WICKED CITY
Ace Atkins
Putnam Adult
Thriller
ISBN: 9780399154577

WICKED CITY continues Ace Atkins’s practice --- inaugurated in his last book, WHITE SHADOW --- of crafting a novel by basing it upon real world events visualized through a fictional prism. It concerns Phenix City, Alabama, in the early 1950s, a small town where corruption, graft and vice had taken root to the degree that, like the kudzu native to the region, it appeared to be impossible to uproot.

The relative complacency of the townspeople to the extent and degree of the wickedness --- there is no other word for it --- is shattered by the cold-blooded murder of Albert Patterson, a crime-fighting attorney who had campaigned on a promise to clean up Phenix City. Fresh off a primary victory that all but assures him of being elected the Attorney General of Alabama, Patterson is gunned down in a downtown alley. His son, John, vows to take his place, and not only to see that the killers are brought to justice but also to fulfill his campaign promise. Among John’s early recruits is Lamar Murphy, a quietly upright and decent soul whose former career as a boxer has given way to a quiet married life that involves nothing more complicated than operating a service station by day and spending time with family in the evening.

At first, Murphy is underestimated by the entrenched vice lords of the city, referred to derisively as a “palooka” and a “grease monkey.” When they realize, however, that he is a serious opponent to be reckoned with, Murphy soon has a price on his head, one that will not be easy to escape. But as time passes, Murphy’s example leads others to stand up as well, including witnesses to Patterson’s murder who previously had been reticent to speak up. Armed with truth, a righteous indignation and firepower, Murphy and John take what is sure to be their one and only shot at cleaning up Phenix City and avenging the murder of Albert Patterson.

Atkins has done yeoman’s work researching Phenix City, and the results show that. It turns out that the author had relatives who were intimately familiar --- and involved --- with the goings-on in Phenix City; indeed, one of the characters here is based on a composite of Atkins’s grandfathers. Atkins met and interviewed Murphy’s direct descendents as well, so that, combined with other extensive research, one feels at times while reading the book that one is in the process of actually witnessing the events. One example of many: Murphy, at one point, leads a raid on what is referred to as the “Rabbit Farm.” Atkins’s description of what follows, and of the premises itself, does not border on genius; it stakes the term out and marks it as posted.  

So how good is WICKED CITY? As I was reading, I experienced the high that readers seek, that of total immersion, where your immediate reality is limited to what is between the covers of the book at any given moment. There were also times when I thought I was going to jump out of my skin. And right to the end, Atkins lobs subtle surprises at the reader, never letting up for a moment. You will read and re-read it, copy passages from it, jealously guard it, and run back into a burning building just to rescue your copy.

    --- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub

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