I came to this book somewhat familiar with Laird Barron's otherwordly horror work, having read the Imago Sequence and some other short stories several years back... and I don't know what I was expecting, to be completely honest. But Barron is surprisingly strong in this milieu, easily settling into character-driven crime fiction without diminishing his capacity to render dreamlike scenes or poetic descriptions of the wilderness, which is quite the trick to behold. While there isn't any real "horror" or fantasy per se, this is in many ways a crime novel for fans of fabulous, formless darkness (in the David Hartwell sense): his characters show both an interest in and reasonably deep knowledge of obscure nerdstuffs like Michael Shea's Polyphemus (Barron does that thing crime writers often do, like George Pelecanos, where the characters sit around and name drop shit the author thinks is cool; here it comes off charming); there are frequent references to mythology, both in the character names and in the trials and tribulations they're subjected to; and when the book decides to go dark, it doesn't fuck around. Violence hits like a short sharp shock of red, and then it's done, and the pace slows back to a charmingly measured trudge. The central mystery feels slightly shoehorned to fit the backdrop of this particular character relegated to this particular place, but once it gets going, it all comes together rather well. The twist is reasonably and realistically calibrated, and fortunately it's not really a HUGE PLOT TWIST kind of book at all, but more of a character study with a narrative device to push things along. All in all, I'm glad to see Barron branching out--from what I've seen, he might be even better at hardboiled crime than horror (no small feat!).

Published by G.P. Putnam's Sons on May 29, 2018

Some of my favorite crime novels focus on criminals, who tend to be more interesting and less self-righteous than cops or private detectives or lawyers. Isaiah Coleridge, a big guy of Maori descent, falls into the category of interesting criminal. He fancies himself as the broad shouldered bad guy in a Bond film who kills people on behalf of the archvillain (presumably he has Oddjob in mind). He’s been dispatched to Alaska, an outpost of the Chicago mob, to help Vitale Night intimidate some underperforming subordinates.

Coleridge makes trouble for himself by punching Night in the throat when Night’s crew begins to slaughter walruses for their ivory. Only his father’s intercession keeps Coleridge alive after the incident with Night. Coleridge has an iffy relationship with his father, who was involved in the death of Coleridge’s mother. That’s one of many features of Coleridge’s past that add complexity to his character.

No longer welcome in Alaska, Coleridge is exiled to New York because the New York mob, unlike the Chicago mob, doesn’t want to kill him. He ends up on a farm in the Hudson Valley owned by Virgil and Jade Walker, two scholars who lecture about the classics when they aren’t bailing hay. The other hired hand is an ex-soldier named Lionel Robard. The Walkers’ granddaughter, Reba, spends weekends on the farm while she “gets over some troubles” from the city. Most of the plot is driven by Coleridge’s attempt (sometimes assisted by Robard) to get to the bottom of Reba’s disappearance while looking over his shoulder to see if Night has landed in New York.

The meandering plot in Blood Standard might inspire a reader to create a flowchart to sort out the relationships between the characters. It draws on a lesson moviegoers learned from The Godfather: just when Coleridge thinks he’s out, the mob pulls him back in. Or at least it tries. But so do other criminal gangs, because criminals with Coleridge’s skills and size aren’t easy to find. Coleridge’s problems with the mob are compounded by problems with the local cops and the FBI and a group of mercenaries and some wealthy New York socialites, not to mention getting himself into the middle of an ethnic gang war. It’s hard to say which adversary is a greater menace. Fortunately, Coleridge has tough skin, a hard head, and a whole lot of fat protecting his vital organs.

Blood Standard mixes dark humor with crime drama. Coleridge is a fun character, if you think a man who is “the essence of violence” can be fun. As criminals go, Coleridge at least has the virtue of being incorruptible, which can’t be said of most of the novel’s law enforcement characters. He’s fond of quoting the classics, perhaps because epic heroes tend to be very violent dudes. He loves and protects dogs (and walruses), a virtue that (to my way of thinking) offsets a good bit of the harm he does to humans, most of whom deserve it. He stands up for his friends even if he knows he’ll pay a price. It’s hard not to like the guy.

The story has moments of action — violent action, to establish Coleridge’s credentials — but the story doesn’t depend on gratuitous violence for its pace. The violence comes at the right moments, punctuating a story that is more about the anticipation of violence than violence itself. The resolution of Reba’s disappearance is almost beside the point, but the plotline does get resolved. The resolution of Coleridge’s problem with Night is tense, surprising, and satisfying. If you enjoy rooting for the criminal in a crime novel, Blood Standard is a good choice.

RECOMMENDED

This is the first book in a new hard boiled detective series featuring Isaiah Coleridge, a mob enforcer who was working in Alaska until being exiled to upstate New York (near the home of his estranged father) after a problem involving walruses pissed off the wrong man. Isaiah is half Maori, has a fondness for classic literature and can't stand seeing animals abused.

Isaiah has been given a cover story to explain his arrival at Hawk Mountain Farm and Center for Symbolic Studies, run by the elderly African American couple Virgil and Jade Walker, both of whom have doctorates in literature and sociology. Their 18 year old granddaughter Reba has a history of getting into trouble and hanging with iffy friends, so she has been sent to live with them for a while. When Reba goes missing, Isaiah agrees to try to find her. However, the search for the girl gets lost in this book, in which there is a little too much going on. Isaiah is not really a detective, he's muscle, and his investigation provides lots of opportunities for the violence at which he excels.

This book has the New York and Alaska branches of the mob, a Native American gang, internal gang rivalries, neo Nazis, the FBI, cops in league with the mob, drug dealing, freelance thugs and strained families. That was a lot to keep track of. There is the customary tough guy talk common to the genre, but there is humor too, like in the dialogue between Isaiah and Lionel, ex-marine and former mercenary who is now a worker at the Center. The author sometimes tends to wordiness and excessive description. "[New York State] reveals her length and breadth, her mercurial character, by slow degrees. Reveals herself via the shift of sunbeams through the canopies forests still wild at the margins, through the soft sweep of the Appalachians and the Catskills, the Hudson and the Rondout curving gently as a mama's arm around her child." Nevertheless, I liked Isaiah, the plot and action kept me interested and I will probably read the next book in the series.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.

The essence of a good crime novel always comes down to a little bit of levity. Despite dark textures, it can take on a type of social commentary or sarcasm if correctly done. This is what made “Goodfellas” so palpable. “Blood Standard” [Laird Barron/G.P. Putnam’s Sons/336pgs] takes the essence of a pulp novel and integrates it with the aspect of a revenge thriller/fish-out-of-water story. Here is the focus is on Isaiah Coleridge, a hitter in the mob but seemingly with a small soft streak. He begins in Alaska but is seemingly exiled to upstate New York, a completely different but slightly similar den. The texture of the characters is relatively small time but fairly lurid in its details. The internal structures of the characters move but also because there is a method to his madness. Isaiah sees the good in others when they don’t, at times, see it in themselves. Most of all the characters are broken but not in ways they can’t be fixed. There is a dexterity of nihilism within the story but also sarcasm. Isaiah’s penchant as a bruiser is undeniable and he doesn’t push it down but details like his love of mythology to his approach of bringing a date to a made place to the aspect of taking down part of a gang because of their abuse of an animal shows a dynamic missing from some stories that take themselves too seriously. The only soft approach to this aspect is the motivation initially to dip his toe back into the life: the missing niece of his upstate NY hosts and benefactors. It seems like a wanton means for penance though he doesn’t seem like the type to adhere to such sentimentality. However the essence of loyalty does permeate both in his would-be girlfriend but definitely to his brother-in-arms Lionel who seems a lost case at times but inherently dependable in a jam. Their quips back and forth before attacking, on a stake out or even hanging out with their photographer friend Calvin in a strip club has the feelings of old school movies or “Oceans 11”…guys in heightened situations who would like to relax but have other scores that need to be settled. “Blood Standard” knows its world but peppers it with textures that are both humorous, brutal and inventive making for an efficient and bombastic read.

B+

By Tim Wassberg

Apparently the American mob is just like Starbucks in that they’ve got franchises everywhere, including Alaska.

Isaiah Coleridge is an enforcer who has been working this frozen turf for a while, but he gets in big trouble after crossing a deadly local boss. That earns him a vicious beating as well as a dangerous enemy. He’s also exiled from Alaska and sent to live on a farm in upstate New York as part of his punishment. Isaiah is content to follow orders about staying away from family business, and he spends his days shoveling shit for the couple who run the place, and he makes several new friends while living a quiet life. However, when the couple’s wild young granddaughter disappears after hanging around several lowlifes Isaiah can’t help but to reenter the murky underworld of mobsters, dangerous gangs, murderous hillbillies, crooked cops, and Feds to try and find her.

Bottom line here is that this a really solid and entertaining piece of crime fiction. I was a shade disappointed that we didn’t get more in Alaska because I thought the entire novel was set there and was looking forward to an offbeat locale, but the rural New York area also makes for an interesting place to have a mob enforcer doing his thing.

The most interesting aspect is Isaiah himself. He’s the son of a Maori woman and a former American military officer so he had an army brat upbringing. As a mob enforcer he’s an expert at both dishing out and being on the receiving end of extreme violence. He’s also a smart guy with a taste for the old school epics like The Odyssey as well as the occasional sip of whiskey. Throw in a soft spot for animals which can bring on John Wick levels of violence when triggered, and you’ve got a complex character who smoothly narrates the twists and turns of the story.

My main complaint is that it’s all just a bit much. The personal story of Isaiah being in the mob’s doghouse and dealing with own issues is deep enough, but when you add in the hunt for the missing woman which entails layers of navigating mob protocol and then add mercenaries to the mix, that’s maybe one or two scoops of stories too much. Plus, it mainly all is to give plot reasons for Isaiah to go to more locations and meet more colorful characters. That’s the classic detective template, but I could have done with slightly less of all of it. Still, I’d be happy to read more of Isaiah’s adventures.

Whatever else I think about this book - the first in the crime-thriller category by this author - I cannot deny his way with words. Even when the going takes gruesome turns, the main character, Isaiah Coleridge, has the chutzpah of a Raymond Chandler private eye combined with the philosophical musings of the late Robert B. Parker's "Spenser."

And that's a good thing; otherwise, Coleridge - once a mob enforcer - wouldn't be a particularly appealing guy. Big, brawny and half Maori, he manages to get on the wrong side of his father and his Chicago mob bosses, who send him north to Alaska. There, his cantankerous genes kick in once again, and he is "retired" to remote Hawk Mountain Farm in upstate New York, where he performs mundane tasks like mucking horse stalls.

Needless to say, the work isn't very challenging, and he misses the hard action of his former life (even he isn't sure whether he prefers getting punched or punching someone else's lights out). Still, he vows not to return to his old ways; but then the Michael Corleone effect kicks in: "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in."

In truth, "they" really aren't the problem; Isaiah simply doesn't have it in him to stay on the right side of trouble. He runs amok of some nasty characters - basically turning their body parts to mincemeat - and saves a wayward young girl from the clutches of some particularly dastardly dudes. Then, in the midst of his having to deal with enemies old and new, the girl he saved goes missing. That hits Isaiah right in the heart (it's stashed right behind his shoulder holster), and nothing - not broken bones, not bloody knife slashes and certainly not threats of a slow and painful death - will stop him from saving her once again.

This is, I believe, the first of a new series - and yes, it's enjoyable enough that I look forward to the next. Thanks to the publisher, via NetGalley, for allowing me to read and review an advance copy. Well done!

Blood Standard is a beautifully written slow-moving hardboiled noir.

Isaiah Coleridge is an enforcer with the Chicago mob. Since he is Maori, he can never be truly part of the Family. When he falls out of favor, he is sent to Nome Alaska, the “Mafia penal colony”. After letting his feelings toward animal cruelty get the best of him, he is abruptly tossed out of the Life. On his own and hiding in a small upstate New York commune, he looks into the disappearance of the granddaughter of the owners.

Definitely a “down these mean streets a man must go” noir. Blood Standard has many great quotes. My favorite is “whenever you think of gangs, think Romance of the Three Kingdoms. In the gangster universe, it’s all ancient Chinese court drama. Face, protocol, plausible deniability. This is what motivates wise guys and bangers. Pussy and money too.” Realistically, that thought could have been expressed in substantially fewer words—but it wouldn’t have been half as memorable. The book reads as if each sentence was edited and re-edited until it was the perfect example of the author’s thoughts. Laird Barron has won the Bram Stoker award for horror and was nominated for a World Fantasy award. This is his first mystery/thriller. Thrillers are by their nature propulsive reads. Speed accelerates the feeling of danger. Blood Standard flows along more slowly, savoring its words and thoughts, and so losing the thriller pacing. This may be okay for readers used to reading horror, fantasy, or even literary fiction. It just felt off to me. I kept putting off reading it but finally finished a couple weeks after I started it.

While I can’t recommend it, I don’t want to say it’s bad—it’s just different and is sure to appeal to some readers. 3 stars.

Thanks to the publisher, Dutton, and NetGalley for an advance copy.

I've never read Laird Barron before and I know that he usually writes horror fiction. This book started off well but just didn't capture my interest. I didn't think there was enough character development of the secondary figures. I also thought the premise for the mystery was week. This book just wasn't for me.

An interesting start to a mystery noir series from an author I admire. Horror writer Laird Barron's protagonist Isiah Coleridge might just rank up there with some of my favorite characters like Lee Child's Jack Reacher and Steve Hamilton's Nick Mason. Give this series a try if you are looking for something new. Will definitely try to steer my customers his way.

BLOOD STANDARD by Laird Barron is about Isaiah Coleridge, who’s father is a descendant from coal miners down south, and mother is a Maori from New Zealand, and is an enforcer for the Chicago division of the Outfit, who’s been assigned to Alaska for some time and finds himself in trouble when he interferes with an illegal hunt for walrus ivory by a made man he’s assigned to.

Vitale Night, the man Isaiah assaults, is a feared hit man for the mob, as is his family members, which places Isaiah in great danger, and puts him in Vitale’s sights after the altercation that almost ends Isaiah’s life following torture until a last minute reprieve by his boss “Uncle”Lucius, who’s also a longtime friend of Isaiah’s father.

Isaiah is reassigned to a farm in upstate New York to keep him out of harm’s way temporarily, as he’s been that warned sooner or later the Chicago mob will be allowed to seek him out for retribution.

Life on the farm and the hard work required helps Isaiah strengthen and recover somewhat from his injuries in Alaska at the hands of Night and his men, but several situations present themselves causing further physical damage, and his life is in even more danger when he tries to prevent a young woman named Reba from the farm who’s been hanging out with local gang bangers and is suspected to have been abducted by them after Isaiah attempts to stop the punks responsible before he blacks out in his weakened state.

Will Isaiah be able to locate and save Reba, and in doing so will he put his own life in further danger?

I really liked this book, and Isaiah as a person due to his heritage and unusual background which makes him a different leading character that works well in the story written by the author.

BLOOD STANDARD is the first book in the Isaiah Coleridge series according to the cover, and I will be looking forward to the next book in this series.

Highly recommended.

5 stars.

Blood Standard might be one of the best crime thrillers I've read in recent years, and while I'd put Isaiah Coleridge in the vein of a Jack Reacher-like protagonist, Laird Barron produces a work of violent noir that wins on its own merits and kept me hooked the whole way through.

Isaiah Coleridge is a Maori/Caucasian-mixed hitter for The Outfit, a mafioso crime syndicate that has assigned him to Alaska to keep the men there from getting into too much trouble. In the book's opening moments, Coleridge ends up making trouble of his own when he's brought into the fold for a sadistic seal hunt that ends with him attacking a made man. After one of The Outfit's higher-ups cashes in a favor, Coleridge finds himself exiled to the Adirondacks in upper New York. Needless to say, trouble once again finds Coleridge when a local girl goes missing, and Isaiah quickly finds himself caught in the crosshairs of the law, mobsters, and warring street gangs. Given the amount of scarring that covers Coleridge's body like a roadmap, this is just another day in the life of Isaiah.

Coleridge is a great big mountain of a man, and violence runs in his blood. Lee Child fans will feel right at home here, although Coleridge is more introspective and philosophical than Child's wandering former MP. College educated, Coleridge is as book smart as he is street wise, fascinated by ancient Greek myth, and the histories of Odysseus and Hercules lend plenty of thematic weight to Blood Standard. Barron's protagonist is one clearly cut from classical cloth, but his wiseguy mouth keeps him firmly rooted in the modern day. Isaiah is an incredibly well-drawn tragic hero, and one with plenty of tough guy wit, as well as a few moments of self-depreciation.

Barron weaves in moments of introspection between a good number of brief action scenes and plenty of tension, surrounding Coleridge with a number of clearly untrustworthy figures with questionable reputations. Coleridge is also given a few well-rounded foils in the love-interest, Meg, and partner-in-crime-cum-heroics, Lionel, a hard-drinking ex-military sort. Isaiah's scenes with these characters help to inform his growth as a man seeking to turn over a new leaf and set his life right. His history, his brushes with death, his exile from The Outfit, and his own firmly established moral code have left Coleridge grasping for a new life, and we get plenty of glimpses of what that life could be, the promises it could hold for him if he does right, how quickly it could fall apart if he steps wrong, and how badly anybody who crosses him will get hurt.

Laird Barron has crafted a terrific new character here, and half-way through Blood Standard I found myself already jonesing for the next book. I'm excited by the prospect of Coleridge's new life and focus, and I'm dying to see what future odysseys ensnare and disrupt him. This is a character that has plenty of legs for a series, and lots of layers left to mine in subsequent entries. And since I've gone and compared Coleridge to Reacher already, let me just say here for the record that I like Reacher a lot. But I like Coleridge a whole lot more.

[Note: I received an advanced copy of this title from the publisher via NetGalley.]