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I am sure that this has happened to everyone at one time or another. You meet somebody that, on paper, should be perfect. And they're not. At least for you. One little gear doesn't click and it throws the whole thing off. You keep checking back with them to see if maybe you, or they, were having a bad day when you met, or you went out, or whatever, to make sure that your judgment is running on all eight cylinders (a rare circumstance, alas, with the males of the species. But don't tell anybody). And it just doesn't happen. It happens in the world of the arts, too. You encounter something you think you should like, but you don't. For me, it's "Seinfeld" on television, and Olu Dura in music. Critically acclaimed, a rabid following, and I don't get it.
So now we come to my apparent conundrum with Robert Ferrigno. He's not my favorite author. He has great plots, interesting characters, and writes well enough. But for some reason we just can't close the deal. Yet...I always read whatever happens to be his new book. And I never, ever feel like I've wasted my time. I'm always just a little disappointed.
FLINCH almost, almost, makes the sale with me. The underlying theme of this bad boy is sibling rivalry. And while Ferrigno doesn't seem to have any qualms about looking at it --- and it's a long, unblinking look --- we never really get a below the roots analysis of it. Sure, their insufferable father had them competing from early childhood in every possible way, but we never seem to get the whole picture of how the two brothers turned out to be so different. And maybe there is no answer, and that's Ferrigno's explanation.
FLINCH opens with Jimmy Gage, a writer-reporter for the hipper-than-you'll-ever-be tabloid Slap, was contacted by someone calling himself The Eggman. The Eggman has claimed responsibility for six apparently unrelated murders in the Los Angeles area. The police ultimately brand the whole matter a hoax --- and Gage as a publicity hound. When he thinks that The Eggman is after him, Gage feels the need to get out of Dodge, and does so quickly. When he returns, his life has changed forever: he finds that his brother has married his girlfriend, that he doesn't have a job, and that he doesn't have a place to live. Some of these things are resolvable. Some of them, like his new sister-in-law, are not. That doesn't prevent Gage from trying, though. Gage also remains obsessed with The Eggman --- an obsession that becomes all the more compelling when he discovers that his brother may be the very man responsible for The Eggman's actions, and Gage's ultimate ruin.
FLINCH includes the introduction of quirky characters, which are the hallmark of every Ferrigno novel, as well as the herky-jerky plot sequences that ultimately and unfortunately make his books all-too-often strain at the boundaries of suspension of disbelief. It is both Ferrigno's blessing and curse, however, that the sum of these parts is so often greater than the whole. And it is the taste of these parts that ultimately makes reading Ferrigno worthwhile. It will also be the reason why I'll happily continue to read Ferrigno's future novels; that and the hope that, eventually, everything will come together one day.
--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
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