Pain Management: A Burke Novel - Softcover

Andrew Vachss

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0375726470 ISBN 13: 9780375726477

Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2002

Synopsis

Burke is back, but still lurking in the shadows, unable to return home. He is prowling the unfamiliar streets of Portland, Oregon, in search of a runaway teen. By all accounts, Rosebud Carlin is a happy, well-adjusted girl. She doesn’t fit the profile of the runaway kids Burke knows so wellÉand once was. But there’s something about her fatherÉ

Burke knows the street script, but the actors are all strangers. Cut off from his family and his network of criminal contacts, Burke is forced into a dangerous alliance with a renegade group dedicated to providing relief to those in intractable pain by any means necessary. A bargain is struck, and the fuse is lit. Heart-stopping and hard-hitting, Pain Management is the latest bout in Andrew Vachss's thrilling reign as undisputed champ of brass knuckles noir.

About this title

Review

When last encountered (2000's Dead and Gone), career criminal Burke was on the rebound from a nearly successful assassination attempt, lying low and licking his wounds in Portland, Oregon. Severed from his connections in NYC, Burke survives on jobs--"violence for money" mostly--brokered by his live-in lover, Gem, an Asian beauty with a painful, larcenous past and a present to match.

At hand is a task Burke has done before: the recovery of a runaway, a 16-year-old girl named Rosebud. But Burke, an assassin with scruples, knows when things aren't right. Rosebud's father, Kevin, has a '60s-era contempt of "The Man" that doesn't jibe with his obvious wealth. Mother Maureen limps through life on pharmaceutical crutches. Younger sister Daisy and best friend Jennifer know things but won't share. As his search spirals out from Portland's mean streets, Burke encounters a mysterious young woman, Ann O. Dyne, who offers to help for a price. Her raison d'être is pain management--securing and dispensing medications vital to the terminally ill but held beyond their reach by a largely uncaring cadre of doctors, lawyers, and politicians. Eventually, of course, this plot line connects with Rose's whereabouts.

Andrew Vachss's MO here, as usual, is a mystery (Rosebud's disappearance) plus an actual cause célèbre (humane pain management). It's a risky formula that aims both to entertain and to enlighten. With its believably unbelievable characters, Vachss's spare noir, and steely pacing that counterpoints a bolt-upright climax, Burke's 13th outing is every bit as satisfying as the dozen that came before. --Michael Hudson

From the Back Cover

“Some of the cleanest, meanest, stripped-down-and-sparkling prose ever penned.” –Austin Chronicle

“A beautifully brutal combination of pulpy noir and social commentary. . . . Vachss’s writing remains raw and hungry, with an epidermis of rage barely containing an infinite core of sadness.” –The Miami Herald

“Andrew Vachss could send his hero Burke to Mayberry, and he’d still
manage to uncover a dark underbelly of sin and corruption.” –Capital Times

“Gritty, fast-paced . . . One of the most hard-boiled and important crime series ever published.” –Huntsville Times

About this edition

• Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0375726470
• ISBN 13: 9780375726477
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 307