When a photo taken at the 1964 Clay-Liston championship
fight held in Miami Beach is displayed as part of an art
exhibit, several powerful people attending the exhibit's
opening are shocked and upset by what they see in the
background of the photo. Upset enough to have the entire
exhibit torched and the photographer killed to obtain all
copies of the photo. However, there is one remaining copy
still out there, and it happens to end up in the hands of
free-spirited Key Largo loner Thorn, who is visiting Miami
to baby-sit his lover Alexandra's Alzheimer's-afflicted
father while she's out of town.
For Alex and her father's sake, Thorn is really trying to
adjust to Miami life, but the noisy rat-race is hard for
him to endure. Thorn thinks that two-weeks with Alex's
father, a retire Miami cop who's also an old friend of his,
will be a good test. It becomes much more than that as he's
sucked into the crime spree involving the search for the
final photo, which his old friend possesses.
The same night the photo was shot of the fight, the family
of a militant anti-Castro Cuban exile was executed. The two
surviving sons of that family know the infamous photo can
give them clues to who murdered their family, so they are
in hot pursuit to acquire it from Thorn. Things get even
messier when a CIA operative and an old assassin join the
search. How many will end up dead before the puzzle
involving the photo is finally solved? And will Thorn be
one of the survivors or not?
Not having read any of Hall's previous Thorn thrillers, I
didn't quite understand all the dynamics of his
relationship with Alex and her father. This left me a bit
out of sync at the start of the book, but I soon had enough
of it figured out that I became totally immersed in the
plot's progression and the characters involved. Based on
real events in the past and newly declassified documents,
this is an interesting crime thriller and an exciting
depiction of life in South Florida.
Based on real events, and newly declassified documents,
MAGIC CITY, like the films L.A. Confidential and
Chinatown, evokes a time in our nations history when
powerful men were willing to do whatever they thought
necessary to achieve their goals. A simple black and white
photograph taken during the 1964 Clay-Liston fight on Miami
Beach sets off a modern-day murder spree that reaches from
the quiet neighborhoods of Miami to the back corridors of
the White House. When the last remaining copy falls into
Thorn's hands, he and everyone he loves become the target
of madmen and trained killers, each of whom has his own
powerful motive to see the photograph destroyed forever and
its secrets kept hidden.
© 2003-2024 off-the-edge.net
all rights reserved Privacy Policy