Anne Bishop getting increasingly complicated as he works his way up the mob hierarchy.
Overall, it’s just a fantastic piece of pulp fiction that shows that even when he was starting out that Block was already a great writer. This is one of my new favorites from Hard Case Crime.
Don Barshter is your run-of-the-mill insurance salesman in a small city in Connecticut, but he’s bored with his life and drinking too much. One night he tries to end an argument with his wife with a brisk slap, but the silly woman falls wrong and ends up dead. Don’s first instinct is to call the cops to turn himself in because it’s 1960 and accidently killing your wife during a fight isn’t that big of a deal, but then he decides to seize the chance to reinvent himself instead.
After stashing the body in a closet and emptying his bank accounts Don is off to exotic Buffalo under the name Nat Crowley, but what should a wife murdering insurance agent pick as a new career? Organized crime seems like a lucrative field with growth opportunities that won’t bother with a lot of background checks so he starts hanging out in bars and rubbing elbows with gangsters while beating up the occasional Canadian tourist to establish his credentials as a rough customer. Soon enough Nat is in with the local mob, but can he ever truly escape his past by engaging in even worse acts?
This is billed as Block’s first crime novel, and in an afterword he explains that while it’s actually the first one of the genre he wrote it wasn’t the first one he published. In fact, he tells a fascinating story about how it got lost in the shuffle of the many books he was churning out for the paperback publishers of the day under various pen names, and while he got paid for it he’d never gotten a copy and had only vague memories of the story. It was a chance conversation with some fans on Facebook that led to him finally learning the title and name it was released under.
It’s a testament to how much material Lawrence Block has written in his life that he has entire books that he thought were lost, but this isn’t just a gimmick trading off the idea that it’s a young Block’s first mystery novel. It’s an incredibly solid and fascinating piece of work that starts out as a plot driven story about how a guy could leave one life and start another on the run. Then it turns into a serious noir that has a lot to say about how you may be able to change your name, but you’re still gonna be stuck with what you’ve done and who you are.
Block also drew on his days as a soft core porn writer to incorporate some steamy sex scenes in the best tradition of the pulp paperbacks, but even those turn into something deeper and darker with Nat’s relationship to the gangster savvy Anne Bishop getting increasingly complicated as he works his way up the mob hierarchy.
Overall, it’s just a fantastic piece of pulp fiction that shows that even when he was starting out that Block was already a great writer. This is one of my new favorites from Hard Case Crime.
May 6, 2017
This is the first crime novel ever written by Lawrence Block, the creator of Matthew Scudder, Bernie Rhodenbarr, Keller, and others, and one of the most prolific writers of his generation. Block wrote the book sometime around 1960, sold it to a publisher, and then never saw or heard of it again. It was ultimately published years later with a different title and under a different name, and the publisher didn't even send the author a copy. Block only vaguely remembered the book among all the others he was churning out at that point, but fifty years later the book surfaced again and Block recognized it as his long-lost creation. The folks at Hard Case Crime have now published the book with the original title and with Block restored as the real author.
It's a very good example of the sort of pulp novel that was popular back in the 1950s and '60s. A Connecticut executive named Don Barshter accidentally kills his wife in an argument. Rather than turning himself in, he goes on the run to Buffalo, New York, and reinvents himself as a mobster named Nate Crowley.
This sort of thing was much easier to do in 1960 than it would be today, and Nate Crowley is a very different kind of man than Don Barshter. He works his way into the local crime scene and finds himself a woman. Naturally, there will be complications and before long, Nate Crowley could find himself in nearly as much trouble as the late Mr. Barshter.
This book is not the equal of most of Block's later work, but only because much of that later work is so exceptional. When he wrote Sinner Man, Block was a very young author, still honing his chops. Clearly, though, he was already as good as many of his much older contemporaries, and he would only get better as the years wore on. This book will appeal to anyone who enjoys early pulp fiction and is a must read for Mr. Block's legion of fans.
It's a very good example of the sort of pulp novel that was popular back in the 1950s and '60s. A Connecticut executive named Don Barshter accidentally kills his wife in an argument. Rather than turning himself in, he goes on the run to Buffalo, New York, and reinvents himself as a mobster named Nate Crowley.
This sort of thing was much easier to do in 1960 than it would be today, and Nate Crowley is a very different kind of man than Don Barshter. He works his way into the local crime scene and finds himself a woman. Naturally, there will be complications and before long, Nate Crowley could find himself in nearly as much trouble as the late Mr. Barshter.
This book is not the equal of most of Block's later work, but only because much of that later work is so exceptional. When he wrote Sinner Man, Block was a very young author, still honing his chops. Clearly, though, he was already as good as many of his much older contemporaries, and he would only get better as the years wore on. This book will appeal to anyone who enjoys early pulp fiction and is a must read for Mr. Block's legion of fans.
February 6, 2017
If one were wearing a hat, it would defiantly need to be removed for Hard Case Crime, now selling their books through the UK company Titan Publishing Group. The company has made it possible to continue receiving some long lost little mystery gems from some of today's better authors along with new works.
The case in point is the new re-release of Lawrence Block’s novel “Sinner Man”. In a lengthy afterword in the book we learn that the book was originally titled “Savage Lover” as written under the pen name of Sheldon Lord, a pen name that was used by Mr. Block from time to time. Don’t be fooled as not all of those sixties books published under the Sheldon Lord name are not Lawrence Block books. Some unscrupulous will sell an unsuspecting buyer on this being a true fact. Buyer beware. Sheldon Lord was a house name and a number of authors wrote under this name.
“Sinner Man” is a fine example of those sleazy fast moving crime books that populated those drugstore bookracks back in the day. The book concerns a guy who kills his wife and then goes on the run, principally by assuming a new name and identity., something that would be well-nigh impossible today as most folks live on credit cards and dna and finger prints leave an obvious trail.
The book has three distinct sections, the original crime, the relocation and rebuilding of a new personality as a small time mobster and last but not least the need to escape this new identity. Mr. Block does an adequate job of in his early crime novel, though he states in the afterword that parts of the book have been re-written.
“Sinner Man“ is a nice voyage back into that ‘60’s era and the book contains a higher level of sexual situations than your average crime novel from that time period. All in all the book is a pleasant read and recommended to anyone who enjoys Lawrence Block or a backward look into a time now long gone by.
The case in point is the new re-release of Lawrence Block’s novel “Sinner Man”. In a lengthy afterword in the book we learn that the book was originally titled “Savage Lover” as written under the pen name of Sheldon Lord, a pen name that was used by Mr. Block from time to time. Don’t be fooled as not all of those sixties books published under the Sheldon Lord name are not Lawrence Block books. Some unscrupulous will sell an unsuspecting buyer on this being a true fact. Buyer beware. Sheldon Lord was a house name and a number of authors wrote under this name.
“Sinner Man” is a fine example of those sleazy fast moving crime books that populated those drugstore bookracks back in the day. The book concerns a guy who kills his wife and then goes on the run, principally by assuming a new name and identity., something that would be well-nigh impossible today as most folks live on credit cards and dna and finger prints leave an obvious trail.
The book has three distinct sections, the original crime, the relocation and rebuilding of a new personality as a small time mobster and last but not least the need to escape this new identity. Mr. Block does an adequate job of in his early crime novel, though he states in the afterword that parts of the book have been re-written.
“Sinner Man“ is a nice voyage back into that ‘60’s era and the book contains a higher level of sexual situations than your average crime novel from that time period. All in all the book is a pleasant read and recommended to anyone who enjoys Lawrence Block or a backward look into a time now long gone by.
February 2, 2017
Sinner Man starts off with a great hook and finishes with a great, escalating sense of doom and consequences, and since crime fiction is rightfully built on both of those things, that's it for this review: read it, you won't regret it, etc. Everything else here is embroidery.
Our narrator begins the novel as Don Barshter, an insurance man--every noir novel gets one, by fiat--who accidentally kills his wife, which upsets him at the level that, say, losing five dollars would upset most people. He nearly turns himself in, probably correctly concluding that nothing much would happen to him from a legal standpoint, but then he thinks about how he'd be ruined socially and professionally by all the whispers that would come up about it. He decides instead to hide his wife's body in a closet until Monday when the banks are open, take out all his money, change his name, and move to Buffalo, where he will set himself up as a sort of organized crime tough guy for hire, because then he won't need a formal past. He feels like he can pull this off because he is genuinely tough underneath all those polo shirts--he's ex-military--and, more worryingly, because he's watched a lot of gangster movies. Don, buddy. I have some concerns.
At this point, the novel could go in a number of different directions, because it's all implausible and Block is having fun with the mechanics of it all: how to get a fake Social Security card in the sixties (more on this in the afterword), good tips for easy disguises, why Buffalo, etc. The comedic, where Don is hilariously under-qualified for a life of crime, gets ruled out pretty quickly, because Don does prove competent and smooth, but Block teases out possible arcs for a while. Will Don's past get discovered? Will the infighting in gangland Buffalo hurt or help him? Are we talking success or failure here?
Well, it's noir. So there's that.
If the beginning carries you on the "how'd he do dat" of Don's transformation into Nat Crowley, the middle sags just a little as it moves the pieces around to establish Buffalo and the shaky status quo of Nat's life there. This is all sharply-written, but it is, admittedly, a lot of time to spend with Nat without escalating action, and Nat is, well, kind of a dick, the kind of guy who congratulates himself on having finally gained the moxie to offer a hotel housekeeper fifty dollars in exchange for sex:
...I wasn't Don Barshter anymore.
So I said, "You're a real pretty girl, honey. You know that?"
She looked at me. It was a look that would have scared hell out of Barshter but Crowley knew how to handle it.
"There's a fifty-dollar bill in my wallet," I said lazily. "Wouldn't take you more than ten or fifteen minutes to earn it."
All is forgiven in a narrator if he's charming, but Nat isn't, particularly, even if he can turn a phrase, so we're stuck with boorishness, at least for a little bit.
But then the novel hits a crisis point where Nat is forced to confront the disparity between his life and the movies after all, in several dingy incidences of ugly violence, and Block's plot and characterization both kick into a high gear and never let up. Nat ends up weighed down by relics and memories of a past he can't shrug off, and his unrelieved and mostly unacknowledged guilt leads him to do more terrible things, if only to be the kind of person who could do terrible things and not mind them. And suddenly the porn-style casual dickishness of the hotel scene turns tragic. There are scenes here, of Nat's poisoned relationship with a woman on the fringe of Buffalo's underworld, that are as powerful as anything I've read in any "bad marriage" domestic suspense novel. The pressure is on, the nastiness is unflinching, and the empathy is stark. It ends up being a hell of a ride. Highly recommended.
Our narrator begins the novel as Don Barshter, an insurance man--every noir novel gets one, by fiat--who accidentally kills his wife, which upsets him at the level that, say, losing five dollars would upset most people. He nearly turns himself in, probably correctly concluding that nothing much would happen to him from a legal standpoint, but then he thinks about how he'd be ruined socially and professionally by all the whispers that would come up about it. He decides instead to hide his wife's body in a closet until Monday when the banks are open, take out all his money, change his name, and move to Buffalo, where he will set himself up as a sort of organized crime tough guy for hire, because then he won't need a formal past. He feels like he can pull this off because he is genuinely tough underneath all those polo shirts--he's ex-military--and, more worryingly, because he's watched a lot of gangster movies. Don, buddy. I have some concerns.
At this point, the novel could go in a number of different directions, because it's all implausible and Block is having fun with the mechanics of it all: how to get a fake Social Security card in the sixties (more on this in the afterword), good tips for easy disguises, why Buffalo, etc. The comedic, where Don is hilariously under-qualified for a life of crime, gets ruled out pretty quickly, because Don does prove competent and smooth, but Block teases out possible arcs for a while. Will Don's past get discovered? Will the infighting in gangland Buffalo hurt or help him? Are we talking success or failure here?
Well, it's noir. So there's that.
If the beginning carries you on the "how'd he do dat" of Don's transformation into Nat Crowley, the middle sags just a little as it moves the pieces around to establish Buffalo and the shaky status quo of Nat's life there. This is all sharply-written, but it is, admittedly, a lot of time to spend with Nat without escalating action, and Nat is, well, kind of a dick, the kind of guy who congratulates himself on having finally gained the moxie to offer a hotel housekeeper fifty dollars in exchange for sex:
...I wasn't Don Barshter anymore.
So I said, "You're a real pretty girl, honey. You know that?"
She looked at me. It was a look that would have scared hell out of Barshter but Crowley knew how to handle it.
"There's a fifty-dollar bill in my wallet," I said lazily. "Wouldn't take you more than ten or fifteen minutes to earn it."
All is forgiven in a narrator if he's charming, but Nat isn't, particularly, even if he can turn a phrase, so we're stuck with boorishness, at least for a little bit.
But then the novel hits a crisis point where Nat is forced to confront the disparity between his life and the movies after all, in several dingy incidences of ugly violence, and Block's plot and characterization both kick into a high gear and never let up. Nat ends up weighed down by relics and memories of a past he can't shrug off, and his unrelieved and mostly unacknowledged guilt leads him to do more terrible things, if only to be the kind of person who could do terrible things and not mind them. And suddenly the porn-style casual dickishness of the hotel scene turns tragic. There are scenes here, of Nat's poisoned relationship with a woman on the fringe of Buffalo's underworld, that are as powerful as anything I've read in any "bad marriage" domestic suspense novel. The pressure is on, the nastiness is unflinching, and the empathy is stark. It ends up being a hell of a ride. Highly recommended.
November 7, 2025
"I left the top up on my Lincoln Continental convertible. I drove slowly, my hands easy on the wheel, the gun tucked comfortably under the waistband of my trousers. I was the angel of death with chrome wings and no halo. I was hell in a short-brimmed hat." -- the ominous start to chapter 13, on page 125
Now published under the Hard Case Crime imprint - and I can think of no better home for it - veteran crime writer Block's Sinner Man was originally titled Savage Lover (ok, yuck) under his early pseudonym 'Sheldon Lord' during its paperback debut in 1968. However, Block actually wrote this gritty and pulpy little story when he was a twenty-two year-old recent college drop-out in 1960, and the narrative is set during that now long-ago era just before 'the Sixties' truly arrived in the U.S. of A. Everyman-type insurance agent Dan Barshter accidentally kills his harpy of a wife during a domestic disagreement one liquor-fueled night, and he quietly flees their suburban Connecticut home to soon arrive in the small metropolis of Buffalo, New York. Re-christening himself as 'Nat Crowley' - plus almost by accident and without much premeditation - he quickly becomes involved in the organized-crime faction that rules the profits from the local drinking / gambling / prostitution establishments, and discovers that he can now easily summon the necessary violence and/or tenacity required to be a reliable 'soldier' in this perilous underworld. It's not the most pleasant of stories - no surprise, but then why would you be reading a Hard Case Crime novel ? - but it was certainly more involving than Block's other 'HCC' offering The Girl With Deep Blue Eyes (I was much underwhelmed by that one earlier this year), and it was sort of scarily plausible how Barshter / Crowley was able to remain undetected and unapprehended for his initial crime without it severely straining logic or credibility.
Now published under the Hard Case Crime imprint - and I can think of no better home for it - veteran crime writer Block's Sinner Man was originally titled Savage Lover (ok, yuck) under his early pseudonym 'Sheldon Lord' during its paperback debut in 1968. However, Block actually wrote this gritty and pulpy little story when he was a twenty-two year-old recent college drop-out in 1960, and the narrative is set during that now long-ago era just before 'the Sixties' truly arrived in the U.S. of A. Everyman-type insurance agent Dan Barshter accidentally kills his harpy of a wife during a domestic disagreement one liquor-fueled night, and he quietly flees their suburban Connecticut home to soon arrive in the small metropolis of Buffalo, New York. Re-christening himself as 'Nat Crowley' - plus almost by accident and without much premeditation - he quickly becomes involved in the organized-crime faction that rules the profits from the local drinking / gambling / prostitution establishments, and discovers that he can now easily summon the necessary violence and/or tenacity required to be a reliable 'soldier' in this perilous underworld. It's not the most pleasant of stories - no surprise, but then why would you be reading a Hard Case Crime novel ? - but it was certainly more involving than Block's other 'HCC' offering The Girl With Deep Blue Eyes (I was much underwhelmed by that one earlier this year), and it was sort of scarily plausible how Barshter / Crowley was able to remain undetected and unapprehended for his initial crime without it severely straining logic or credibility.
June 17, 2022
From 1960
After accidentally killing his wife, a man moves, changes his identity and joins the criminal class. It is all well thought out. This and the fact that he is/was an insurance man, reminded me of Double Indemnity. I'm sure Block was inspired by James Cain.
After accidentally killing his wife, a man moves, changes his identity and joins the criminal class. It is all well thought out. This and the fact that he is/was an insurance man, reminded me of Double Indemnity. I'm sure Block was inspired by James Cain.
February 6, 2017
Sinner Man tells the story of small town insurance-peddler Don Barshter, and how after a few too many drinks, inadvertently murders his wife following an errant strike. Rather than call the police and turn himself in, Don decides to cram his wife’s body into a closet and flee town. It’s during his aimless travels that Don forms a plan - get to Buffalo and join the mob under a new identity. Now known as Nat Crowley, he quickly begins a career in organized crime and subsequently hooks up with a woman who may be more dangerous than she first lets on.
Nat Crowley, while trying his best to frame himself in a positive light, is a despicable, layered character - as all great noir protagonists are. Barshter suffers from the “smartest man in the room” syndrome where his own arrogance and self-perceived intelligence blinds him. How can you blame him? His ramshackle, cartoonish plan actually unfolds as he envisioned but when ripples begin to show, he ignores them thinking he’s infallible. So while it appears at the beginning he’s done a serviceable job replacing the spineless Don Barshter with the cold, callous Nat Crowley, he realizes too late that like leopards, you can’t change your spots (sorry for the overdone expression) and despite his best efforts, history threatens to repeat itself before all is said and done.
Identified as Block’s first ever crime novel, Sinner Man is ripe with noir excellence. You’ve got all the hallmarks of the genre; tough-talking baddies, femme fatales, a plethora of murders and steamy sex scenes. For fans of Hard Case Crime, this is an easy sell - Sinner Man lives up to their publishing standards revealing itself as a hidden gem from Lawrence Block’s vast catalogue of work.
Nat Crowley, while trying his best to frame himself in a positive light, is a despicable, layered character - as all great noir protagonists are. Barshter suffers from the “smartest man in the room” syndrome where his own arrogance and self-perceived intelligence blinds him. How can you blame him? His ramshackle, cartoonish plan actually unfolds as he envisioned but when ripples begin to show, he ignores them thinking he’s infallible. So while it appears at the beginning he’s done a serviceable job replacing the spineless Don Barshter with the cold, callous Nat Crowley, he realizes too late that like leopards, you can’t change your spots (sorry for the overdone expression) and despite his best efforts, history threatens to repeat itself before all is said and done.
Identified as Block’s first ever crime novel, Sinner Man is ripe with noir excellence. You’ve got all the hallmarks of the genre; tough-talking baddies, femme fatales, a plethora of murders and steamy sex scenes. For fans of Hard Case Crime, this is an easy sell - Sinner Man lives up to their publishing standards revealing itself as a hidden gem from Lawrence Block’s vast catalogue of work.
May 20, 2021
Mid 20th Century North American Crime
COUNTDOWN: BOOK 14 (of 250) - Favorite Opener
HOOK - 5 stars: "Oh, for Christ's sake," I said. "You can get up now. No matter how long you lie there, nobody's gonna give you a fucking Academy Award for it." No response. I noted the trickle of blood from her temple..."
Just bloody fucking brilliant, I say.
PACE - 5 stars: A battering ram to the brain.
PLOT - 4: A man on the run must change his identity. Not really that original, but Block does a great job getting Sinner Man into all kinds of trouble and ensuring the character lives up to that titular name.
CAST - 4: Sinner Man goes from a 'Donald Barshter' to a 'Nat Crowley'. He thinks to himself, "It occurred to me that Barshter couldn't have been much of a guy. Too thin, too empty. In four short days he was all gray, all fuzzy at the edges. He must have been pretty useless to begin with." We never meet Mrs. Barshter, but I got the feeling she was just fine without the husband around. Anne Bishop is a sly one: undercover cop or mob moll? Johnnie Walker makes an appearance, as does Legs Diamond and others.
ATMOSPHERE - 5: Block takes us to graveyards often. To horrific places full of the worst of humanity. And while we're there, Block hits all the right notes one expects from this genre but doesn't get too style-heavy. Like, "I found a Texaco station and pulled in for a transfusion." Or Anne saying, "I'm a good listener. I learn things. So I learned a sub-culture. I learned things...that didn't happen in split-level [track houses]. I learned that some people get along without a pension plan." And this steamy beauty: "...two cheap punks and their girl, spending every night finding new ways for three people to turn each other on. The room was filled with the overpowering odor of stale sex and pot. Pigs, Angie said, a bunch of pigs that stunk." On top of all this, Block still has time for references to Shakespeare and Arthur Miller, for example. And it all works.
SUMMARY - 4.6: It's hard to believe this one was ever really lost. No matter: it's here and it's big. It's mean. It's from the days when manly men beat each other to pulp, all the while calling each other 'baby'. It's from the time when manly-man pulp writers refer to beat poets as those "bitter clowns on the West coast." Gotta love when steamy noir brings in the clowns.
COUNTDOWN: BOOK 14 (of 250) - Favorite Opener
HOOK - 5 stars: "Oh, for Christ's sake," I said. "You can get up now. No matter how long you lie there, nobody's gonna give you a fucking Academy Award for it." No response. I noted the trickle of blood from her temple..."
Just bloody fucking brilliant, I say.
PACE - 5 stars: A battering ram to the brain.
PLOT - 4: A man on the run must change his identity. Not really that original, but Block does a great job getting Sinner Man into all kinds of trouble and ensuring the character lives up to that titular name.
CAST - 4: Sinner Man goes from a 'Donald Barshter' to a 'Nat Crowley'. He thinks to himself, "It occurred to me that Barshter couldn't have been much of a guy. Too thin, too empty. In four short days he was all gray, all fuzzy at the edges. He must have been pretty useless to begin with." We never meet Mrs. Barshter, but I got the feeling she was just fine without the husband around. Anne Bishop is a sly one: undercover cop or mob moll? Johnnie Walker makes an appearance, as does Legs Diamond and others.
ATMOSPHERE - 5: Block takes us to graveyards often. To horrific places full of the worst of humanity. And while we're there, Block hits all the right notes one expects from this genre but doesn't get too style-heavy. Like, "I found a Texaco station and pulled in for a transfusion." Or Anne saying, "I'm a good listener. I learn things. So I learned a sub-culture. I learned things...that didn't happen in split-level [track houses]. I learned that some people get along without a pension plan." And this steamy beauty: "...two cheap punks and their girl, spending every night finding new ways for three people to turn each other on. The room was filled with the overpowering odor of stale sex and pot. Pigs, Angie said, a bunch of pigs that stunk." On top of all this, Block still has time for references to Shakespeare and Arthur Miller, for example. And it all works.
SUMMARY - 4.6: It's hard to believe this one was ever really lost. No matter: it's here and it's big. It's mean. It's from the days when manly men beat each other to pulp, all the while calling each other 'baby'. It's from the time when manly-man pulp writers refer to beat poets as those "bitter clowns on the West coast." Gotta love when steamy noir brings in the clowns.
October 20, 2017
Second Lawrence Block I've read, and second one I've enjoyed immensely. I just love Block's way of writing, his style, his moody characters. They aren't quite film noir gangster types, they have if at all possible a certain edge to them which I can't explain. They remind me more of the 'Sin City' ideals of a wise guy with all the ugly, bitter and twisted characteristics but also something intrinsically likeable about them. In 'Sinner Man' Don Barshter is on the run after murdering his wife, he winds up involved in a crime syndicate in New York with a brand new personality, and the pick of any woman he wants, but sooner or later however far you run, the past will always catch up with you.
May 19, 2017
Noir erotica written by one of the best in the business. The lost first crime novel by Lawrence Block is centered around a violent man with violent ambitions; Don Brasher, after accidentally murdering his wife makes a run for it to Buffalo where he dons a new personality and becomes a gangster and hired gun for the local mob outfit. However, his escape from murder leads him down a bloody path full of bodies and bullet holes - it's one hell of a ride that's everything a noir enthusiast could hope for; violence, exploitation, dames and dues. I ate up every bite with relish. 5 / 5 stars.
February 12, 2025
Almost 4 stars, but I’m not sure about that ending…
November 23, 2016
Had this on pre-order for about six months and it showed up in the mail today so had to immediately start reading and read it from start to finish in about three hours. Not all that action-packed but the character progression has a strong pull-through, and Block makes you keep waiting for the "shoe to drop." The story is the "growth" of the protagonist into the sinner man role he has adopted. If you are willing to bend the classical definition of tragedy, this plot kind of fits.
So, everyman insurance guy accidentally kills his wife and decides to run and adopt a new identity. How to hide out? He decides to become a gangster in the Buffalo mob. We follow him as he creates and develops the new identity and succeeds in becoming accepted into the mob. Once in, his role accelerates as he takes part in the intra-family war. His true evolution of character, though, is best revealed through how his relationship with his girlfriend changes. Great writing by Block to show these character changes.
The writing is smooth. Scudder smooth, not at all like the rest of Block's earlier books. Puts me most in mind of Westlake's early Stark books. I really want to find a copy of the original publication of the the book (Savage Lover by Sheldon Lord) and compare it with this version. Block mentions that he revised the beginning and that Charles Ardai did a line-edit. Nice improvements, I'm sure, as this reads as smooth as a new Block book would.
Has a great afterward by Block that describes the history of this "lost" and then found again book of his that was actually the first crime novel that he wrote, though not the first that he had published.
The page count is further padded at the end by including the first five chapters of The Girl with the Deep Blue Eyes.
So, everyman insurance guy accidentally kills his wife and decides to run and adopt a new identity. How to hide out? He decides to become a gangster in the Buffalo mob. We follow him as he creates and develops the new identity and succeeds in becoming accepted into the mob. Once in, his role accelerates as he takes part in the intra-family war. His true evolution of character, though, is best revealed through how his relationship with his girlfriend changes. Great writing by Block to show these character changes.
The writing is smooth. Scudder smooth, not at all like the rest of Block's earlier books. Puts me most in mind of Westlake's early Stark books. I really want to find a copy of the original publication of the the book (Savage Lover by Sheldon Lord) and compare it with this version. Block mentions that he revised the beginning and that Charles Ardai did a line-edit. Nice improvements, I'm sure, as this reads as smooth as a new Block book would.
Has a great afterward by Block that describes the history of this "lost" and then found again book of his that was actually the first crime novel that he wrote, though not the first that he had published.
The page count is further padded at the end by including the first five chapters of The Girl with the Deep Blue Eyes.
February 11, 2017
This is the one of the better early LB Hard Case reprints that I've read, as good as "Lucky at Cards", which I really liked. Nicely paced with a high body count, sex, and sardonic observations. The main character "broke bad" with an ease and a lack of regret that I found a bit unbelievable, or maybe just disturbing. Definitely glad that this long lost gem found a home in my Hard Case Crime collection.
May 29, 2022
This is another Lawrence Block crime novel that he wrote early in his career. In fact, this is considered his first crime novel but not his first published novel. In the afterword to this edition, Block tells how this novel was written in about 1960. Then he was paid and it was sent to a publisher. However, Block never received a printed copy of the book and he wasn't sure if it had actually been published. At that time he was using various publishing houses and his books were published with different titles and by using various pen-names. He remembered the basic plot of the story and used a blog to try to find the book. Then a Facebook friend tagged him with a photo of several books by Sheldon Lord, one of Block's pseudonyms. And finally the book was identified as SAVAGE LOVER published in 1968 by Softcover Library. Block made some edits to the book and it was republished by Hard Case Crime under its original title, SINNER MAN.
The novel is about an insurance salesman named Don Barshter who accidentally kills his wife who falls and hits her head after a slap from Don. Don decides he doesn't want to do time for manslaughter so decides to run and take on a new identity. He travels to Buffalo, New York and changes his name to Nat Crowley. He decides he can't get a job without references so he seeks out the criminal element in the city. He is soon in with the mob there and to move up, he agrees to kill several others in the opposing faction. So will he avoid prosecution for killing his wife? And will he stay away from the police in Buffalo after gaining access to the underworld there?
This was another very compelling crime novel from Block. Some of the sex and violence in the book was quite shocking although Block wrote a lot of erotic fiction before he made it big with his novels in the 1990s. This was written in the late 50s and things have really changed since then. Crowley was able to get a new Social Security card without providing any other form of ID like a birth certificate. He was also able to carry a loaded gun onto an airline in his pocket! I think that Block is one of the best crime writers out there and even his early work is worth reading. Several of his early novels have been republished and I know I'll be reading more of them.
The novel is about an insurance salesman named Don Barshter who accidentally kills his wife who falls and hits her head after a slap from Don. Don decides he doesn't want to do time for manslaughter so decides to run and take on a new identity. He travels to Buffalo, New York and changes his name to Nat Crowley. He decides he can't get a job without references so he seeks out the criminal element in the city. He is soon in with the mob there and to move up, he agrees to kill several others in the opposing faction. So will he avoid prosecution for killing his wife? And will he stay away from the police in Buffalo after gaining access to the underworld there?
This was another very compelling crime novel from Block. Some of the sex and violence in the book was quite shocking although Block wrote a lot of erotic fiction before he made it big with his novels in the 1990s. This was written in the late 50s and things have really changed since then. Crowley was able to get a new Social Security card without providing any other form of ID like a birth certificate. He was also able to carry a loaded gun onto an airline in his pocket! I think that Block is one of the best crime writers out there and even his early work is worth reading. Several of his early novels have been republished and I know I'll be reading more of them.
July 11, 2018
This book is one of the reasons I love Hard Case Crime. This was a "lost" book. Well...it was kind of lost. This was the first crime novel written by Lawrence Block. It wasn't his first novel...he'd been writing erotica. And it wasn't his first crime writing...he'd been putting short stories into magazines like Manhunt. But it was the first crime novel he wrote. He placed it with his agent and...that was kind of it. He was never quite sure if it was published and if so by whom, under what title or under what name (he used a number of pseudonyms). Over the years he vaguely remembered part of the plot and attempted to track it down. He finally did and found it had been published as Savage Lover under the name of Sheldon Lord. The book was re-edited by Charles Ardai and published by Hardcase. It's all set out in a fun afterward written by Block.
And the thing is...for a first crime novel it's not too shabby. Our protagonist accidentally kills his wife in an argument. Rather than face a manslaughter charge he runs, changes his name and gets in with the Buffalo mob. And he does well for himself. Unfortunately there's a femme fatale who he might want to treat a bit better than he does.
The book shows some problems that are probably to be expected from a young crime writer. There are some issues with how the mob works that Block almost certainly wouldn't make today. But overall it's a very solid literary noir. For the time it was written (mid 60s) it was probably a tad lurid. Today, not so much. And while it's definitely not a classic of the genre it far surpasses the novelty aspect of being the first crime novel written by a master of the genre. It definitely didn't deserve to be lost and forgotten. And a huge thanks to everyone for bringing it into the light.
And the thing is...for a first crime novel it's not too shabby. Our protagonist accidentally kills his wife in an argument. Rather than face a manslaughter charge he runs, changes his name and gets in with the Buffalo mob. And he does well for himself. Unfortunately there's a femme fatale who he might want to treat a bit better than he does.
The book shows some problems that are probably to be expected from a young crime writer. There are some issues with how the mob works that Block almost certainly wouldn't make today. But overall it's a very solid literary noir. For the time it was written (mid 60s) it was probably a tad lurid. Today, not so much. And while it's definitely not a classic of the genre it far surpasses the novelty aspect of being the first crime novel written by a master of the genre. It definitely didn't deserve to be lost and forgotten. And a huge thanks to everyone for bringing it into the light.
January 25, 2020
Sinner Man is yet another in a line of lost pulp novels now published by Hard Case Crime. Sinner Man was a full novel that Block submitted for publication during his Midwood erotica period, but somehow never made it to the printing presses. When you pick up a now-famous writer's lost first novel, you either find a juvenile early work good only to complete your collection or sonething special. I really enjoyed this novel and think it's worth a read.
Block does a few clever things with this novel and he definitely has the man on the run theme going here, but the man on the run this time is not some innocent guy being framed. Don Barshter did the crime, but he ain't doing the time. The other clever thing is that the lead character is a chameleon who slips into a new role quickly shedding his old identity. The twist being that his new identity is that of a hardcore mafia hood: Nathaniel Crowley. Part of the fun here is wondering why he slips so easily from being Mr Insurance salesman to being a hard case. Was it such a change for him or is that who he always was underneath it all.
There are also other prominent themes here, including the comparison of square life in a nine to five job and the house in suburbia with the Life of someone on the edge of the law.
If you've read a bit of Block, you definitely hear his narrative voice here and the subtle irony in that voice. There's plenty of action here as the main character Nat Crowley climbs the ranks of mafiadom. It's also filled with some sexy, passionate scenes. In the end, what you have here is a pulpy, sexy, fine story that evokes another era. You wonder if this might be movie material as well.
Block does a few clever things with this novel and he definitely has the man on the run theme going here, but the man on the run this time is not some innocent guy being framed. Don Barshter did the crime, but he ain't doing the time. The other clever thing is that the lead character is a chameleon who slips into a new role quickly shedding his old identity. The twist being that his new identity is that of a hardcore mafia hood: Nathaniel Crowley. Part of the fun here is wondering why he slips so easily from being Mr Insurance salesman to being a hard case. Was it such a change for him or is that who he always was underneath it all.
There are also other prominent themes here, including the comparison of square life in a nine to five job and the house in suburbia with the Life of someone on the edge of the law.
If you've read a bit of Block, you definitely hear his narrative voice here and the subtle irony in that voice. There's plenty of action here as the main character Nat Crowley climbs the ranks of mafiadom. It's also filled with some sexy, passionate scenes. In the end, what you have here is a pulpy, sexy, fine story that evokes another era. You wonder if this might be movie material as well.
February 7, 2017
Do NOT let your husband read this book. It makes killing your wife and assuming a new life seem much too easy. After all, the world is only pretty dames and mob types.... and we've all seen enough gangster movies... Don't judge someone for sinning differently than you.
December 14, 2019
A man accidentally kills his wife and takes up a new identity. Evidently Block’s first published crime novel. It’s an enjoyably straightforward mix of what you would expect from Block – full of witty hardboiled dialogue and description, with lots of violence and rough sex!
[Henry Knight, a priggish character from my previous book - Thomas Hardy’s A Pair Of Blue Eyes – certainly wouldn’t approve!]
[Henry Knight, a priggish character from my previous book - Thomas Hardy’s A Pair Of Blue Eyes – certainly wouldn’t approve!]
March 9, 2017
This author is new to me. As a possible sign of dementia, I will admit that I have allowed the net I cast to find new books perhaps a bit too much freedom. I am too old to feel ashamed of reading a book that includes rather a bit of "rough" sex, particularly since it seemed to me a natural part of the story being told. I do feel I must note it for those who wish to avoid athletic bedroom shenanigans. For all I don't know, this could be a common theme in either this author's works or his genre. The author's story of his attempts to find a copy of this early book of his (published under a different name back in the early 1960's) is almost as entertaining as this short crime novel.
What a prologue to my review! Apparently I am embarrassed.
The plot is simple, clever and somewhat amusing. Opening scene finds our hero very drunk, very late for dinner, very ready to argue with his wife and slap her face. This results in her fall to the slate floor in front of the fireplace - end of argument. "My wife was dead. And while I might try to blame her--for provoking the blow, for falling clumsily, for landing wrong--it was clearly my fault and not hers." That was the last truthful thing he thought as he quickly put together a plan of escape. He does come up with a rather odd plan, considering he had lived his life in Connecticut as faithful husband, working as a successful insurance salesman. He is soon in Buffalo looking to join the mob.
What a prologue to my review! Apparently I am embarrassed.
The plot is simple, clever and somewhat amusing. Opening scene finds our hero very drunk, very late for dinner, very ready to argue with his wife and slap her face. This results in her fall to the slate floor in front of the fireplace - end of argument. "My wife was dead. And while I might try to blame her--for provoking the blow, for falling clumsily, for landing wrong--it was clearly my fault and not hers." That was the last truthful thing he thought as he quickly put together a plan of escape. He does come up with a rather odd plan, considering he had lived his life in Connecticut as faithful husband, working as a successful insurance salesman. He is soon in Buffalo looking to join the mob.
December 16, 2016
This one has been on my to-read list and I found a copy at the library. It is a republished copy of Lawrence Block's 1960 hardboiled crime novel, advertised as the author's "long-lost first crime novel."
* * * * *
Five stars for crime fiction noir! Lawrence Block certainly was a master of the genre. This was a short and thoroughly entertaining read, makes me want to read everything Block wrote.
* * * * *
Five stars for crime fiction noir! Lawrence Block certainly was a master of the genre. This was a short and thoroughly entertaining read, makes me want to read everything Block wrote.
February 25, 2017
When I first saw this title, I thought it was going to be another Elmer Gantry. Well, it isn't a muckraking novel about corrupt fundamental evangelists (No! That doesn't mean ALL evangelists, just SOME!). It is something wonderful--a triumph over rejection and a fascinating idea.
F. Scott Fitzgerald is reputed to have papered his wall with rejection slips. Most writers have had to rework and recycle a rejected manuscript in order to finally get it before the right editor. Even the great Lawrence Block had to do some of that. I was shocked to read in the afterward of Sinner Man that he had not only lost track of the company to whom this novel was originally sold, but that he never received an author’s copy (which he said was common when he started out). He didn’t know that it had been published under the name Savage Love. But, after he described the novel in a chapter of a book on writing (Write for Your Life), an alert reader found it for him and an alert publisher bought it again from him. Savage Love was written under the pseudonym, Sheldon Lord. The alert publisher was Charles Ardai, founder and brains behind Hard Case Crime (also one of their writers under his own nom de plume).
Block informs readers in the afterward that he had been forced to “sex up” the book to sell it as Savage Love and took the opportunity to clean it up for its appearance as Sinner Man. Sinner Man follows the idea of an ordinary middle class insurance salesman whose life has become so boring that drinking heavily and arguing with his wife seems preferable to selling policies and making a living. So, the reader discovers right away that the guy has killed his wife. It’s clearly manslaughter, but he decides he can’t even live with that. So, he disappears and methodically becomes another man, another man who could be recruited for a job where they didn’t check resumes.
Of course, when we see television shows, movies, or read books and short stories where a “killer” tries to do this, we can usually track where he is going to go wrong. This time, the killer really has it figured out. He accomplishes what he sets out to do and, at the top of his power, his hubris gets the best of him. With poetic justice, his tragic flaw comes as a result of being too successful at becoming the person he set out to be. Appropriately enough, he loses what he values most at the same time. It really does have something of the tenor of a Greek tragedy toward the end.
But this protagonist has remade himself before. Can he do it again? Or is it a matter of diminishing returns? Is his final plan the beginning of a cycle of entropic decay? Does it echo in a more realistic way the false bargains of Mr. Dark in Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes or Leland Gaunt in King’s Needful Things?
And, in case you read Sinner Man in order to determine just what kind of a survivor this protagonist who rises from multiple disasters may be, you will also get an excellent view of train travel in the early days of aviation and the night life where jazz truly sparkled in the squalor of poverty and the shadows of prejudice. Block (much like Michael Connelly in the Bosch novels) practically annotates a soundtrack for our reading pleasure. Sinner Man was so well-done and so much more than I expected that I am as thrilled with this discovery as I would be if restorable celluloid of a classic film like Theda Bara’s Cleopatra (1917) or, even better, Lon Chaney’s London at Midnight (1927) was to turn up. Want to see a beautifully restored early novel from a master? Sinner Man is for you.
F. Scott Fitzgerald is reputed to have papered his wall with rejection slips. Most writers have had to rework and recycle a rejected manuscript in order to finally get it before the right editor. Even the great Lawrence Block had to do some of that. I was shocked to read in the afterward of Sinner Man that he had not only lost track of the company to whom this novel was originally sold, but that he never received an author’s copy (which he said was common when he started out). He didn’t know that it had been published under the name Savage Love. But, after he described the novel in a chapter of a book on writing (Write for Your Life), an alert reader found it for him and an alert publisher bought it again from him. Savage Love was written under the pseudonym, Sheldon Lord. The alert publisher was Charles Ardai, founder and brains behind Hard Case Crime (also one of their writers under his own nom de plume).
Block informs readers in the afterward that he had been forced to “sex up” the book to sell it as Savage Love and took the opportunity to clean it up for its appearance as Sinner Man. Sinner Man follows the idea of an ordinary middle class insurance salesman whose life has become so boring that drinking heavily and arguing with his wife seems preferable to selling policies and making a living. So, the reader discovers right away that the guy has killed his wife. It’s clearly manslaughter, but he decides he can’t even live with that. So, he disappears and methodically becomes another man, another man who could be recruited for a job where they didn’t check resumes.
Of course, when we see television shows, movies, or read books and short stories where a “killer” tries to do this, we can usually track where he is going to go wrong. This time, the killer really has it figured out. He accomplishes what he sets out to do and, at the top of his power, his hubris gets the best of him. With poetic justice, his tragic flaw comes as a result of being too successful at becoming the person he set out to be. Appropriately enough, he loses what he values most at the same time. It really does have something of the tenor of a Greek tragedy toward the end.
But this protagonist has remade himself before. Can he do it again? Or is it a matter of diminishing returns? Is his final plan the beginning of a cycle of entropic decay? Does it echo in a more realistic way the false bargains of Mr. Dark in Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes or Leland Gaunt in King’s Needful Things?
And, in case you read Sinner Man in order to determine just what kind of a survivor this protagonist who rises from multiple disasters may be, you will also get an excellent view of train travel in the early days of aviation and the night life where jazz truly sparkled in the squalor of poverty and the shadows of prejudice. Block (much like Michael Connelly in the Bosch novels) practically annotates a soundtrack for our reading pleasure. Sinner Man was so well-done and so much more than I expected that I am as thrilled with this discovery as I would be if restorable celluloid of a classic film like Theda Bara’s Cleopatra (1917) or, even better, Lon Chaney’s London at Midnight (1927) was to turn up. Want to see a beautifully restored early novel from a master? Sinner Man is for you.
March 2, 2020
Don Barshter has a fight with his wife and slaps her a little too hard. She hits her head and dies. This will seriously impact Don's standing in the community with him being an insurance salesman. So he hides her body and leaves town and moves to Buffalo. He changes his name to Nathaniel Crowley and becomes a mobster. But sooner or later his past will catch up with him. It always does.
November 22, 2016
Sinner Man was written in the 60's and the author lost track of the book over the years and it was only recently that the book actually resurfaced and he was able to re-release it. I am so glad that it did come back as I had such a great experience reading Sinner Man. As I said before, I wasn't planning to read this yet but I read the first and second page and I was immediately hooked. I enjoyed the writing style, the language, the swift and potent plot development and especially the main character.
Don Barshter kills his wife by accident, he knocks her down and she falls dead. Instead of panicking, calling the police and facing the consequences of his actions, he decides to go on-the-run and re-invent himself in Buffalo, New York. Don has to shed all of his previous personality including his appearance, speech, body language, behaviour and lifestyle, and in doing so become Nathaniel Crowley. Nat isn't a square like Don was, he likes to live large, spending money, getting involved with the mob and having sex with whom ever he wants. The evolution of Don is fast paced but meticulous, he wants to live his life but the only way he can see himself surviving is by becoming Nat.
I don't read enough Noir and this book told me that over and over. I had not heard of Lawrence Block before I read this but now I am a huge fan! Now I do not agree with what Don did to his wife and his choice not to face up to the music, but it is fascinating to observe this transformation and witness Nat's journey into the mob scene. The writing style was rapid, concise and brimming with character. In the back of my mind, I was trying to work out how a man could pull of this sort of stunt, but Block has an answer for everything and is so convincing in his writing that I ended up just enjoying the ride.
I don't really have anything negative to say about Sinner Man. It is definitely not for everyone, there are mature themes like violence, murder and abuse, but it caters to readers of crime/noir and being nearly 60 years old means it most definitely helped define the noir we read today. Nathaniel Crowley is the heart and soul of this book and Block got his development spot on. I was amazed and bewildered by his choice just to drop who he was and become someone new and I was also mesmerised by his unwavering commitment to this completely new person occupying the same body as Don.
I have given this book 4.5 stars because I had such a great reading experience with this book, I sat and read it in one go and I was left wanting more. I took a 0.5 off as Sinner Man is not for everyone due to the harsher tones, but I do believe the people who seek out this genre of book will have a great time with it. If you have read the book or are going to then please let me know what you thought in the comments.
Don Barshter kills his wife by accident, he knocks her down and she falls dead. Instead of panicking, calling the police and facing the consequences of his actions, he decides to go on-the-run and re-invent himself in Buffalo, New York. Don has to shed all of his previous personality including his appearance, speech, body language, behaviour and lifestyle, and in doing so become Nathaniel Crowley. Nat isn't a square like Don was, he likes to live large, spending money, getting involved with the mob and having sex with whom ever he wants. The evolution of Don is fast paced but meticulous, he wants to live his life but the only way he can see himself surviving is by becoming Nat.
I don't read enough Noir and this book told me that over and over. I had not heard of Lawrence Block before I read this but now I am a huge fan! Now I do not agree with what Don did to his wife and his choice not to face up to the music, but it is fascinating to observe this transformation and witness Nat's journey into the mob scene. The writing style was rapid, concise and brimming with character. In the back of my mind, I was trying to work out how a man could pull of this sort of stunt, but Block has an answer for everything and is so convincing in his writing that I ended up just enjoying the ride.
I don't really have anything negative to say about Sinner Man. It is definitely not for everyone, there are mature themes like violence, murder and abuse, but it caters to readers of crime/noir and being nearly 60 years old means it most definitely helped define the noir we read today. Nathaniel Crowley is the heart and soul of this book and Block got his development spot on. I was amazed and bewildered by his choice just to drop who he was and become someone new and I was also mesmerised by his unwavering commitment to this completely new person occupying the same body as Don.
I have given this book 4.5 stars because I had such a great reading experience with this book, I sat and read it in one go and I was left wanting more. I took a 0.5 off as Sinner Man is not for everyone due to the harsher tones, but I do believe the people who seek out this genre of book will have a great time with it. If you have read the book or are going to then please let me know what you thought in the comments.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 17, 2016
Hard Case Crime has once again unearthed an entertaining early novel by Lawrence Block with an interesting backstory. Written in the winter of 1959-1960, this is the tale of Donald Barshter who accidentally kills his wife in a fit of rage. He flees his home in New York City, assumes a new identity as a low-level criminal, and then quickly rises the ranks within organized crime. It is an engrossing if improbable story from beginning to end. While Don is a bit of a stereotype, the character of Anne Bishop is intriguing. Her story arc provides a haunting final scene that is a perfect echo to the opening scenes of the book.
The author provides an afterward explaining how this book came to be written, published, and then lost for more than 50 years.
Calling this Lawrence Block’s first crime novel is a bit of marketing puffery. It seems to have been written after Candy and Cinderella Sims, which I would argue are as much crime novels as this one. Plus, this novel as presented has been revised, perhaps significantly, for republication. Still, in this form it is certainly one of Block’s stronger early efforts from that time period.
One aspect that struck me is that this novel has many similarities to Block’s two most recent novels, Resume Speed and The Girl with the Deep Blue Eyes. It is a sign that Block’s style and themes are coming full circle. None of these pulp-inspired novels bear much resemblance to his famous Matt Scudder and Bernie Rhodenbarr novels. They are throwbacks to the simpler, grittier golden age of pulp crime.
The author provides an afterward explaining how this book came to be written, published, and then lost for more than 50 years.
Calling this Lawrence Block’s first crime novel is a bit of marketing puffery. It seems to have been written after Candy and Cinderella Sims, which I would argue are as much crime novels as this one. Plus, this novel as presented has been revised, perhaps significantly, for republication. Still, in this form it is certainly one of Block’s stronger early efforts from that time period.
One aspect that struck me is that this novel has many similarities to Block’s two most recent novels, Resume Speed and The Girl with the Deep Blue Eyes. It is a sign that Block’s style and themes are coming full circle. None of these pulp-inspired novels bear much resemblance to his famous Matt Scudder and Bernie Rhodenbarr novels. They are throwbacks to the simpler, grittier golden age of pulp crime.
February 6, 2017
A long lost early Lawrence Block novel back in print thanks to the folks at Hard Case Crime publishing. 1950's insurance agent Don Barshter comes home to meet his wife in their Connecticut home after a hard day of drinking. Harsh words are exchanged leading to a little slap to the wife. Wife falls, bumps her head awkwardly and is dead. Does Connecticut have the electric chair or the death penalty? Don should really call his attorney before he calls the police, he would be looking at manslaughter charges right, not murder? The phone is picked up but then it's put back in the cradle as Don needs to think. Don thinks long and hard, literally the rest of the weekend while his wife lies dead in the closet where he had placed her out of sight so he could think more clearly. After making a stop at his bank on Monday morning Don is aboard a train headed to Buffalo New York well on his way on becoming Nathaniel "Nat" Crowley. Can Nathaniel become a new and different person as an up and comer with the mob or will his past catch up with him before he can even attempt to become a new man? I enjoy this early work from Block. Those readers that enjoy hard-boiled early crime will surely enjoy this one.
November 18, 2017
That was...unexpected? And refreshing?
I didn't think a novel close 50 years old would be that thought-provoking. The protagonist murders his wife right off the bat. Very little context is given about it and SINNER MAN is him trying to become someone else to get away with it... and being really good at it. There are subtle religious undertones to it, echoes of being cast out of heaven and into the world of the damned, so that was cool. But it's mostly a novel about the permeable nature of identity. That you can make it up as you go and that nothing's sacred in the land of the damned.
Another hit by the old master.
I didn't think a novel close 50 years old would be that thought-provoking. The protagonist murders his wife right off the bat. Very little context is given about it and SINNER MAN is him trying to become someone else to get away with it... and being really good at it. There are subtle religious undertones to it, echoes of being cast out of heaven and into the world of the damned, so that was cool. But it's mostly a novel about the permeable nature of identity. That you can make it up as you go and that nothing's sacred in the land of the damned.
Another hit by the old master.
February 11, 2017
Great characters all the way through and excellent pace.
December 26, 2018
Written in 1959, first published in 1968 under a different title and lost until 2010, this was Block's first crime novel and is pretty good.
February 17, 2020
great pulpy noir, like reading source of a rather cheesy but compulsive netflix series ...but great to have on the nightstand not the screen
September 12, 2019
Good story. The plot didn't slow down. Likeable characters. It came full circle, sort of. I enjoy these books. They may be dated b/c of when they were originally published, but they keep me entertained.
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