Chicago, Mamet - B+

                                               This novel is the author's homage to his hometown. Set in the late 1920's, it features Mike and Parlow, two beat writers for the Chicago Tribune whose lives and work are very different from that of their legendary editor and owner, Robert McCormick. McCormick may have dealt with the great economic and political issues of the day, but Mike and Parlow hang out with crooked cops, mobsters, prostitutes and con men as they cover street life in the city. Their focus is the murder of Jackie Weiss, a tavern owner; the role played by his moll, Lita Grey; and why the mob went after him. The lead of Mike's article is "Jackie Weiss had died of a broken heart, it being broken by several slugs from a .45." As for Jackie's establishment, the Chez Montmartre, "it purveyed edible food, and liquor which, while not imported as advertised, was sufficiently cleansed of poisons as to not induce either dementia or blindness." There was a lot going on in Chicago, and Jackie could have gotten on the wrong side of the Irish on the north side, the Italians on the south or the IRA, which was in town running guns. Mamet's way with words is extraordinary; life in the Roaring 20's was quotable and enjoyable. A great book.