About the Book
On a blowtorch-hot night in Cape Town, ex-model Roxy Palmer and her gunrunner husband, Joe, are carjacked, leaving Joe lying in a pool of blood. As the carjackers make their getaway, Roxy makes a choice that changes her life forever.
Disco and Godwynn, the ghetto gangbangers who sped away in Joe's convertible, will stop at nothing to track her down. Billy Afrika, a mixed-race ex-cop turned mercenary, won't let her out of his sight because Joe owed him a chunk of money. And hunting them all is Piper, a love-crazed psychopath determined to renew his vows with his jailhouse "wife," Disco.
As these desperate lives collide and old debts are settled in blood, Roxy is caught in a wave of escalating violence in the beautiful and brutal African seaport.
About the Author :
Roger Smith was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, and now lives in Cape Town. Before turning to a life of crime writing, he was a screenwriter, producer and director.
Review :
[A] stellar thriller... Bad choices, not bad luck, drive human depravity in this brutal fable, where the human ideals of beauty and goodness and truth can't save their possessors and even fatally attract the soulless. One fundamental irony unforgettably lingers: that these characters, trapped in poverty, ignorance, and prejudice, have really had no choice at all. Publishers Weekly (starred review) Wake Up Dead is proof that Noir is alive and flourishing. With his second novel, Roger Smith reaches another level of unrelenting Noir, with all the elements of the genre given homage yet wonderfully mutated. Dark and brutal, the novel has a focused poetic style that stays with you long after you finish reading -- Ken Bruen Violent, uncompromising, unflinching, Wake Up Dead grabs you by the throat and will haunt you long after you've finished its last blood-soaked pages -- Dave Zeltserman From the terrific first sentence, the reader is firmly hooked in this dark South African thriller of murder, drugs, corruption, and revenge... with bizarre characters Elmore Leonard might appreciate and an intricate plot of tangled relation-ships across racial divides. Highly recommended for those wanting their noir as hard-boiled as it gets Library Journal (starred review) An intricate Robert Altman-like narrative that, when the pieces finally connect, forms a terrifying portrait of the Cape Flats. [A] searing vision of characters trapped in a fetid purgatory Kirkus Reviews Racial tension, gang warfare, prison life, and witchcraft - with a nod to cannibalism - will make this thriller a prime destination for readers who like to detour from crime-fiction's beaten path Booklist Horrific to read, impossible to put down NPR Top-notch... exposes the seamy side of Cape Town. Smith presents a flamboyant array of gangsters, conmen and petty criminals, loosely connected by one event... The consequences are violent and funny -- Marcel Berlins The Times Once you start reading Wake Up Dead, there is no putting it down until the last page is consumed The Citizen, South Africa Smith delivers fast-paced, gut-wrenching, page-turning South African crime fiction that appeals to a world audience Classic Feel South Africa A great read with an unexpected climax. Don't miss it Cape Community Newspapers, South Africa thanks to his brilliant pared-down style, stunning ear for dialogue and penchant for pitch-black humour; it's a slick, compulsive page-turner Cape Times, South Africa Smith has been called the Tarantino of South African crime fiction, but this is nonsense. Tarantino is an old maid, a boring gasbag, too wordy by half, when compared to Smith, whose crackerjack narratives (this is his second novel) don't so much drag you through a Cape Town that the tourist brochures don't mention as just kick you from one end of the story to the other. Here's the first line: "The night they were hijacked, Roxy Palmer and her husband, Joe, ate dinner with an African cannibal and his Ukrainian whore." And it takes off from there like a rocket. Very, very noir. The Times, South Africa
