Swag

By: Elmore Leonard

Narrated by: Frank Muller

The smallest of small-time criminals, Ernest Stickley Jr. figures his luck's about to change when Detroit used-car salesman Frank Ryan catches him trying to boost a ride from Ryan's lot. Frank's got some surefire schemes for getting rich quick - all of them involving guns - and all Stickley has to do is follow "Ryan's Rules" to share the wealth. But sometimes rules need to be bent, maybe even broken, if one is to succeed in the world of crime, especially if the "brains" of the operation knows less than nothing.

©2009 Elmore Leonard (P)2010 HarperCollins Publishers

Hang in there

I almost bailed after a few chapters, the beginning third or so is over-long, not edited to contemporary standards, but it’s in keeping with the decade it was written in, which sort of contributes something to the charm. It does gain momentum and get more interesting later on. Character development is great and the narrator does a great job in my opinion. Recommended, especially if you’ve ever harbored fantasies of quoting your day job and becoming a career criminal. Enjoy!

This story was really good!

Simple story, colorfully told about characters you don't necessarily love or hate, but you like them all enough that you want to know where to send their Birthday Cards, whether it's prison or some remote town in Mexico.

Frank Muller is fantastic.

Enjoy a different lifestyle

If you want to live the life of a small time criminal, read Swag. The ending was slightly disappointing but all the preceding story and dialogue seemed believable. Worth a read.

Not the top Leonard, but Muller still rocks.

Swag is the story of Ernest Stickley, Stick, and Frank Ryan. Yes, that's right, Frank and Ernest. These two guys rob 32 stores in three months, and think it's easy. Then they get together with a hustler named Sportree and his sidekick Leon Woody, and the four of them plus a guy named Bobby Ruiz, and they plan a robbery of J.L. Hudson, one of the largest department stores in Detroit. The robbery goes badly wrong, with a witness and Bobby Ruiz dying. The noose begins to tighten on Frank and Ernest. Both of them have been romancing several "career girls" in the apartment complex they live in. They party hearty. Stolen money and booze fuels a lifestyle which they love, but Stick wants out, knowing that the ride has to stop sometime. Leonard is not at his absolute best here, but, again, the combination of the two of these guys, Leonard and Muller, is just plain fun. Along the way Stick has to kill four guys, which is clearly not what he has intended at all. Stick is a recurring character, with a book named after him, and we know that he is not a killer, actually just a lost man who gets pulled in very easily. Once again the pace quickens as only Leonard and Muller can rev it up. I won't spoil the end. If you listen to the book, you'll love it. Leonard always leaves you wanting more.

Riveting: Quinten Tarantino before there was Quentin Tarantino

This is an excellent novel that builds a lot of tension, character plot, dialogue and has a great use of social realism.

Elmore Leonard has ver multi layered characters and he knows how to create stories with really good endings that doesn’t seem very cliché and predictable.

The story never feels like it drags, sometimes I have to read sections over and over to make sure I understand it and I was happy that I was able to make time to finish this great novel. I do think for people who want to study dialogue, pacing and how to write characters that are very deep with very minimal description, this is a great book to study.

This is a great novel about morality, friendship, living life on the edge, human desire of wanting to trust people and live and break your own rules. It very well captures adult relationships and betrayals very well while its subject matter is more of a body and a heist story, it still has very emotional impact.

Frank Mueller is extremely excellent in his narration and he does it in a way that is very realistic, he does not put in his own creative touch to a point where it’s obnoxious like when I read the narration for the invisible man by a different reader. I do think that he knows how to read very well and match the pacing of the story and match the actions in the book, an excellent articulator of the Elmore Leonard stories. A buying point for any Audible Elmore Leonard book is Frank Mueller’s reading of it.

Second rate crooks are not Elmore's best

The two primary characters are small time robbers (grocery stores, liquor stores, bars) who ride out their luck until they fall in with some serious guys. They were not particularly appealing personalities to me. I appreciate that they did not intend to hurt anyone, but they are so careless and thoughtless that the inevitable happens.

The women are not as one-dimensional as some reviewers believe - there are a few women who really move the story forward. The "career girls" by the pool were a 1970s reality - looking for a bit of fun until they had to settle down. Teachers, clerks, models and other career girls were the ones who could afford to live independently in a singles apartment complex. They were as superficial in their relationships as the guy next door, even if that guy was a petty criminal.

These two guys, however, are not suave and slickly charming; they are insecure, whiny and weak. No one in the book was interesting enough for me to care what happened to them. Many much better Elmore Leonard novels out there (Get Shorty and Pronto come to mind)

Great Read

What made the experience of listening to Swag the most enjoyable?

Dialogue. Leonard's characters sound about as real as it gets.

Who was your favorite character and why?

The primary protagonist.

What about Frank Muller’s performance did you like?

Muller's laid-back suspicious tone is a perfect marriage to Leonard's crime characters.

Any additional comments?

Muller and Leonard are such a good combination, that I started looking at other titles they have together.

I couldn’t finish it

With an hour left I just stopped listening. I’m not a prude or averse to reading about a life of crime but there’s no reason to care about either of the main characters. Two fictional people could not be less worthy of being dreamed up and put to the page.

Dated attitudes, good plot

Any additional comments?

Two lowlifes realize they can make a comfortable living doing low-level armed robberies of grocery and liquor stores. They get an apartment in a swingers apartment complex and throw parties with lots of booze, sex and Mantovani records. Then they get bored and try for one big score that will set them for a year. The book was written in 1976, and the white male main characters are products of their time: sexist and racist. Leonard himself seems respectful of the black characters, even if the white characters have to remind themselves not to use the N-word in their company. But he treats the female characters as less significant in every way. That said, the plot is good and dialogue excellent. Bechdel test: fail.

excellent

my first audio book by Leonard and absolutely loved it! cant wait to listen to more.