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Total Chaos.
Izzo, Jean-Claude (author).
Nov. 2005. 256p. Europa, paperback, $14.95 (1-933372-04-4).
REVIEW.
First published October 15, 2005 (Booklist).
Add another European city, torn between old and new worlds, to the hard-boiled map. Izzo’s Marseilles Trilogy, of which this uncompromising mix of noir thriller and unconventional procedural is the first volume, was a smash in France and, with enough buzz, may be here, too. The story concerns three friends--Ugo, Manu, and Fabio--who grew up in Marseilles’ roughest neighborhood, dabbling in street crime and vying for the same girls. But Fabio opted out, alienating his friends by becoming a cop. Now, 20 years later, Manu and Ugo are dead, and it is left to Fabio to avenge them. Mood is all here, and Izzo nails it, exploiting Marseilles’ port-city seediness and the racial tensions that have transformed what was once a haven for immigrants into a powder keg ready to explode. No aging, world-weary cop in the manner of Henning Mankell’s Kurt Wallander, Fabio is a microcosm of the new Europe: young, angry, and unpredictable, an updated Jean-Paul Belmondo working both sides of the law. Watch this series closely. — Bill Ott
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